Today was not the kind of day that I expected or would have planned, but it was just the kind of day that I needed. Thank you Lord.
Today, I put myself in an uncomfortable situation so that I could confront a deep pain of mine from 2 years ago. This was not easy and when I came home this evening I read this message written by my friend, Eric Elder, and I would like to share it with you today. God really used this to speak to my heart.
Rejoicing In Your Sufferings
Lesson 13 from Romans: Lessons In Renewing Your Mind
I'd like to talk to you about pain today. While it may not sound like a very pleasant topic, when I shared this message with a group of men on Friday morning, one of them wrote to me later in the day to say, "Thanks for your devotional this morning. I got there in a pretty lousy frame of mind and you had me full of joy before you were done.”
It's amazing how getting God's perspective on a subject can give you a whole new perspective on it—especially a subject like pain. I'd like to give you a new perspective on pain today so that you'll never see it the same again.
Even though we may not like to think about pain, we sometimes like to talk about it. Like a good fish story, we often try to outdo one another with how much pain we've had to endure in life. One person starts talking about their pain and then another chimes in to say, "Aw, that's nothing. You should have seen…”
I had this happen just a few weeks ago. Three of us were talking about what we've gone through to get some warts off the souls of our feet. One guy started by talking about the pain he felt when he dug a knife deep into his skin to get one out. The other guy started talking about the pain he felt when a doctor froze a wart off his foot.
I couldn't resist. I had to add my story, not only because it seemed larger in my eyes than any of the pain that they had described (it was my own pain, after all, which always tends to seem larger, I'm sure), but also because it was such a strange method to me. My doctor, after trying various other painful treatments, finally used one that outdid them all: he applied some juice from something called a blister beetle from South America directly onto my wart. While I felt nothing whatsoever as he put it on, within a few hours, the skin on the bottom of my foot had blistered to the size of a silver dollar within, pulling up what felt like every layer of skin that could possibly have been on the sole of my foot—and the wart along with it. The pain while that blister grew was more excruciating and intense than any other treatment I had received on that wart thus far. But as painful as it was, within a few weeks, the wart was gone. The wart that had plagued me for several years, causing me pain every time I walked, was finally gone.
As Daniel Defoe has said:
"God will often deliver us in a manner that seems initially to destroy us.”
How true that is about pain.
In the book of Romans, the Apostle Paul describes pain in a surprising similar way, saying that pain—or suffering in this case—is not just something we have to endure, but something that we can actually rejoice in:
"And we rejoice in the hope of the glory of God. Not only so, but we also rejoice in our sufferings, because we know that suffering produces perseverance; perseverance, character; and character, hope” (Romans 5:2b-4).
Paul says that the pain we experience in life is not without purpose. Rather, it can produce in us perseverance. Perseverance can then produce character. And character produces hope.
Some of the most hopeful people I know are not those who have a pollyanna, happy-go-lucky view of life who have never experienced deep pain. Instead, the people I know who are the most hopeful are those who have been through the wringer of life and have persevered through it. The pain they've endured has built up their character and given them hope—a hope that they can then pass on to others who need it.
Pain is not without purpose. In fact, pain has been designed by God to let us know that something in our life needs attention. It's a sign that something is broken and either needs to be fixed before it gets worse, or, as in the case of the pain of losing a loved one, serves an indicator of the depth of our deep love for that person. When you can acknowledge that your pain serves a purpose, it can change your whole perspective on it.
I think my perspective began to change when I first read a book by Dr. Paul Brand called, Fearfully and Wonderfully Made. In the book, Dr. Brand describes his work among modern-day lepers.
Leprosy is a disease that affects the nervous system. Those who have leprosy often don't feel pain because their nerve endings don't work properly. As a result, lepers' bodies can often become disturbingly deformed, losing fingers or toes, or going blind in their eyes. It's not the leprosy itself that causes these abnormalities. It's the fact that lepers no longer have the benefits of pain.
They don't know if a stove is hot or cold until they've left their hand on it too long, damaging their fingers beyond repair. They don't know they've stubbed their toe on a rock until bruises and swelling give them a visual clue that they've hit something far too hard. Believe it or not, they don't realize that they're supposed to blink every few seconds, because they never feel what it's like to have dry, sore eyes. As a result, they often go blind, unless someone teaches them how to blink on a regular basis to give their eyes the moisture they need. Imagine giving thanks for the ability to feel that your eyes are dry and sore!
Yet lepers often wish they had something most of the rest of us wish we didn't have: pain. Lepers, perhaps more than the rest of us, seem to understand that pain—when used in the way for which God intended it—serves a terrific purpose. If lepers could feel pain, they would probably rejoice like the Apostle Paul, saying "Praise God, I can feel the pain!” They know that without it, they're in for bigger hurts down the road.
So far, I've been talking about physical pain. But if you'll indulge me to go a little longer than usual with today's message, I'd like to talk for a few minutes about a pain that can often go deeper and last longer than physical pain, and that's the pain we feel in our hearts and minds when we get hurt by someone else.
