“If through a broken heart God can bring His purposes to pass in the world, then thank Him for breaking your HEART.”
Oswald Chambers, My Utmost for His Highest
The Source of Pain
Guilt is an uncomfortable feeling, but it’s completely different from the feeling we are talking about in this chapter. You experience guilt because of the things done by you, while pain comes from the things done to you by others or by yourself. Pain can be physical or emotional or both. It can be from something that happened in the past or something that’s happening right now. And it can control you. When the pain gets too overwhelming, it’s all you can do to function. And sometimes pain can completely cripple you emotionally.
Before we get started, let us just note that there are two different kinds of pain that need to be addressed when learning how to get over it. The first is the pain of the past: bad memories, heartaches, abuse, and bad things that have been done to you. These are things that can hurt you deeply. They may be stomping on your last nerve. They may be threatening to undo you. They may be making you totally depressed. But they are not meant to debilitate you. They are not meant to be the definition of who you are or who you become.
These are things that we want to help you to get over—and not only to get over but to move beyond. When you can look at this kind of pain from God’s perspective and see its value and its purpose, then you can get up on the wave of it and ride it like the famous surfer Kelly Slater. Every surfer knows that you have to paddle hard and get on top of the wave in order to have a successful ride. Let the wave overcome you and engulf you, and you’re down in an instant. You can ride on the top of the wave as it curls below or surf through the pipe of the wave if it’s big enough. But either way, you can’t let it be your demise and take you under. You’ve got to get over it.
But there is a second kind of pain, and this kind of pain is deep and irremovable. It is a pain that is the mother of all pain. This pain isn’t just inconvenient; it is life altering. When you experience a loss so deep that it changes your world, pain seemingly defines you. We are talking here about the pain of losing someone you love and never seeing them again on this earth, and the pain of disability, such as losing the use of your legs or experiencing chronic suffering where your body relentlessly hurts.
These kinds of physical losses that will never be undone are not the kind of things we are going to tell you to just get over. We are aware that getting over it is something that has its proper time in the area of pain, and for severe physical loss the proper time to get over it may be very far in the future. For example, when a boy loses his father in a car accident, we don’t tell him to man up and get over it. That would be irrational and lacking compassion and grace. Suffering isn’t something that should be covered up, ignored, or denied. It is the response to pain in our lives, and the depth of that pain will determine, to a great extent, the length of our suffering. Some pain, like losing a parent, is going to take its time in your life.
King David experienced pain that wasn’t fleeting and didn’t just kinda hurt—it tore into his life like the horns of a bull. David suffered a lot when he was running away from Saul, who wanted to kill him. He had to hide away in caves, fear for his life, and wonder when it would end. His life was flipped upside down as he hid in terror. Pain changed his life, and your pain might be doing the same to you. Look at how David described his pain and suffering:
Have compassion on me, Lord, for I am weak.
Heal me, Lord, for my bones are in agony.
I am sick at heart.
How long, O Lord, until you restore me? . . .
I am worn out from sobbing.
All night I flood my bed with weeping,
drenching it with my tears. (Ps. 6:2–3, 6 NLT, emphasis added)
O Lord, how long will you forget me? Forever?
How long will you look the other way?
How long must I struggle with anguish in my soul,
with sorrow in my heart every day? (Ps. 13:1–2 NLT, emphasis added)
My God, my God, why have you abandoned me?
Why are you so far away when I groan for help?
Every day I call to you, my God, but you do not answer.
Every night you hear my voice, but I find no relief. (Ps. 22:1–2 NLT, emphasis added)
Pain is real. And pain at the hands of deep suffering isn’t something that you have to get over today. Suffering has to run its course, so if your life-changing pain is fresh, then don’t think you’ve got to ignore it or cover it up. That’s not true. But let us help you discover how to start working toward finding relief. As we look at the purposes God has for pain and the spiritual awakening that can come out of it, take these words to heart and know that though your pain might seem to have no purpose other than to completely ruin you, that isn’t true. Pain has a very good and great purpose in the life of all who have turned their lives over to Jesus.
