No pain no gain

When your in pain, what is the first thing that comes to your mind? You want it to end right? Yeah me too. Whatever circumstances we are in that causes us discomfort we want stopped and right now! What if the pain we were experiencing had a profound purpose? Would that change things? When Paul was in prison, and let me tell you that prison was horrible then, he had this incredible focus on what his mission was. In Philippians 1 he talks about how he was in prison for preaching the gospel of Christ. He suffered much there but his suffering looked much different than mine does. Instead of being fully focused on ending his situation, instead he looked for purpose in his suffering. He found it too! While he was in chains, others outside , who before were scared to preach the gospel, seeing Paul’s courage to face imprisonment or even death, rose up and began preaching the good news of Jesus’ salvation. Also the guards of the prison noticed Paul’s attitude of joy and knew that he was different from other prisoners. Imagine if we could fully trust God, as Paul did, in whatever terrible thing we were going through? Instead of fixating on the end, we were to pray for understanding of what good thing God had planned to come from it? One of the hardest things in my life was going through the illnesses and death of my parents. It was awful. Through those experiences though I have been able to comfort others who are going through that. Our pain isn’t wasted. God can use it for his glory and the good of others and us! None of us like pain, but maybe we should suffer better by having joy knowing that God will not waste our pain!! Thank you Lord for the hard times! Help us to see the good you do in and through our suffering.
Love you folks!