Triumph Over Your Pain

 

Romans 5:3-5 (NLT)
"3 We can rejoice, too, when we run into problems and trials, for we know that they help us develop endurance. 4 And endurance develops strength of character, and character strengthens our confident hope of salvation. 5 And this hope will not lead to disappointment. For we know how dearly God loves us, because he has given us the Holy Spirit to fill our hearts with his love."

The holidays for many are an especially challenging time of the year. Some people are going through a breakup of a significant relationship. Others might have lost someone they loved dearly around the holidays and find it difficult because they miss their loved ones so much. There are also some individuals that just feel overwhelmed by the pressures of gift-giving and the hustle and bustle of the holidays. Whatever the reason, for some it’s an emotionally taxing time of the year, and they just want the season over as quickly as possible. It’s important that we know that God doesn’t want us sad or anxious for any reason. He wants us to remember the birth of His beloved and precious Son, Jesus Christ, and to use the holiday season to be very thankful for His extraordinary gift.

I know a kind gentleman that is in recovery from an addiction. It caused him to lose many meaningful things in his life. His wife left him, his children are still very angry and unsympathetic, and he has only a very small fraction of what he worked so hard to obtain. He says that when he looks back over his life, he can’t understand how he came to the place where he is today. He doesn’t understand why God allowed him to go through so many painful things. He says that he feels blocked on every hand, and he wishes he could skip the holidays altogether.

I sympathize with his pain. As Christians, many of us come to a place in our lives where we ask ourselves, “How do I triumph over my pain?” The answer to this question will help us embrace more of the character of Jesus Christ. The holiday season serves to remind us that he is always and forever the answer for any pain that we experience in life. Jesus Christ invites us in Matthew 11:28-30(NLT), “Come to me, all of you who are weary and carry heavy burdens, and I will give you rest. 29 Take my yoke upon you. Let me teach you, because I am humble and gentle at heart, and you will find rest for your souls. 30 For my yoke is easy to bear, and the burden I give you is light.” No matter the season, our Lord and Savior can heal our pain, and he invites us to bring it to him.

Some people have it in their heads that Jesus Christ was not a happy person when he walked the earth. This isn’t the truth. He loved life because he is the Son of the One True God who is life itself. Jesus Christ was deliriously happy to walk with God during his time on earth, and he is gloriously happy to be with the Father now, at the right hand of the Father's throne.

He wants us to share in his joy. The Apostle John teaches us in 1John 1:2-4(NLT), “2 This one who is life itself was revealed to us, and we have seen him. And now we testify and proclaim to you that he is the one who is eternal life. He was with the Father, and then he was revealed to us. 3 We proclaim to you what we ourselves have actually seen and heard so that you may have fellowship with us. And our fellowship is with the Father and with his Son, Jesus Christ. 4 We are writing these things so that you may fully share our joy.” Having walked with Jesus Christ during his ministry on earth, and then having to witness his crucifixion, not to mention all the other troubles they endured, it's clear that the apostles had tremendous challenges. It was much more than you and I can ever know, but the joy of intimately knowing Jesus outweighed any challenges and suffering John and the others experienced. He had actually been with the Master, and through Christ, John encourages us to know our beloved Lord and Savior through God’s Word so that we, too, can share in his joy.

Many of us feel that we need to put on a face of happiness, when we are feeling the exact opposite on the inside. Jesus Christ never did this. He didn’t fake his joy; he is joy itself! He is life to us!  He is true blue—the real deal, and he is our example! And what an extraordinary example he is. Christ is so yummy, so kind, so awesome, so compassionate, so generous, and so loving; his standard is our benchmark for life! In the midst of whatever it is that we’re facing, we can have joy because of all that he accomplished for us. Now the trouble is, a lot of us haven’t gotten to the place where we fully believe this. Yes, we know that he gave his life for our sins. We know that because of him we can have a relationship with God, but for many of us that isn’t extending the kind of joy and happiness that it should. Why is this?

In 2Corinthians 4:2-4, the Apostle Paul said he and those that taught the Gospel had put off dishonesty, arrogance, and foolish things, and they didn't handle God’s Word deceitfully. However, some still would not delight in Christ. Paul said that the Good News about Jesus Christ is hid from those that are lost because the god of this world, the devil, blinds their minds so that will not believe. It is important for us to know this so that we will not allow the devil to use this same trick on us. The man that I mentioned earlier didn’t recognize that the devil was blinding him from the Good News. He blamed his unhappiness on people, things, situations, and even God.

Outside influences cannot control our internal being, they can’t control the way we think, feel, or act. God has given us free-will choice, and only we can control our emotions, thoughts, and actions. We control how we will respond to situations and people. No human being walking upon this earth has the power to make us feel or respond to something against our own wills. These feelings and emotions are already in us, and we make the choice to allow what is inside to be displayed on the outside.

Jesus Christ said in Luke 6:45(NLT), “A good person produces good things from the treasury of a good heart, and an evil person produces evil things from the treasury of an evil heart. What you say flows from what is in your heart.” Our pain is often a buildup of internal stuff that we’ve harbored in our hearts. And because some of us haven’t learned to walk in the love of Jesus Christ in a way that restores our hope, we hold on to the past. The door to the past is closed, and it can never be opened again. We have pain in our hearts during the holidays because we continue to stare at a closed door and have refused to pivot and move beyond it.

God doesn’t expect us to rejoice over the circumstances of our pain or the cause of it. He wants us to rejoice because of our faith in Him, because He is always with us and will never forsake us or let us down. We can rejoice because God has given us the Holy Spirit to fill our hearts with His love. It’s a love that is beyond understanding and comprehension. It’s so overwhelmingly comforting, so magnificently healing, and so exorbitantly rich that it will fill up our empty spaces. It will deepen our connection to God and cause His goodness to ooze from our every pore. Only the Holy Spirit can give us this kind of love, and if his love hasn’t touched you to the point of igniting your faith and filling your every move with joy, then set your dial to surrender.  You may be experiencing pain and hurt today, but if you’ll simply let go and let the Spirit do his most perfect work within you, you’ll triumph over your pain and be better than you ever thought possible.

Scripture quotations marked (NLT) are taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Inc., Wheaton, Illinois 60189. All rights reserved.

"Triumph Over Your Pain”, written by Kim for https://rescuefromdomesticviolence.blogspot.com© 2021. All rights reserved. All praise and honor to God through Jesus Christ, our Lord and Savior.