This poem was read by David Mains on the radio when I was still a young woman;  I never heard it read again until this week, when Ravi Zacharias read it on his radio program, "Let My People Think."

(Author Unknown)

When God wants to fill a man
and skill a man, and drill a man;
When God wants to mold a man
to play the noblest part;
When He yearns with all His heart
to create so great and bold a man
that all the world will be amazed;
Watch His methods; watch His ways.

     How He ruthlessly perfects
     who He royally elects;
     How He hammers him and hurts him,
     and with mighty blows converts him
     into trial shapes of clay
     which only God understands;
     Till his tortured heart is crying
     and he lifts beseeching hands.

          How He bends, but never breaks;
          What is good He undertakes.
          Then how He uses who He chooses,
          and by every purpose fuses him;
          by every act induces him
          to try his splendor out.
          God knows what He's about!