I have no clear recollection of a life without pain.
Although it didn’t dominate my life as a young child as much as it does now, for roughly thirty years, I’ve been housed in a physical frame that’s baseline is one of physical pain and illness.
When physical affliction is a way of life, there is no framework for what life might be like without the constant awareness of discomfort on the best days, and utter agony on the worst days. You wonder what life must be like for those who are blissfully unaware of a body that works as it should. What is it like for food to simply be enjoyed rather than feared for the pain it might trigger with it? What is it like to think without pain-fractured thoughts, make plans without caveats, or begin a day without already being depleted?
Personally, I don’t know. And maybe it’s good that I don’t. Merely a taste of sweet relief would likely make the bitterness of pain all the more unbearable.
If you know the life of daily, moment by moment, relentless physical suffering, you know it all too well. Everything has a cost. And it’s a cost few can see. You learn to smile through the stabbing torment of misfiring nerves. You sit in the stands and cheer for your child, despite the nausea sitting in your throat, and an eye on nearest the bathroom. You swallow your pride when you hear the familiar disappointment in your friend’s voices when you cancel at the last moment – again. You sit at the stove and stir with pure resolve, fighting for the last ounce of strength that you used up hours ago.
Somehow, you just keep going. Sometimes forgetting it’s all you know, sometimes wondering how long until you are freed from this wretched frame you call home.
For those doing this life without Jesus, I don’t know how you do it. I would have given up long ago. But I fight another day because I have been brought to the end of yourself and found the arms of Jesus at rock bottom.
Somewhere in the misery, in the debilitating weakness and sorrow and agony, Jesus becomes all the more real. He isn’t just the example to follow in a Sunday School story; he isn’t just there to slap a spiritual label on your self-absorbed life; and he isn’t there as a backup plan if life doesn’t pan out the way you want.
He’s the man of compassion who searched for and healed the desperate bleeding (unclean) woman who merely had to touch the hem of her Savior’s robe for him to draw close (Matthew 9:20-22). He’s the man who wept with Mary in her grief, despite knowing he would raise her brother Lazarus back to life moments later (John 11:33-35). He’s the man who fiercely defended the blind man when the disciples accused him of suffering because of his own sin (John 9:1-4). He’s the tender Lord who pulled little children onto his lap and pursued those who society cast aside. And he’s the enduring Savior who remained on the cross for us, even as he was crushed by the unimaginable weight of the world’s sin and the full agony of pain and suffering that we experience in this world.
Jesus isn’t naive to a life of pain. He was well-accustomed with grief. Because of that, he’s a perfect, ever-present Friend and Savior to those of us who are acutely aware of our need and the wretched pain of this world.
I wonder, if our life in this world is predominately marked by pain, how much sweeter will Heaven be to us than if it had been marked by ease? Maybe the unveiled presence of Jesus will be all the more glorious in the light of eternity because we knew his palpable presence in the darkness.
After all, Paul has told us,
“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
I don’t know about you, but I am keenly aware of my “wasting away”. My broken body is a daily reminder that this world isn’t as it should be. But it’s also a tangible reminder that this isn’t my home.
Truly, pain will bring the proudest to their knees in an instant. We are so much more fragile than we like to think we are. And yet, despite how much I despise the pain itself, I also believe it’s one of the only places we truly come to experience the depths of Jesus’s strength and presence of comfort.
Pain may be a taste of the hell we’ve been spared from, but it’s also a taste of the heaven that’s coming when Jesus meets us in it.
And he promises he will.
Home is around the corner,
Sarah
To read more of Sarah’s writings, you can pick up a copy of He Gives More Grace: 30 Reflections for the Ups and Downs of Motherhood, Hope When It Hurts: 30 Biblical Reflections to help you grasp God’s purpose in your suffering), Tears and Tossings (short evangelistic resource on how God carries our sorrows), or Together Through the Storms (for married couples navigating the trials of life). Lastly, you can now order Sarah’s Pilgrim’s Progress inspired children’s book based on the account of the Prodigal Son, titled “The Long Road Home” (Crossway).
Set Apart 
I think one of the biggest battles I’ve had lately with the years of chronic pain is the temptation to think that somehow I’m more spiritual than those who do not have it. That somehow I’m special because of it. I am special, just as those who do not have this kind of suffering or special, because that’s who God imparts us to be. It’s hard because only God can judge. And sometimes it feels unfair, but then it is unfair that I live in a country where I can worship freely when so many of my brothers and sisters do not. I don’t have to worry that somebody is going to burn my house or my church down or shoot my children because we are Christians. Certainly there is a little bit of that here in America now, but not on the level that it is and
Even as I read the parable of the rich man and Lazarus, because the Bible is very clear that lack of love for the poor and the oppressed is as damnable a Sin as murder, I am tempted to feel that somehow my poverty at times, my physical illness and years of pain is the reason that I’m blessed or close to God. But that would deny the working of the Holy Spirit in those many people around me that do not have that. I believe each one has their own cross and I struggle sometimes with an air of superiority. And I have to actively take the word of God, the sword of the spirit and come against the lies.