As with all things in your life, for getting past your pain it is crucial that you understand that nothing happens to you except what God allows for his glory and your ultimate benefit. We know that when it comes to your pain—those things that have hurt you, bruised you, even broken you—it can be hard to see any good coming of it at all, especially when no good is in sight. Pain, like the Grand Canyon, can be a hard thing to get over. But it can be gotten over, even if it is never removed. And figuring out how that happens is what we are going to do in this chapter.
The pain in your life can come from a lot of places, many of which are completely out of your control. We live in a depraved, broken world where people look away from God and do whatever they want, and a lot of times that includes hurting people around them. Hayley’s life was turned upside down by an adulterous father. His sexploits plagued her for years and made her feel unloved by the first man in her life. Michael’s life went topsy-turvy when his mom left his dad for almost a year, even getting her own apartment, all because she wasn’t getting what she wanted out of the marriage and she wanted to make a point. For a little kidlet, that’s a painful and incomprehensible point. Our point is, broken people do broken things and sometimes never even realize the effect they are having on others.
“My suffering was good for me, for it taught me to pay attention to your decrees.”
— Psalm 119:71 NLT
Your heart might be broken; your body might be bruised; your feelings might be hurt. Mean people might surround you; offensive people might attack you. You might be dealing with the pain of resentment and anger against your offenders. All this pain can seep into your life and make your future look bleak. Looking at it like this might make you start to think that pain is pretty much inevitable. Live and you’re gonna get hurt. And that’s pretty much true. Jesus even talked about it when he said, “In this world you will have trouble” (John 16:33 NIV, emphasis added). There’s no way around it. Live, and trouble will come.
But the amazing thing for the life of the believer is that pain is never the end of the story. In fact, in the life of faith it’s just the beginning. Without the pain of the cross endured by Christ, where would your faith be? His pain was your salvation. His suffering was your gift of eternal life.
The Beauty of Pain
Even the most messy and horrible stuff wasn’t meant to destroy you but to make you stronger and more holy. Even the biggest pain in your life can be a tool in the hand of the sculptor if you are only willing to stand still and let him do his work. When you can do that, nothing others do can destroy you. Even if they plot against you, attack you, and hate you, you are still hopeful and confident in the One who saves.
God’s Word confirms this truth through the story of Joseph’s life. This was a guy who knew about pain. He was hated by his brothers, sold into slavery, and put into prison, but still he knew who was in charge. He was certain of it, and in the end he was able to say to his brothers, “Even though you planned evil against me, God planned good to come out of it” (Gen. 50:20).
When pain comes your way, you can follow one of two lines of questioning. One is to ask, “Why me?” It’s the natural response to pain and suffering to ask, “What have I done wrong? Why me?” and even “Where was God in all this? Doesn’t he care?” These questions make sense to the natural mind, and they are the usual gut response, but they don’t usually get you anywhere. The problem is that they are accusatory. They assume that you shouldn’t have been the one suffering, and so God must have messed up. This line of questioning is more self-centered than God-centered, so the answers you get never fully satisfy you.
But there is another line of questioning that soothes the believing heart and is at the very least a foundation for getting your ultimate answer. It begins something like this: “Could God have stopped whatever it is that is making me suffer?” That’s a foundational question, and it says a lot about what you believe about God. If you can confidently answer yes, then good for you; you’re on the right track. But if you can’t answer yes, then you need to learn more about God and what we call his sovereignty, which is his power over the world and everything that happens in it.
Let’s take a quick look at Daniel 4:35 and see if it helps you get a better picture:
Everyone who lives on earth is nothing compared to him. He does whatever he wishes with the army of heaven and with those who live on earth. There is no one who can oppose him or ask him, “What are you doing?”
