“It is good for me that I have been afflicted, that I might learn thy statutes” (Psalm 119:71).

This seems like a strange testimony. Affliction is often accompanied by complaining or discouragement, but seldom by a statement of satisfaction and thankfulness, such as in our text for today.

“Thus saith the LORD, Stand ye in the ways, and see, and ask for the old paths, where is the good way, and walk therein, and ye shall find rest for your souls. But they said, We will not walk therein” (Jeremiah 6:16).

“Turn thou us unto thee, O LORD, and we shall be turned; renew our days as of old” (Lamentations 5:21).

“And I saw a new heaven and a new earth: for the first heaven and the first earth were passed away; and there was no more sea” (Revelation 21:1).

Big Bang cosmologists believe that our human bodies are essentially "stardust," composed of elements generated long ago in exploding stars which disbursed their dust into space.