I really soaked in deep in this post by Jason Vallotton. I hope as you read it the great Comforter, Holy Spirit, would lift up the burden off your shoulders and walk you through pain and enter into victory and freedom. We serve a good God.
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Warning: contents in this letter may be honest…
Pain comes in many colors, shapes and sizes; when you least expect it and when you expect it the most. Bad news never has good timing, and there is no quick way to mend a broken heart. I lived life trying to walk the thin line of safety, carefully choosing every decision knowing full well that everyone will have an effect on my eternity; still at the end of the day it was not my choice that unleashed the crushing blow, it was the choice of another.
There is no vaccine strong enough to rid us of this disease called pain. It is not just a stab or blow; pain’s shape comes in the form of the onslaught and continual pressure of emotions previously unknown and unnamed. You are not immune if you hide at home all day, neither can you avoid it because you do not commit to marriage but instead, only choose to live together. It is false to believe that somehow you can live in this world and never be affected by your decisions and the decisions of others.
Pain according to the ‘Encarta Dictionary’ is defined (in the emotional sense) as merely ’severe emotional or mental distress,’ but that definition lacks the words and expression to truly define what everyone at some point in life will have to tempestuously endure. The phrase ’severe distress’ only causes me to picture a boat on a choppy sea or a tornado touching down on a grassy field. ‘Severe distress’ does not fully explain the inability to eat, the taste that lingers in the mouth, the lethargy the body succumbs to, or the way the mind shuts down to nothing but a dim survival mode. Pain is the blackest black, the numbest numb, the deepest deep; pain is feeling so much you cannot comprehend it, to the point that you believe you are not feeling anything at all. Pain temptingly beckons avoidance, denial, and fear. It can cause a person to never consider a bold move again. To be this strong as to cause complete avoidance (of not only pain, but also things such as love, people, communication, etc.) is to be beyond definition. It is not the ‘Encarta Dictionary’s’ fault for lacking creativity. There are just not enough words created to net the lashing monster that is pain.
In an attempt to avoid pain I find myself facing more than fear. I find myself facing a world that never was, and never will be, what I thought. Pain from betrayal causes me to acknowledge the deception I lived under, which in turn brings about more pain, and the realization that I must choose to survive. Head on; don’t look back, go through, and move through, the muck and the storm.
Loss of trust, unintentional fear, and hopelessness are the obstacles of pain. Waiting for the quick fix, the vaccine is nothing short of being stagnant. Pain does not call for action, but rather it beckons me to choose action (every waking moment, every sleepless night). Choosing to survive means choosing to look the ugliness of humanity in the eye; it means feeling the pain, but not giving in to its destructive temptations. Pain means feeling the worst you possibly can but then choosing to believe that there must be a complete opposite to the darkness.
The process of healing can only begin when we stop and stand our ground; when we face the terror of memories that have put us to flight. There is a mindset shift that must take place in order to walk out the road of wholeness. The memories that used to send me crashing are now welcomed in, each one is carefully pondered and mourned until the sting is gone. This is the practice of stewardship. That’s right, you have to steward every painful thought, looking at each one as a gift brought to make you whole. Once your fear is removed, there is an excitement that comes. The excitement lies in this truth: that every memory is a step towards freedom.
The promise of wholeness can be found in the beautiful book of James; ch.1 vs.2 ‘Consider it pure joy, my brothers, whenever you fall into trials of many kinds, because you know that the testing of your faith develops perseverance. Perseverance must finish its work so that you may be mature and complete, not lacking anything.’ This scripture displays the beauty in the breakdown. God has actually designed for our trials and heartache to bring us to a place where we will lack nothing. In the desolations of life, perseverance is cultivated and tested. This is the stewarding process of working through the pain without avoidance. Each trial stewarded becomes a harvest planted. When perseverance has run its course, there will be no lack.
There is no way around the inevitable pain that this burdened life will so gruesomely dish out. Nevertheless, we are not left to our own survival devices. We live under unavoidable and promising truths that summon our inner most parts to not just endurance of the strongest kind, but to strength previously unknown to our human mind. As we overcome each battle to work through hurt, mourn the memories, and face our fears, the monster of pain loses its force. And although we may have been stripped of everything we thought we knew or understood, we realize we lack nothing; we are free and we are whole.
- Jason Vallotton
Johnny
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