What is the purpose of grace? This is what all the work of grace aims at—an even deeper knowledge of God and an ever closer fellowship with Him.
How does God in grace prosecute this purpose? He does this by exposing us to burdensome and frustrating circumstances so as to overwhelm us with a sense of our own inadequacy, and to drive us to cling to him more closely. This is the ultimate reason why God fills our lives with trouble and perplexities of one sort or another — it is so ensure that we shall learn to hold Him fast.
The reason why the Bible spends so much of its time reiterating that God is a strong rock, a firm defense, and a sure refuge and help for the weak, is that God spends so much of His time bringing home to us that we are weak, both mentally and morally, and we dare not trust ourselves to find, or to follow the right road. When we walk along a clear road feeling fine, and someone takes our arm to help us, as likely as not we shall impatiently shake him off; but when we are caught in rough country in the dark, with a storm getting up and our strength spent, and someone takes our arm to help us, we shall thankfully lean on him. And God wants us to feel that our way through life is rough and perplexing, so that we may learn thankfully to lean on Him. Therefore He takes steps to drive us out of our self-confidence and away from the things of this life to trust in Himself.
-- J.I. Packer
