It has been a long week.... missing much of last week and the weekend, and finally getting free of most of the pain of that headache...I've never had a migraine like that. I'm praying that I don't ever again. I'm still on the drugs..I hate to rely on chemicals, but prayer and rest did not have the positive results I had hoped for. Some of it is the allergy/sinus thing, but I know some is stress and tension. As Bruce said, there is something in the air in the DFW area. Many symptoms...none of them much in the out and out flu, though. It's as if our family has shared the symptoms instead of one bearing all of them. That in itself could be the answer to prayer....and a metaphor as to the sharing of burdens among us.
And if rest and prayer are not relieving my pain...what is my pain telling me?
I was whining to our big Daddy this morning about pain. What does He want from me? Why all the pain in my family at this time? Why is my stepmom suffering so? My brother? My son? Why the young mom...who couldn't conceive a child...finally through faith has had a baby...and now fears leaving him because she has cancer. Why?
Pain. Physical and emotional. There's a lot of it going around. In Don's search for life , Don posts something about this. Pain...the resulting experience to a resistance to what is. That is definitely true, but some pain is inevitable. A lot of suffering is indeed a choice. What pain do we bring upon our selves? Is the act of selflessness...of reaching out to others...of being vulnerable an invitation to hurt?
I've noticed in reading blogs, and with blog and personal interaction with some of you that I have shared more than I will share with people on a face to face basis. I so appreciate that opportunity. I have the tendency to trust others only after a long period of time, then I throw my loyalty and heart full into the relationship.
Before I met Jesus, I walked alone. I didn't open up to people. My heart was hurt and selfish and introverted. When that change came over me, it was as if He revealed the broken hearts of others to me, and their hurt became a priority in my life, leading me to ministry to others. It was no longer about me. Motherhood, of course was the precursor to that, but it was the death of my mom that drove me to Him, and the manner in which He answered my prayers that made me see Him as the Love that He is--especially in adversity.
Still....in that vulnerability...that revealing of myself to others in the earthly realm, the face to face, I've been flogged a time or two...my expectations of what friendship is have exceeded reality and the beatings have been brutal. One or two true friends remain with me, but still I feel I walk a thin line between total openness and that glass brick wall of self-protection. I am not accepted as I accept others. Reality bites.
I still walk alone, only now the pain of seeing the pain of others walks with me. Before I could simply cast off anyone who rejected me..now I see the cause of that rejection...and it's not me and yet I still feel the shame. We all reject true and complete love all the time, everyday. When we reject that love and acceptance, we reject Him. He was the one under the weight of the cross, and He bore it, yet He tells us to take it up with Him. He bore the stripes, yet we still walk with those wounds that others have inflicted upon us and those we have inflicted upon ourselves, when we are to allow Him to heal us, body and spirit...by HIS stripes, not ours.
Maybe that's the thing....He wants us to know this pain. Rejection--this time with complete love and forgiveness. When we don't know pain, how can we know unconditional love? If we don't know sadness, how will we know unbridled joy? If we say we forgive someone, do we really forgive them? Only He forgives and forgets. If it's not forgotten, though, are we REALLY capable of the act of true love: forgiveness? He was. When will we be capable of this?
What is our pain telling us?
4 comments:
Martin Zender spoke a great truth when he said that this life is one of contrasts. "How would we know joy without having experienced pain.".... You are correct in your assumptions. When Jesus spoke of taking up OUR cross and following Him, it was pre-crucifixion, before the cross. What I think that many don't understanding is that we went to the cross, suffered the pain with Him, died with Him on that cross,.(We took up that cross) "We are buried with Him" and we rose to new life with Him. That's where we stand now having been redeemed by what happened to us with/thru His sacrifice, of which we were a part. We are reconciled, but still living an imperfect human existence while here. And pain, whether of our own making or not is our sometime companion.
Before I met Jesus, I walked alone. I didn't open up to people. My heart was hurt and selfish and introverted. When that change came over me, it was as if He revealed the broken hearts of others to me
I completely get this. Goosebumps!
I cannot testify for anyone else, but I can account for almost all the past suffering in my life (who couldn't?) and see that every instance brought me closer to God. Often it did not improve my life in tangible ways - frequently making things worse, but something fruitful always happened in my relationship with God. Bit by bit I became someone who began to understand and give love.
PS - I originated in DFW and something about my overall health greatly improved when we moved here to New England. My husband, who suffered from migraines, has not had one since we left there 6 months ago. Hmmm...
well said, Don....
yes, Missy....you and I are similar in many ways....
DFW..allergy capital of the world...any houses for sale your way? ;-)
Walking alone, been there, don't care for it.
Pain is human. What else can I say, temporary bodies that hold in-numeral nerve endings. Minds that are very imaginative, creating all sorts of chaos. We are human and therefore not perfect yet.
Prayers going up.
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