Finding Hope and Healing in Suffering

1. "Life's full of trauma and it's full of pain and it's full of suffering, even for us as Christians. And in fact, I would say that of all the promises for Christians in the Bible, the one that we can all personally, universally attest to is John 16, 33, where Jesus said, here on earth, you will have many trials and sorrows. Can I get a witness? Amen. And if that's where you are today. If you're in a place of trial or loss or sorrow or discouragement or despair, I just want to tell you as your church family, man, we're here for you and we want to share your pain with you and we want to bear that pain with you and we want to just pray with you." [00:00:27] (45 seconds) (Download raw clip | Download cropped clip)


2. "So a really common and really hard question that specifically atheists like to bring up when they're arguing against Christianity is they will say, well, if God is all good, if God is all powerful, how do you explain pain and suffering? I mean, if God loves me completely and if he can do anything, why would he let me get sick? Why would he let my kid get sick? Why would he let my relationship fall apart? Why would he take away my mom or my dad? And these are really hard questions, and they're really difficult to wrestle with. But the truth is, on earth, pain and suffering are unavoidable, and they're undeniable, and they're undeniably hard for every religion and for every belief system and for every philosophy to deal with." [00:02:31] (56 seconds) (Download raw clip | Download cropped clip)


3. "And then Christianity, I think, is different. You know, Christians don't see suffering as some sort of test or divine obstacle course to keep us out of God's presence. God wants us in his presence. And we don't see pain and suffering as a punishment for our failures of the past because Jesus took our punishment. And we don't see pain and suffering as a way to teach us not to become attached to people because God wants us to be connected to one another. And as real and as difficult as pain and suffering are, we don't see them as being meaningless because we find meaning and we find truth in this. Our God does see and care about our pain and suffering." [00:05:37] (48 seconds) (Download raw clip | Download cropped clip)


4. "So Christianity has a really unique perspective on pain and suffering. Christians believe that pain and suffering are not what we experience. They're not what God chooses for us or wants for us. They're a natural result of the separation of God and man and man from each other that was caused by choices that we've made to follow our ways instead of his ways. And we believe that those choices, and even the pain that those choices cause us are redeemable. And that someday Jesus will come back and he will dry every tear and he will undo every wrong. And he will make all things right. Jesus is new again when his kingdom is fully come. And between now and then, Jesus is with us. In fact, his spirit is in us to help us get through the pain and suffering of this world." [00:06:37] (53 seconds) (Download raw clip | Download cropped clip)


5. "And Christians believe that God is somehow able to do what he says in Romans 8, 28. That he is able to cause everything. Even our pain and our suffering, he's able to cause everything to work together for our ultimate good. And our God knows that the real best thing for us is real intimate relationship with him and with each other. And sometimes he uses the pain and suffering of this world that he hates, but he uses it to draw us closer together. And to draw us closer to him and Christ. And Christians believe that even when it's the hardest and the darkest and the scariest and the ugliest and the most painful, even when we experience real loss and sorrow and despair, they God can turn our tears into joy. And then he can turn our ashes into beauty." [00:07:45] (63 seconds) (Download raw clip | Download cropped clip)


6. "So we've been talking about the practices of Jesus. These are just ancient, you know, activities and behaviors of Jesus that we want to practice so we can be more like Him. And these things are designed to slow our lives down and to open our lives up so that God can do His transforming, miraculous work in us. And as we do these things that we can do through these practices, God does in us what we can't do, and He transforms us to be just like Jesus, the only complete, complete, complete, complete, complete, complete, complete, complete, complete, human that has ever lived in total communion with God." [00:09:57] (31 seconds) (Download raw clip | Download cropped clip)


7. "And if that's what you've been experiencing when you quiet yourself, then you need to know that you're not alone and that it's not uncommon at all. And it makes sense. If you think about it, like after a lifetime of staying busy, right? After a lifetime of just going and running and staying busy all the time, partly to avoid facing pain, then yeah, sometimes when we quiet down and sometimes when we slow down, it catches up with us. And what comes up first when we quiet ourselves is what John Mark Homer calls undigested emotional pain that we've just, you know, pushed down or distracted ourselves from or tried to ignore by being busy." [00:12:01] (58 seconds) (Download raw clip | Download cropped clip)


8. "So whether it's in this quiet time or maybe it feels like it's all the time, uh, feeling loss and feeling pain doesn't mean you're doing it wrong. It doesn't mean, like, you're a bad, um, practicer of the practices. It actually might mean that you're doing it right. Because as you begin to, like, um, purge? Right. That's what it's about. stuff as you begin to kind of detox your spirit of the leftover hurt from your past that can be a really important step in part of your spiritual formation so remember these practices they're not you know just stuff we do you know these are not just a checklist of things to do so that you don't go to hell anymore. These are intentionally designed by God to slow us down and open us up and create time and space for him to do this supernatural work of making us more like Jesus." [00:13:36] (54 seconds) (Download raw clip | Download cropped clip)


9. "And that's a positive thing. I love how John Mark says this. He says, pain is an invitation from your soul to explore a path in your story. And that's a positive thing. And that's a positive thing. And that's a positive thing. And to follow it down to its origin point in search of healing. Yeah. So if you think about like physical pain in your body, when you get hurt, pain is your body's way of drawing attention to that area, that part of you that needs attention. It needs healing. It needs care. It needs love. It's a signal to your mind that something is wrong and something is in need of healing. And emotional pain is very similar. It can be a signal to your body that something is wrong. It can be a signal to your brain that some aspect of your person, some part of you is in need of attention and is in need of healing and is in need of love." [00:15:04] (49 seconds) (Download raw clip | Download cropped clip)


10. "So pain and suffering come to all of us. And it's not necessarily a bad thing. Maybe it needs to come to the surface so we can find some healing. We have to figure out how to deal with it. And if Jesus' way of dealing with pain and suffering isn't denial or detachment or drugging it, what is it? You know, what does it look like? It sounds great to say, let's meet God in our pain. But like, what does that look like? And specifically, how does our rabbi, how does Jesus teach and model for us how this life's unavoidable pain and suffering can actually do something good and even become part of God's transforming process of making us more like Jesus?" [00:19:24] (44 seconds) (Download raw clip | Download cropped clip)