Now that I'm in a larger house and have more space, my mom has been slowly dropping off boxes of my stuff that had been sitting in the attic at her house. As I was going through one box from college, I came across some index cards on which I had written some inspiring quotations as part of my counseling. On one of these cards I wrote, "The richness and quality of our lives depends not on pain or the lack of it, but on how we use it." I didn't write down where I got this quote from, but when I read these words again this week years after I first wrote it on the card, I was struck again by the statement's truth.
We also rejoice in our sufferings, because we know that suffering produces perseverance; perseverance, character; and character, hope. And hope does not disappoint us, because God has poured out his love into our hearts by the Holy Spirit, whom he has given us. --Romans 5:3-5
When we are faced with pain we have three choices: we can let the pain break us, we can squelch the pain and have it resurface later in an even worse way, or we can turn the pain over to God and let Him use it to change us. As humans, I think our natural tendency is to try to avoid pain and suffering because it's easier to hide from pain than to face it head on. But God has never called us to the easy path. Pain is an inherent part of living in a fallen world with fallen people. God calls us not to run from pain, but to change our perspective about the pain. If we see pain as bad, we will continue to run from it, but if we see pain as an opportunity for growth, we can learn to embrace it. When we walk through our pain with God, we cannot help but come out on the other side as stronger people. Pain can enrich our lives if we let it. Since we are going to have to face pain anyway, we are better off embracing it and learning from it so that our lives can be fuller and our faith can grow as we watch God turn our pain into something beautiful.
Posted by Kim at May 3, 2007 01:24 PM