A few years ago, my husband and I received a calendar with inspirational sayings. I saved this one: “Endurance is not just the ability to bear a hard thing, but to turn it into glory.”

I thought of that saying when I received resilience as my blogging topic for Asian American Women on Leadership. For although the quote doesn’t use the word resilience, that’s really what it’s all about. The quote starts with the ability to bear the hard thing—which lines up with dictionary definitions of endurance as “the ability to withstand hardship.” But the quote also goes beyond endurance to resilience—not only bearing the hard thing. but recovering from it and transforming it into something more, turning it “into glory.”

In the calendar, the author of this quote was not identified, but in a quick online search, I found the quote attributed to William Barclay. “Of course,” I thought. William Barclay was a pastor and author, well-known for his popular commentaries and other books. I had used several of his commentaries in preparing for sermons, and had always appreciated his creative and careful use of language. But what many people might not know is that he and his wife had a daughter who died when she was just twenty-one years old. I had read the story years ago in his autobiography, and after my husband died, it helped me to read that part of his story again.

Barclay’s daughter and the young man that she might have married one day were both drowned in a tragic boating accident. It was a difficult time for them as parents, but Barclay said that while God did not stop their daughter’s accident at sea, God stilled the storm in their hearts. That’s how he and his wife were able to get through that difficult time.

In A Spiritual Autobiography (William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 1975, page 46), Barclay wrote,

The day my daughter was lost at sea there was sorrow in the heart of God.

When things like that happen, there are just three things to be said. First, to understand them is impossible. Second, Jesus does not offer us solutions to them. What he does offer us is his strength and help somehow to accept what we cannot understand. Third, the one fatal reaction is the bitter resentment which for ever after meets life with a chip on the shoulder and a grudge against God. The one saving reaction is simply to go on living, to go on working, and to find in the presence of Jesus Christ the strength and courage to meet life with steady eyes, and to know the comfort that God too is afflicted in my affliction.

That’s the endurance to bear the hard thing and the resilience to turn it into glory. For William Barclay, that kind of resilience wasn’t just a saying. It was part of his life.

When tragedy strikes, when difficulties come our way, this witness from William Barclay encourages me, and I pray it will encourage all of us. There is sorrow too in the heart of God, who is afflicted in our affliction. So let us turn toward God and move forward with strength, courage, and faith in the One who walks with us. Amen.

This article also appears on Asian American Women on Leadership.

Writing/Reflection Prompt: What is your definition of resilience?

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