using pain to grow and strengthen
Purpose in Pain
We often think of feeling pain as weak.
We tend to push it deep down, leaving undealt-with emotions and agony.
But over the years I’ve found that there is purpose in pain. God uses pain in countless ways, some of which we may never even see.
I grew up on a farm with a get-tough attitude. Though this helped me have thick skin, it often made pain difficult to deal with, so I pushed it deep down. I felt like a failure if I was hurt and felt any sort of emotional pain. Eventually I learned that there is a strange, beautiful purpose in pain.
Pain is something we all have in common: broken families, difficult relationships, death.
As humans, we have all felt that suffering to some extent or we will.
Though we may see and feel the hard times, we have a difficult time walking through those seasons and seeing purpose through it all.
When painful times come, we often ask the Lord to get us out of the trial, not grow and strengthen us as we walk through it.
Seeing the purpose in pain can be difficult.
We’re sometimes too blinded by our own emotions to see that God has a plan and a purpose and will use pain to grow us.
I look back on various seasons of my life and see how God used pain to strengthen me, glorify Himself, change me and mold me into a better person.
Life with Jesus can be portrayed as a walk in the park, but it’s not.
One time I was crying out to the Lord, asking why I was being patronized for following Him. He put a picture in my mind: Jesus carrying the cross, thorns in his head, blood dripping from his skin.
The King of Kings, our Savior, was beaten, bruised and crucified. He suffered the ultimate pain. But it was pain with a purpose: to save us all.
So, remember when those hard times come, the pain and hurt have a purpose.
We just have to trust the Lord that He will use it for HIS purpose.