Don’t Delay the Pain

God, who foresaw your tribulation, has specially armed you to go through it, not without pain but without stain.  C.S. Lewis

I was reading Builder Magazine yesterday and there was an article by its Editorial Director John McManus.  In the article he spoke about the housing industry but the statement that struck me was this: “When we mess with things and try to “fix” them when they don’t work the way we want them to, we don’t prevent pain – we only delay it.   And, by messing with it and delaying it, we only make it worse.”

I started thinking about how we do this very thing.  Instead of depending on God to see us through the pain, we mess with it and try to “fix” it.  So in reality we delay the very thing God has allowed to happen for our own good. 

If we look at this from a physical therapy standpoint, the physical therapist doesn’t tell you to stay motionless.  If we stay motionless the muscle will “atrophy” or waste away.  The therapist will get you up and get you moving.  That moving of your body will bring pain but the result is you may be able to walk again.  The pain is worth the effort.

When we apply this to our Christian life it may go like this. We want to avoid pain at all cost.  So what do we do?  We deny it, ignore it and go around it.  Anything to avoid what we know will be painful.  The best lessons I ever learned in this life were when I was in the midst of my pain.  God didn’t create pain to punish us.  He created it to help us become stronger.   If I delay the pain, I am circumventing what God wants to teach me. 

One of the best examples of this in the Bible is Peter.  Remember when Jesus told Peter that he would deny Him three times.  Jesus knew that Peter would fail yet Peter said that he would die for Jesus.  Immediately following this denial, Peter wept bitterly because he knew he had failed Jesus.  But that wasn’t the end of the story.  Peter later would suffer through many trials and great pain, but that one denial was the best lesson he would ever have in life.  He later wrote some of the best scripture about life that we can still follow today.  How many people gave their lives to Christ because of the results from Peter’s greatest pain?  We will never know, but it is an example we can follow daily.  Don’t delay the pain.  Grab God by the hand and walk through it.  Psalm 16:8 I have set the Lord always before me; because He is at my right hand I shall not be moved.

Prayer for the Day: Heavenly Father, when I suffer pain it draws me closer to You.  I am human and weak and I know I need Your strength to get me through the pain of life. You never promised life would be easy.  If pain draws me closer to You, then I am thankful for it.  One day there will be a place in heaven where there will be no pain.  I look forward to that day and that beautiful place.  

         

Scripture: Jesus Predicts Peter’s Denial

Then Jesus said to them, “All of you will be made to stumble because of Me this night, for it is written: ‘I will strike the Shepherd, and the sheep will be scattered.’ “But after I have been raised, I will go before you to Galilee.”

Peter said to Him, “Even if all are made to stumble, yet I will not be.”

Jesus said to him, “Assuredly, I say to you that today, even this night, before the rooster crows twice, you will deny Me three times.”

But he spoke more vehemently, “If I have to die with You, I will not deny You!”

And they all said likewise. Mark 14:27-31

 

Peter Denies Jesus, and Weeps

Now as Peter was below in the courtyard, one of the servant girls of the high priest came. And when she saw Peter warming himself, she looked at him and said, “You also were with Jesus of Nazareth.”

But he denied it, saying, “I neither know nor understand what you are saying.” And he went out on the porch, and a rooster crowed.

And the servant girl saw him again, and began to say to those who stood by, “This is one of them.”  But he denied it again.

And a little later those who stood by said to Peter again, “Surely you are one of them; for you are a Galilean, and your speech shows it.”

 Then he began to curse and swear, “I do not know this Man of whom you speak!”

A second time the rooster crowed. Then Peter called to mind the word that Jesus had said to him, “Before the rooster crows twice, you will deny Me three times.” And when he thought about it, he wept.  Mark 14:66-72