Did you get that? This is where we see that asking “Why me?” is really a silly exercise. Are you really gonna ask God what he’s doing? Really? Sounds silly when you say it like that, doesn’t it? But in case you still aren’t buying it, here’s one more nail in the coffin of doubt from Isaiah 45:7:
I create the light and make the darkness.
I send good times and bad times.
I, the Lord, am the one who does these things. (NLT)
God’s Word confirms it: he’s got everything under control. Nothing happens to you that you can’t bear (see 1 Cor. 10:13) and that isn’t meant for good, because we know that God never intends anything for bad.
Okay, if God has everything under control and he didn’t stop what led to your pain, why didn’t he? Now this kind of question (unlike “Why me?”) is powerful. “Why didn’t he?” is the beginning of a great discovery. It’s the beginning of making use of the pain rather than resenting it and wishing it away. Asking “Why did God let this happen?” is the first step toward getting over it for good. So let’s look at some of the reasons why God lets pain and suffering come into your life. Okay? You up for it? If you are, then let’s go!
The School of Pain
Here’s the thing about pain in the life of the believer: it’s for your good. Always. No question (for extra credit, take a look at Ps. 119:71; Col. 1:24). God doesn’t waste anything in the life of the person whose heart is bent on serving him and knowing him more. Nothing, not even the pain. Since you know pain happens, why does it surprise you when it happens to you? And worse yet, why do you pull away from it, hate it, and even attack it when you have a God who will use it for good if you will only trust him with it?
As a believer you need never let your pain be wasted or used against you. You waste it when you ignore it and pretend it doesn’t exist. And it is used against you when you let it become your excuse to sin. Sinful responses to pain destroy you, while godly responses uplift you. So what is a godly response to pain? And how do you make use of something that hurts so much?
Good questions. The answers have to do with the reasons why God allows suffering and pain in your life. See, if pain were just a random attack on you—if there were no spiritual reason behind it other than your destruction—then you’d have a reason to be upset and resentful. If pain serves no purpose in the life of faith, then you’re right to want to medicate it, cover it up, and avoid the sensation at all costs. But because pain serves a big purpose in the life of faith, you can’t do what the rest of the world does and sweep it under the rug or let it pile up on you and destroy you.
No, pain is the coach of character. In fact, pain is the gym class teacher that screams in your ear to keep doing push-ups. It’s the ultimate Biggest Loser experience. It’s the way to having a heart that needs nothing but God and because of that can move mountains. And to endure and get over your pain is to see the value in it and to respect it but not fear it. It is to experience it and not numb it or forget it but let it be your spiritual training. When you do, you will see that the things it can teach you are unbelievably important—things like endurance, character, confidence, joy, hope, and trust (see Rom. 5:3; James 1:2–4).
When you rely on God to redeem your pain and make it something of value rather than destruction, you are then able to completely get over it and get on with life to the full. Because that’s why Jesus came, you know—not to destroy you but to give you life to the full (see John 10:10). And in order to have life to the full, you have to get over giving your pain the place of power and control over your life. You have to let go of your need to comfort yourself with anything other than God, including your need to avenge yourself or pity yourself, and get on with the real purposes of pain in your life.
So what is your pain teaching you? The first subject in the school of pain is endurance. Endurance just means the ability to handle whatever comes your way. Can you imagine letting nothing shake you? Have you seen people like that? These people have a great peace in their lives. They know something the rest of us don’t: that “this too shall pass.” They know it from experience because the suffering they have lived to tell about has taught them much.
This is the purpose of pain according to the book of James. Take a look at chapter 1, verse 2:
Be very happy when you are tested in different ways. You know that such testing of your faith produces endurance. Endure until your testing is over. Then you will be mature and complete, and you won’t need anything.
See, this line of testing that leads to endurance gets you to the point of peace in suffering because it teaches you through repetition who God is when you need him. The more you suffer, the more he becomes your everything.