I do not know why some have certain suffering and some do not. I believe some of it is just this Fallen World so out of whack with the original creation intent. I believe some of it is choices that we ourselves make or that others around us have made that were poor choices spiritually or physically. But the beauty is that all of these whirling thoughts and arguments are at the cross. It is finished. He is enough. And I can Rejoice with my friends that are healthy in their walk with God, being honest that in some cases I am more mature spiritually than some of my friends because of my years of walking with him, but certainly with no question my pastors who often over the years have helped me walk through these battles, are of deeper maturity than I am spiritually, because maturity is measured not by knowledge but by love. They are more patient than I am, often more kind. Love does not envy and it’s so tempting to Envy those who seem to have it easier.
but here I am in this moment in time. And he is the resurrection and the life, he is the Alpha and the Omega the author and finisher not just of my faith but of those around me and he is enough.
I love that God is the I am. He’s not the I was or the I will be. And I can trust in his love and he understands when I long for deliverance and healing. He understands when I want things to be more easy a body that doesn’t react to every little trigger. He has Mercy on my constant foolish overspendings when I feel too sick to even navigate pulling out the food that I cooked the night before for tonight’s dinner and get it on the table, and once again though he’s helping me grow in this area, spend money that does not exist on eating out. And his mercies are new every morning and somehow every day the bills are covered and paid because he is faithful when I am not.
I have never been too scared about the pain until about 8 months ago when by God’s grace it started to subside. And I missed it. I wanted it back I had grown so used to it. That scared me. Even now I am doing better I can walk now. Where I could not walk before but part of me is like oh well shouldn’t I be sick God? Don’t you want me still sick? But to everything there is a time and a season and it’s okay to pray and ask for healing. It’s okay to rest in the job seasons knowing that God is enough. When I was at my worst Point job became my favorite book of the Bible. I had never understood it before, but when I was in my darkest season where I couldn’t even not have terror unless one of my daughters held me, it was the worst thing I’ve ever gone through and I pray nobody have to go through that, but yet in the midst of those moments of our toes touching hell, we’ve serve and live for the one who broke down the barriers and says that the Gates of Hell shall not Prevail against them. I wanted God to take me out of the fire but he and able to me to endure and come out unscathed spiritually and so now I’m able to walk into the fire and bring others out. And it’s a beautiful place. But I pray on faithful because the Temptation is not to go back into the suffering and it takes wisdom through the spirit of God to know when he is asking me to rest and to heal and when he is asking me to go back in and enter in promising me that one way or another he will always bring me out..
but he is Lord of his people and of his sheep and it is not my pain or suffering that makes me special, or them, it is his love he loves us all so very much and he invites us to take up our cross and follow him into the suffering of this world. To use our time energy money and resources to live fully for him and the kingdom of God.
My head is a bit gooey today so forgive the ramble I have always been so blessed by your posts.
Galatians 6:14 NIV[14] May I never boast except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, through which the world has been crucified to me, and I to the world. https://bible.com/bible/111/gal.6.14.NIV
to everything there is a time and a season. Wisdom through God’s grace is knowing what time it is.
Job 19:23-27 NIV[23] “Oh, that my words were recorded, that they were written on a scroll, [24] that they were inscribed with an iron tool on lead, or engraved in rock forever! [25] I know that my redeemer lives, and that in the end he will stand on the earth. [26] And after my skin has been destroyed, yet in my flesh I will see God; [27] I myself will see him with my own eyes—I, and not another. How my heart yearns within me!
https://bible.com/bible/111/job.19.23-27.NIV
I always found that so amazing. Job was a contemporary of Abraham. And God heard his plea. Does anybody see how amazing this is? God hears our prayers and answers them. Job asked for the impossible. For his words to be recorded for eternity. And God inscribed his words into the written word of God, preserved for eternity. There is nothing more amazing to me than our God.
Luke 13:16 NIV[16] Then should not this woman, a daughter of Abraham, whom Satan has kept bound for eighteen long years, be set free on the Sabbath day from what bound her?
”https://bible.com/bible/111/luk.13.16.NIV
and then there was a season for job as well when it was finished and he was no longer sick. I know for us that might be here in this life, but as we look at the world around us we know for many, there will be an eternity to enjoy without pain or suffering or starvation or fear of War because God does hear our prayers and answer them as we cry out to him day and night for his kingdom to come and his will to be done on Earth as it is in heaven. And it is written he is not willing that any should perish but that all come to knowledge of his love.
💞 he is all together lovely.
hugs and God’s peace.
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If Jesus walks alongside us during our hardest times, He must always be with you, Sarah. God bless you and keep you strong. 🙂
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Father, thank you for Sarah. Thank you for the new heart you have given her. Thank you for her gift of writing in a way that glorifies your Name. Father, will you keep her faith, guard it and protect it. Grant her ease of pain, even if just for a moment. Thank you for her hope of heaven, keep it burning for her. Oh the day when we behold Jesus Christ, the Righteous, in all his splendor and holiness. Impress that day on her heart and mind and thoughts. Keep her in perfect peace as her mind is stayed on you as she trusts in you. Keep encouraging weary saints through Sarah’s writings. Thank you that we know her pain is not in vain but it shaping and molding Sarah to look like her blessed Savior. And oh how beautiful she will be, presented spotless and holy without spot or blemish or free of all pain. We love you our Great King. Come quickly!
in Jesus precious name, Amen
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Brittany, what a beautiful prayer and such a gift to me. Thank you, sister. ❤️
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