Food for ThoughtJames 1:2-4 Pain
Food for Thought
An all-creatures.org Guide to Kingdom Living

By Marni Montanez

James 1:2-4 Holman Christian Standard Bible

2. Consider it a great joy, my brothers, whenever you experience various trials,
3. knowing that the testing of your faith produces endurance.
4. But endurance must do its complete work, so that you may be mature and complete, lacking nothing.

Most Christians have walked through trials which usually present themselves as deep emotional pain.  Although this is part of our Christian experience, it can produce fear.

Many of us learn to dull our senses when we cannot face pain. It seems this is easier, but in dulling our senses we are putting more energy and investment into not feeling than into becoming stronger.   

Pain is characterized in our minds as a destroyer and it is; it destroys our control on a situation.  What we tend to be blind to is that pain works in our life as a tool God uses to mature us. We look at pain as an oppressive entity instead of the doorway to maturity.   The only bondage in pain is the fear of it.  If we use a deadening mechanism to block the intensity of pain, we hinder our ability to grow from it.   

It is not easy facing pain but in doing so we are building up our emotional muscles so that strength and maturity manifest.      

The victim mentality many struggle with must be replaced with the victorious mentality.  Seeing suffering as part of our journey dismisses the mystery about it and gives us the needed balance so that we do not fall to the wiles of the enemy.  God promises us difficulties………

John 16:33 New (NKJV)

“These things I have spoken to you, that in Me you may have peace. In the world you will have tribulation; but be of good cheer, I have overcome the world.”

But in the same verse He promises peace.  We can give our pain to the Lord and choose to learn from it or we can complain and grumble and return to that very same place in the future.  

When Jesus was suffering on the cross, He refused the vinegar that was offered to Him that would have dulled His pain.  

There is a reason for us to feel pain and to meet with many trials; it is for the sake of maturity and to put us in the position of empathy for another.  Feeling pain is a way for us to connect with others who are suffering and to understand and walk with them through their darkness.  

If we choose to desensitize ourselves we stop our maturing process and we allow the enemy to oppress us with our own lack of feeling.

Challenge:  Trust God with your pain.  He can do so much when we put our own suffering in His hands.   

God bless

Marni

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lamb-rightThe purpose of this series is to encourage people to live as loving, compassionate, and peacemaking children of God: Jesus tells us to pray, "Thy kingdom come, thy will be done, on earth as it is in heaven." (Matthew 6:10) God tells us through Micah (6:8), "He has told you, O man, what is good; And what does the Lord require of you But to do justice, to love kindness, And to walk humbly with your God." And we know from Revelation 21:4 that there will be no more mourning, or crying, or pain, or death. Thus, Christian living requires us to set the standards of these conditions here on earth for our fellow human beings, and for the other animals, as a witness to the rest of the world. To do otherwise is not Christian.