I could easily spend weeks writing this blog out instead of a single day, but I’m sticking to my guns and going to do the best that I can!
Pain.
What a title hu?! I definitely need to work on my clickbait skills. I’m sure this blog will be in the running for least opened!
Why?
We naturally run from pain, and those who don’t are usually classified with a disorder.
It’s not something that needs to be taught to us.
Growing up, we all learned to avoid pain. When you accidentally touched something that was too hot, It’s like your muscles already knew what to do! You immediately reacted by pulling your hand away from whatever is burned you.
We find out pretty early in life that our flesh hates pain.
Since our flesh is the first place we learned pain, from youth we were conditioned to avoid it.
And most of the time, it is a pretty good idea to avoid pain when it comes to our flesh. But that does lead to a question.
Is all pain bad?
Is there such a thing as good pain?
Let’s just stick to pain in the flesh for a minute.
An example of a good type of pain in the flesh is exercise.
Exercise is painful, some people like me might describe it as suffering, (insert comedic pause here).
Exercise hurts because your muscles are literally tearing. After they tear, you rest, as you rest the muscle heals and builds more muscle where it was torn. But we invite the pain because it makes us healthier and able to handle more in the future.
Physical health can only come through a process of pain and attending our wounds.
So if that’s true for the physical, is there pain that’s good for emotional, mental, and spiritual health?
What did Jesus say about pain, mourning, and suffering?
Well, He actually told us that we’ll face much pain and suffering in life. And in many aspects, He Himself chose pain and invited us to choose it as well!
Matthew 5:4;11-12, Luke 18:13, John 11:35, Like 22:44, Matthew 10:37-38, Mark 8:34-35, are just a few examples.
But why would Jesus invite us into pain?
Isn’t He Good?
Isn’t He for me and not against me?
Well we first have to come back and see that not all pain is bad. Yes, there are obviously bad kinds of pain, Jesus is not inviting us to self-harm or any kind of sadistic practice or thinking. But God does not want us to live in fear of pain, but show us how to invite pain healthily into our lives. There are places in our lives that can only be healed by attending our pain.
In the same way we looked at physical health, if we want to reach emotional, mental, and spiritual health, we have to enter that process of pain and attending our wounds.
This is again where people start to think of unhealthy pain and have flashbacks of their past when they have experienced wounding.
I challenge you to not let fear guide you in this process. It’s harder for us to trust Jesus in emotional, mental, and spiritual healing because we cannot see it like we can the physical. But the results are the same, strength and wholeness.
I hope my testimony will help you overcome this fear. Jesus took me(and is still taking me) to a lot of scary and painful places these past few years. It hurt beyond what I can describe in this short blog to face myself in this way, but now I stand more healed and complete than I’ve ever been.
The first revelation and step that came for me to heal in my soul and sprit is to realize that I actually had wounds.
My wounds had been with me for so long, that I had accepted them as truth. I didn’t think that there was anything wrong, so why would I try to heal something I didn’t know was broken?
A silly example: If I saw around me is that everyone had broken legs, I would never realize my broken legs were a problem. I would continue living life broken and wounded because “that’s just how it is”.
I know that sounds extreme and laughable. But that’s how I feel now about the emotional, mental, and spiritual wounds I see around me all the time. But when I started this journey, I was shocked at how many “that’s just how it is” wounds were in my life. I just didn’t know anything different, I saw the same problems in people around me and accepted that’s just “struggles we all have” or that I “had to live with this”.
And honestly, it was less painful to accept those wounds as truth instead of attending them.
Just to give you an idea of some of those wounds, here were a few:
1. I’m not worthy of relationships or friendships.
2. I’m not fun.
3. I’m not a real friend.
4. I don’t have what it takes to disciple anyone.
5. If anyone helps me, they’re going to mess things up.
6. I will never truly be able to be myself.
7. People love me but they don’t like me.
8. I have found my relationship with God by accident and it was never meant for me.
9. I don’t belong anywhere.
10. I’ll never be a great leader.
All of these things I had accepted as truth were tied to experiences I had in the past. I didn’t even realize I struggled with most of these until the Lord revealed it to me, and until I was willing to face the pain.
Which lead me to the second step: Healing and tending the wounds that I now saw I had.
This kind of healing can only happen in our soul and spirit through Unconditional Love and Honest Truth.
The only place we can truly find this is in Jesus.
But the Lord is so Good, even in His rebuke!
I’m reminded of the story of Jesus calling Peter “Satan”.
It’s found in Matthew 16:23
Jesus turned and said to Peter, “Get behind me, Satan! You are a stumbling block to me; you do not have in mind the concerns of God, but merely human concerns.”
Ouch. That had to hurt. But Jesus showed Peter that this was not who He made Peter to be. That Peter let things into his life that had to die. Jesus had already told Peter who he really was. Just 4 verses before this circumstance, Jesus told him his true Identity.
Simon Peter answered, “You are the Messiah, the Son of the living God.” Jesus replied, “Blessed are you, Simon son of Jonah, for this was not revealed to you by flesh and blood, but by my Father in heaven. And I tell you that you are Peter, and on this rock I will build my church, and the gates of Hades will not overcome it. I will give you the keys of the kingdom of heaven; whatever you bind on earth will be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth will be loosed in heaven.”
– Matthew 16:16?-?19
When Jesus saw Peter falling short of who he was created to be, Jesus called the lies out! The pain of Jesus’s words were refining Peter to be stronger and whole. The Truth in Love.
Similarly, when Jesus showed me all the lies that had taken root in my life. He spoke Truth over them, often that Truth was painful. But even though it was painful, I would feel His Love tearing away things that had grown into my identity.
The more and more time I spent accepting that invitation to the painful conversations, the stronger I grew and the more freedom I experienced from false identities.
Jesus showed me that when we finally face pain in our hearts and spirits instead of avoiding it, we can heal and be strengthened.
Now that those lies have been refined by the painful Consuming Fire of Truth and Love. I look and feel a little different. And by a little, I mean I feel like a brand new creation.
The best part about all of this is that I’m no longer avoiding pain in my life. It no longer intimidates me into passivity and burying how I feel. I actually get a little excited when I find a new wound in my life. I get excited because it means that I found a new place that God wants to heal and make new.
Fear of pain no longer dictates who I am or how I act. I get to rule over it and force it to face Truth and Love and see what’s left.
Do you believe that all pain is bad?
Is pain controling how you think or act?
Do you want to heal?
Have you been intimidated by the pain of facing the lies in your life?
I want to encourage you to invite Jesus into your pain. Let Him show you wounds and lies you might have in your life. Once you’ve identified a couple, begin to let Him speak Truth in Love. Then rest in Him and let Him attend those wounds.
Freedom from the fear of pain, will lead you into Healing, True Identity, and Wholeness.