In the Western world we really know little of suffering, but in a lot of places where Christians are persecuted, suffering is an active and powerful part of life. Take a look at the lives of people of faith in those dark countries where believers are hated, tortured, starved, and killed, and you will find more power, peace, hope, and patience than you have ever seen. A missionary friend of ours tells the story of pastors in China who consider prison to be their “seminary.” That’s because, they believe, it is only in suffering for your faith that you truly begin to own it and to have experiences of God’s saving power that you can share with others. The persecuted (“suffering”) church knows more about the hope and the power of God than most of us in the Western church will ever know because he is all they have, and faith in him demands everything of them—even their lives.
That leads us to another subject in the school of pain: compassion. As Paul says in 2 Corinthians 1:4–5:
He comforts us whenever we suffer. That is why whenever other people suffer, we are able to comfort them by using the same comfort we have received from God. Because Christ suffered so much for us, we can receive so much comfort from him.
How would you know how to reach out to others, to have compassion on them, and to comfort them if you hadn’t experienced the same comfort in your life? We learn from example, and in your pain and suffering God is your example of compassion. As you suffer and look to God for your peace, you learn more about who he is than you could any other way. His Word becomes alive to you. It suddenly makes sense where it didn’t before. It ministers to you so that you can minister to others with those same words. If you want your pain to mean something, then know beyond a shadow of a doubt that it all means something big and very important to your life and the kingdom of God. Nothing is just dumb luck. Your pain most certainly will be a step in the direction of a deeper faith and stronger compassion for others who suffer.
Suffering isn’t something new. It isn’t something rare, and it isn’t just reserved for us sinners. Christ himself suffered, and in reading about his suffering you can learn another important lesson about pain. Hebrews 5:8 says, “Although Jesus was the Son of God, he learned to be obedient through his sufferings.” Obedience isn’t what saves you, but it is what proves you know Christ (see 1 John 2:3), and in suffering your obedience is proven in a major way. Suffering is the hardest place for obedience to happen. You might even say that obedience is not really obedience when you’re just doing what you want to do and it’s just your nature, but when it’s hard, that’s when you prove your faith—through doing what you should even when you don’t want to. Suffering brings out the obedience in us because it gives us a chance to choose not to be angry, bitter, resentful, vengeful, or hateful, even though we naturally want to be. And we aren’t because we see pain for what pain is—a lesson in the life of faith.
But sometimes pain is so bad that it threatens to be the death of us. There was a time when Hayley believed that and cowered at its attacks. She feared pain so much that it took all her energy just to fear it, worry about it, and run from it. But once she realized the true value of the death part of pain, she was set free. See, Jesus calls us to a new life in him. We are new creatures, and when that happens the old passes away or dies (see Rom. 6:6–7; 2 Cor. 5:17). And this is a good thing, because the old us is bad, stupid, and lazy. The old us got us into nothing but trouble, and so dying to that old self is of great spiritual value. Dying to self is another lesson of pain. When something threatens you with pain, you can say “bring it on” when your goal is not self-preservation but self-destruction—destruction of the old, sinful self. Pain isn’t meant to destroy you, but it can destroy the sin in you, so bring it on! Who doesn’t want the sin in them taken out?
Suffering and pain also teach you not to hang on so tight to this world but to put all your eggs in the basket of heaven. In Philippians 1:23 Paul talks about how much better things are going to be when we are united with Jesus in heaven. When you suffer here on earth, it should remind you that earth is only temporary and that pain is to be expected, but in heaven it’s all done with. Finished. And there things will be so much better than you could ever imagine. You just have to put up with some trials while you are here. But don’t worry—this will be over in the blink of an eye (see Rom. 8:18–21).
