Pain & Suffering

PAIN & SUFFERING

There is a saying that beauty is in the eye of the beholder. So too pain and suffering are in the emotions of the recipient. One thing we are assured of in life is death. We have faith for the rest. Pain and suffering. We want so desperately for things to go the way they are supposed to go, the way we plan for them to go, the way we want them to go. And when they don’t? The pain, the anguish that surrounds loss becomes great, so great at times that we get to the point where our strength is depleted and we want to give up. Yesterday I heard about a lady that was in anguish about the death of her mother. Her mother passed away last month and she just could not come to terms with this loss. The pain of the loss was becoming so great and the chasm that was created was deep. You see, she is not married and has a son, about 16 years of age. That is until the day before yesterday. In events too horrendous to recount, she lost her son yesterday. Stop all the clocks stop all the trains; my love is lost, my son is gone. Where do we go from here? How do even begin to even try and understand the anguish and pain of this daughter and mother? Do we say things like I feel your pain? We are walking with you in this? How can we?

It’s at times like this that we come to the end of ourselves, to the end of our power, the end of our strength, the end of our understanding, only to find in that place of powerlessness, a strength, and peace that was not there before.

I was inspired by a section in a book I read by Rob Bell, Drops like stars – It goes something like this:

“It’s in the place where we are reminded that true life comes when we’re willing to admit that we’ve reached the end of ourselves, we’ve given up, we’ve let go. We’re willing to die to all of our desires to figure it out and be in control.

We lose our life, only to find it.

We are going to suffer and it’s going to shape us.

Somehow.

We will become

BITTER

OR BETTER

CLOSED

OR OPEN

MORE IGNORANT

OR MORE AWARE

MORE

OR LESS

Tuned into thousands upon thousands of gifts we are surrounded with every single moment of every single day.

This too will shape me.”

Read a sample https://sample-f18295002a475010c20dd76faac71cbc.read.overdrive.com/?p=drops-like-stars

Take a look at this introduction.