I was reminded of this again this past month when I read a blog post by a friend. His post left me stunned. He had served with me in my ministry several years ago, encouraging me, mentoring me, giving me opportunities to use my gifts and talents in ways that went beyond what I could do for myself. Yet a day came when he took me out to lunch and said that he was going to step back from my ministry. He said his priorities had changed and he needed to focus on a few other things that required his time and attention.
I was hurt. I had enjoyed our friendship and our times together, our conversations, and our urging one another on in the Lord. His reasons for stepping back didn't seem to line up. Something was wrong, but I didn't know what, and the pain of not knowing, and the feelings of hurt and rejection, have surfaced in my heart from time to time for the last several years.
Yet when I read his blog post a few weeks ago, I finally understood. Something had gone wrong.
He had begun to make a shift in his thinking several years ago on a number of topics. He confessed that he lost his job a few years ago at a large ministry because his views and opinions had shifted so radically that they could no longer keep him on staff. As I read his message, my heart began to break for him. It also began to melt for him. For I finally started to understand that his stepping back from my ministry was a blessing in disguise, for if he hadn't done it then, it would have become a bigger problem for me and my ministry today than I could have imagined. In talking with God about it later that day, I felt like God was saying to me:
"What looked like rejection was really My protection.”
It still hurt, but it definitely made the hurt feel better. I'd like to share what I wrote in my journal that day, words that seemed to capture what I felt God was saying to my heart. Here's what I felt God was saying:
"Oh, no doubt about it, Eric, I know it hurt. But there's also no doubt that I allowed that hurt to help you avoid a bigger one in the future. Pain is not without purpose. In fact, I've designed it precisely for that purpose—to make you aware that something is wrong so you can take action before things get worse. If you don't respond to the initial pain, like a toothache, I've designed it to escalate to a higher pain so you will respond. If you don't respond to even that, then, well, the consequences are your own. But the pain itself serves a very good purpose: to spare you from greater pain down the road. If you'll believe that and take it to heart, you'll never see pain as your enemy again. Pain is your friend, if you'll respond to it in My ways.”
Again, these are my words, not God's, yet they helped me to understand what I felt God has been saying to me about pain. These words helped me to understand what Paul was talking about when he said that we could actually "rejoice in our sufferings,” for suffering does have a purpose. And they helped me to understand that we have a choice to make regarding the pains that we experience in life.
There's a story that's told by The Westside Baptist, found in The Speaker's Quote Book, that illustrates this well. It goes like this:
There were two young boys who were raised in the home of an alcoholic father. As young men, they each went their own way. Years later, a psychologist who was analyzing what drunkenness does to children in the home searched out these two men. One had turned out to be like his father, a hopeless alcoholic. The other had turned out to be a teetotaler (someone who abstains from alcohol). The counselor asked the first man, "Why did you become an alcoholic?” And the second, "Why did you become a teetotaler?”
And they both gave the same identical answer in these words: "What else could you expect when you had a father like mine?”
It's not what happens to you in life but how you react to it that makes the difference. Every human being in the same situation has the possibilities of choosing how he will react, either positively or negatively.
We all experience pain. Jesus wept. I've wept. I imagine you've wept, too. We would hardly be human if we didn't. Yet pain is not without purpose, and depending on how you respond to it, it can define your future for years to come.
My kids were crying this week because one of our newly born kittens had died. It was only a few weeks old, but they had already become very attached to it. When they found it dead, they couldn't help but cry.
As I talked to them about it, I told them that I was sorry for the kitten and for them, but I was thankful that they were able to cry. It showed me that they really cared. Their tears were an expression that something had gone wrong in the world. Their tears revealed to me that they had already begun to care for one of God's creatures that was given to us for such a short amount of time. Their tears were response enough.
As Charles Robinson has said:
"Jesus wept once; possibly more than once. There are times when God asks nothing of His children except silence, patience, and tears.”
Pain has a purpose, whether it's to reveal something that needs to be addressed, or to reveal a depth of love that we've felt for something or someone we once held close, but now have lost.
Pain hurts, but that doesn't mean that pain has to be your enemy. As lepers have discovered, pain can be a blessing, sparing you from greater pain down the road. Pain can be a blessing if you'll let God use it in your life to work His purposes, responding to it in ways that God wants you to respond.
When pain threatens to get you down, remind yourself (meaning "put it in your mind again”) that pain is not without purpose. Ask God to help you persevere through your pain. Ask Him to use it to build up your character. Then ask Him to fill your life with hope--hope for yourself, and hope that you can pour into the lives of others.
As Paul said,
"And we rejoice in the hope of the glory of God. Not only so, but we also rejoice in our sufferings, because we know that suffering produces perseverance; perseverance, character; and character, hope” (Romans 5:2b-4).
I pray that from this day forward you'll never look at pain the same way again.
Will you pray with me?
Father, thank You for Your words in the Bible that challenge our thinking on so many topics, including the topic of pain. Help us to see the purpose of pain from Your perspective, and help us to respond to it in ways that You would have us respond. Help us to understand the role of pain in our lives so we can not just endure it, but somehow, as Paul did, to truly rejoice in the midst of it. In Jesus' name, Amen.
To read more from this series, Romans: Lessons In Renewing Your Mind, please visit:
theranch.org/Renew-Your-Mind.705.0.html