Pain also teaches you about your need for other people. God planned for us not to be islands but to need each other. Remember what he said back in the Garden of Eden: “It is not good for the man to be alone” (Gen. 2:18). We were meant to live in community with one another, and pain makes that a necessity. When you suffer, you need other people to comfort you and help you. While comforting them is part of your service to God, letting them comfort you is part of that same gift. If nobody needs anybody else, then how will we serve one another? So you can think about your pain as a chance to lean on someone else and to give them the ability to use their gift of service on you. Being needed feels good to people, so don’t feel bad when on occasion you desperately need God’s people to be by your side.
As you start to take a more biblical look at your pain, you might just see that what’s inside you that is hating the suffering isn’t really self-preservation at all but is something much more despicable. See, if it’s true that suffering is meant for your good, and if it’s true that if you suffer you are learning more about God and his role in your life, then running from it would be running from God. And if you are running from God, who are you running to?
What you’re about to read might sound totally historic and not relevant at all, but in the Bible God talks a lot about these little things called idols. They are little gods, really, that take our attention away from the one true God. They are things and even people that we go to for the things we should be going to God for. So idols can be food, shopping, friends, video games, sports, money, popularity, success, comfort, and the list goes on and on. Anything that makes you feel better, tells you what to do, keeps you from doing what God wants you to do, or leads you to sin as you pursue it is an idol. And idols are oftentimes the first things to scream when pain hits, because pain is meant to destroy them, not you. And they don’t want to go.
So when you suffer, think about what it is inside you that is screaming. Is it your need for comfort or rest? Is it your need for protection or respect? The scream needs to be detected and identified as something not to be listened to. One of the valuable things about dying to self is that this process kills our idols. And if you have any understanding of God’s Word, then you probably know that idols need to be killed—and not just when you get around to it but right now, because idols keep you away from God and his promises (see 1 Cor. 6:9–10). If you want to be idol-free, then let the pain do its job. So what if it hurts a little? It’s worth it if it helps you learn to say, “No, I’m not listening to you anymore, idol. Today I’m turning my thoughts over to God, so scream all you want—la, la, la, la, I can’t hear you anymore!”
As a believer you don’t want anything or anyone to replace God in your life. You don’t want anything to come between you. You love him and you are devoted to him, so when pain comes, accept it as a hot fire that burns away the impurities from your life. Sure, it’s hot and it hurts, but if that’s what it takes to purify you, then why freak out about it? Think about it like this: If you could suffer in order that God might be glorified, wouldn’t you do it? Well, then suffer and know that all your suffering is ultimately for God’s glory.
Jesus gave an example of this when he answered a question about a blind man. His disciples were wondering if the guy was blind because he did something wrong. But Jesus’s answer confirmed that it wasn’t about what the guy or what his parents did or didn’t do, but “he was born blind so that God could show what he can do for him” (John 9:3), which Jesus then proceeded to do by healing the man’s blindness. When God can show what he does for us, that brings him the glory.
When God intends something like pain for your good, you can be sure that the heart that trusts him will find good coming its way. Your pain might not end immediately; it might linger for a really long time, but the blessing that comes with it will far overshadow it if you will just trust God and refuse to take matters into your own hands. Let pain do its work, and trust that God will work all things out for your good. For the believer, pain is never the end in itself, or else how could God command us to find joy in it? That’s what he does, you know. Check out James 1:2–4:
Dear brothers and sisters, when troubles come your way, consider it an opportunity for great joy. For you know that when your faith is tested, your endurance has a chance to grow. So let it grow, for when your endurance is fully developed, you will be perfect and complete, needing nothing. (NLT)
“We know that all things work together for the good of those who love God—those whom he has called according to his plan.”
— Romans 8:28
Trials and pain, suffering and hard times are really a gift from God. After all, they lead to really good stuff—endurance and being perfected. Think about the most amazing and interesting people in the world. Would you say that most of them were people who struggled, suffered, and overcame? Or people who never had a care in the world and had everything handed to them on a silver platter? History confirms it: suffering builds character, it builds story, and it builds a really amazing life. So don’t waste your pain, but find the purpose in it and get over it today.