The POWER of PAIN

P-A-I-N

Mr. Webster defines “pain” as a physical suffering or distress.  For a normal human being, we spend our entire lifetime trying to avoid pain, but no matter how crafty, cunning or strategic we are it always seems to find us.  Pain is something we can not hide or run from, so why does a loving and compassionate God allow us to go through it? We can find our answer in the book of Exodus, with the Israelites being slaves to Egypt.  God hears the cries and prayers of His people and He raises up a leader, Moses, to lead His people into the Promise Land.  God instructs Moses to go before Pharaoh with a demand to “let His people go.”  Pharaoh refuses and because of his refusal God sends a total of 10 plagues to Egypt, which ravished the land, people, and live stock.  If we take a look at the attitude of the Israelites after the first couple of plagues, we will see the Israelites are ready to give up and stay in bondage to Egypt.  These reason why they wanted to do this is because their work-load was increased and they would rather stay and go back to the way things “use-to-be.”  However, God continued His wrath on the Egypt and after the 9th plague, Israel’s whole outlook was different.  Their living conditions became so unbearable that there was no way they could stay in Egypt.  God used the pain of the plagues to create a value of deliverance the Israelites were going to need in order to live in the Promise Land.  If God would have just delivered them, they would have had a deliverance they never worked for.  It is easy to squander way something that has no value to you.  Look at the Prodigal Son, he squandered his inheritance because he it didn’t cost him anything to receive it.  God uses the pain of our lives to create a value in us.  To many people want a blessing from God but do not want to go through the pain of receiving it.  This is why I have a hard time believing and listening to the doctrine of “Name it and Claim it”.  It makes me sick to my stomach to watch someone stand in front God’s people and proclaim a lie to them.  This is why we have some many people in debt, and they are waiting for God to show up and magically fix financial issues with an instantaneous blessing.  Don’t get me wrong, I believe if God wanted to He could, but I believe God is more interested in creating in you a value / discipline of how to handle your money.  Let’s be honest, if we do not learn how to be “Godly” minded with our money, giving us more money would only drive us farther in debt, because we have not learned the lesson. God will use the POWER of PAIN to create a value in us that we will never forget, thus being more like – Christ.

I will challenge you with this, “If you never endure a great burden, you will never be able to handle great success.”

“Dear brothers and sisters, when troubles come your way, consider it an opportunity for great joy. For you know that when your faith is tested, your endurance has a chance to grow. So let it grow, for when your endurance is fully developed, you will be perfect and complete, needing nothing.” 1 Peter 1:2-4

Blessings,

BWT