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The Need for Meaning Even in Pain
Maybe I should say, "especially in pain." Meaning in life is essential.
Having meaning in pain is even more so.
Recently Joey and I took the opportunity to hear Dr. Jordan B. Peterson’s lecture on We Wrestle with God presented in Oklahoma City. Peterson is an author, clinical psychologist, online educator and Professor Emeritus at University of Toronto. The Jordan B. Peterson podcast frequently tops the charts in the Education category.
Though we could not video, record or tape the lecture, nor because it was so dark, could Joey even take notes, I came away with some insights to share with you.
When he was young, Peterson researched Communism and Nazism, finding man can do evil beyond our comprehension. He described a “spirit” intertwining with man forming a relationship to devise extreme torture.
Certain circumstances led to the German people accepting these atrocities, some that parallel today.
Only a few individuals spoke against it. One, Dietrich Bonhoeffer, lived true to his convictions.
Today all of us are quick to say we’d be one of those, but he concluded no one is exempt from performing these evils.
He also equated their atrocities present in today’s families—illustrating with Dante’s Inferno.
No surprise there. The Bible says, The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked, who can know it? Jeremiah 17:9.
He then spoke of pain.
We can endure pain if it has meaning.
For example, a person will endure a lot of pain in service for others, because the pain holds a secondary aspect, the mission is more important than the pain.
Or a martyr will die in pain because the cause for which he dies is worth the pain.
The Nazis and Communists in their prison camps devised the ultimate torture—pain without meaning. Prisoners picked up rocks from one spot and moved them to another, only to return them the next day. Their pain had no meaning. It produced hopelessness.
(In applying this concept later, I thought of school children, who are given “busy-work” —work without meaning, not an accident.
Even coloring, when I tried to have my boys color in the coloring book, they resented the “fun”. They could extract no meaning. They thought it was torture. I stopped the busy-work in our curriculum.)
Allow me to elaborate on this concept of pain with meaning.
How does God give us meaning in pain?
Here are a few promises giving pain’s purpose:
Pain brings glory.
For I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worth comparing with the glory that is to be revealed to us. Romans 8:18.
Pain works for good.
And we know that for those who love God all things work together for good, for those who are called according to His purpose. Romans 8:28.
Pain is not permanent.
He will wipe away every tear from their eyes, and death shall be no more, neither shall there be mourning, nor crying, nor pain anymore, for the former things have passed away. Revelation 21:4.
Pain will bring Christ closer.
And after you have suffered a little while, the God of all grace, who has called you to His eternal glory in Christ, will Himself restore, confirm, strengthen, and establish you. I Peter 5:10.
Pain enables us to comfort others.
Who comforts us in all our affliction, so that we may be able to comfort those who are in any affliction, with the comfort with which we ourselves are comforted by God. 2 Corinthians 1:4.
Pain keeps us humble.
So to keep me from becoming conceited because of the surpassing greatness of the revelations, a thorn was given me in the flesh, a messenger of Satan to harass me, to keep me from becoming conceited. 2 Corinthians 12:7.
Pain brings purification.
So that the tested genuineness of your faith—more precious than gold that perishes though it is tested by fire—may be found to result in praise and glory and honor at the revelation of Jesus Christ. I Peter 1:7.
Pain tests our faith.
Count it all joy, my brothers, when you meet trials of various kinds, for you know that the testing of your faith produces steadfastness. And let steadfastness have its full effect, that you, may be perfect and complete, lacking in nothing. James 1:2-4.
Pain brings obedience.
Although he was a son, he learned obedience through what he suffered. Hebrews 5:8.
Pain perfects.
For it was fitting that he, for whom and by whom all things exist, in bringing many sons to glory, should make the founder of their salvation perfect through suffering. Hebrews 2:10.
Pain brings rewards.
Not only that, but we rejoice in our sufferings, knowing that suffering produces endurance, and endurance produces character and character produces hope. Romans 5:3-4.
If we endure, we will also reign with him, if we deny him, he also will deny us. 2 Timothy 2:12.
Pain brings the completion of the church.
Now I rejoice in my suffering for your sake, and in my flesh I am filling up what is lacking in Christ’s afflictions for the sake of his body, that is, the church. Colossians 1:24.
Pain is preparation for heaven.
So we do not lose heart. Though our outer self is wasting away, our inner self is being renewed day by day. For this light momentary affliction is preparing for us an eternal weight of glory beyond all comparison, as we look not to the things that are seen but to the things that are unseen. For the things that are seen are transient, but the things that are unseen are eternal. 2 Corinthians 4:16-18.
Pain with a purpose. God made sure we understood that we must suffer. But it would be worth it.
But notice in all those verses, that we don’t work to “figure out the reason.”
We mistakenly think, “If we learn the why, the pain will stop and we can get back to ‘normal’ living.”
That’s not a promise God gives.
In fact, we may never understand why we have a particular pain.
But God does promise His presence through the pain and that it’s worth it.
And so, we’ve again seen that element of trust Him when you can’t see.
A trust that proves our anchor holds through the storm.
What a great God we serve!
I write about what matters...to you---
women, wives and moms---
about your family, faith and future.
I write about what's hard, what helps and what heals.
I show you how it's done. And not done.
I hold your hand as you find what matters to the Savior.
And let go of those things that mattered to you, but not to Him.
I write about what matters...to Him.
Sonya Contreras
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Author of Biblical fiction, married to my best friend, and challenged by eight sons’ growing pains as I write about what matters.
Faith
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under the Table of Contents. Also available in book form.
Or here:
under the Table of Contents. Also available in book form.
Articles on Suffering can be found here,
under Table of Contents. Also available in book form.
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