You’ve got pain. I’ve got pain. Physical, emotional, or any other type no one is immune from pain in this world. It exists in all of our lives. And it’s a problem. It’s a problem for us because, as C.S. Lewis puts it in “The Problem of Pain,” “our finite, human minds selfishly believe that pain-free lives would prove that God loves us.”
It doesn’t feel selfish to want a pain-free life. But saying it out loud sure puts it into perspective, doesn’t it? We sometimes believe if our lives just had no pain, we could finally trust that God loves us. I know…I’ve been there…and I’ll likely have to work through that lesson again. It’s enough sometimes for us to even turn our backs on God. I know…I’ve been there too.
But even more than I believed that lie, I also knew deep down that God is more concerned with making me holy than He is making me happy. Lewis also wrote in that same book, “Love demands the perfecting of the beloved.” Somewhere in the foundation of our souls we know this. We know that honest, pure, and true love from God doesn’t allow us to remain attached to rags when riches are at hand. Pain is…painful. It hurts. But it’s not the end!
God takes our pains, whatever they may be, and uses them to make us more like Jesus. And that is worth far more than our simple understanding of what love should look like when we hurt. Hebrews 12:2 says, “looking to Jesus, the founder and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is seated at the right hand of the throne of God” (ESV)
Be a witness,
Nate