" Contrary to what might be expected, I look back on my experiences that at the time seemed especially desolating and painful, with particular satisfaction. Indeed, I can say with complete truthfulness that everything I have learned in my seventy-five years in this world, everything that has truly enhanced and enlightened my existence, has been through affliction and not through happiness, whether pursued or attained. In other words, if it ever were to be possible to eliminate affliction from our earthly existence by means of some drug or other medical mumbo jumbo . . . the result would not be to make life delectable, but to make it too banal or trivial to be endurable. This of course is what the cross signifies, and it is the cross more than anything else, that has called me inexorably to Christ..."
There is unspeakable truth in what Muggeridge said! I may have not lived as long as he did when he wrote this, but in my "short" 21 years and 6 months on this earth, I confidently say that I would not trade anything to replace the experiences I went through. The pain I have felt, the times of loneliness, the struggles I had to battle with, all of this...made me a stronger person. Without such experiences, Muggeridge put it so well by saying life would be "not authentic or interesting; dull".
Despite the challenges, the struggles, the pain, you may feel or have felt, God Loves You. And all this is shown at the cross.
Job 42:5-6 (KJV)
"I have heard of thee by the hearing of the ear: but now mine eye seeth thee.
Wherefore I abhor myself, and repent in dust and ashes."
Job cries out to God in the midst of his pain, asking God to be his Revealer and Comforter. But it comes in moments of personal surrender unto God...
I'll leave you with a verse from the new testament that I'm sure many know well.
Matthew 11:28 (KJV)
"Come unto me, all ye that labour and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest."