God will not only use your gifts to fulfill his calling on your life, but he’ll also use your limitations.

Esther is a great example of this. She had several big limitations that made her perfect for the role God wanted her to fulfill. She was an orphan adopted by Mordecai; she was a minority, a Jew living in a Persian country; and she was a single woman. A single woman in a male-dominated society had zero rights.

But God used all of these things to help her fulfill her destiny.

Sometimes what looks like a disaster in your life is part of a much bigger plan.

Esther could have just said, “If only I hadn’t been chosen . . . If only I had a better education . . . If only I were more like someone else.” Sometimes we do that in ministry. We live our lives in resentment, always looking at people and saying, “Well, it must be nice to be them.”

If you have that attitude, you will never fulfill God’s purpose for your ministry. You have to realize that the unpleasant obstacles in your life are often God-ordained opportunities to make a difference.

But it’s hard to see that when you’re in pain.

Look at Job. He was the wealthiest man in the world, and then God allowed everything to be taken from him—his family, wealth, and health.

Then, when Job started questioning God, God was silent.

Job said, “I do not see him in the north, for he is hidden. I look to the south, but he is concealed. But he knows where I am going . . . Once he has made his decision, who can change his mind? Whatever he wants to do, he does. So he will do to me whatever he has planned. He controls my destiny” (Job 23:9-10, 13-14 NLT).

Pastor, you cannot figure everything out in your life and ministry. But God knows what’s going on. He is intimately concerned about your ministry in the church, in your community, and in your home. The pleasures and pains, the opportunities and obstacles—God can use it all for his good.