Hey everyone is Leslie Ludi host of the set-a-part girl podcast biblical encouragement for women of all ages.

Today we're going to talk about how to have joy in the midst of trials.

And this is something that God has really been pressing deeper in my life over the past year as Eric and I have walked through some challenging situations, challenging financial struggles in our ministry and just different things that have been hard to walk through.

My default reaction is to say, hey, I just can't handle this.

It's too much for me. I have an excuse or a reason to be

down and sorrowful and depressed and I begin to really lay this area of my life

before God afresh this This is something God's

worked in my heart in different seasons of my life and I've done other podcasts

about finding true happiness and what God has done in my life, but this past year it was just a fresh reminder. And so I want to

share some of those things that I've been recently meditating on with you. One of the most

powerful things that has helped me during times when I'm struggling to have a joyful perspective

is to read or listen on audio book to stories of Christians throughout history who triumphed

through extreme trials and difficulties and I read about women who were in concentration camps for their faith in Christ.

And it's amazing to me that they suffered as much as they did and remained as joyful as they did.

Some of my favorites are Darlene Dipler.

She was a young married missionary in World War II

and she and her husband were overseas and they were captured by the Japanese

during the war and they were both put in individual work camps and she went through incredible suffering as I hear her story I'm just

amazed that a young 20-something-year-old girl who grew up in America with a

comfortable lifestyle just fresh out of Bible school, newly married, could walk

through what she did and remain as triumphant and joyful. She was an example to everyone in that

camp.

...