Emotional Pain. It can be hard to know what to do when we are hurting.
Inundated with pain and sadness that makes us want to cry for hours, we feel lost and all alone. Our hearts become mangled beyond recognition.
One blow. A twinge of pain. Two blows. Excruciating pain. Three blows. The depths of despair!
Completely subjugated on a bed of affliction, we feel buried under a mound of mental anguish.
As Christians, we tend to feel guilty when we experience negative emotions.
That’s when we act in pretense and find the nearest rug to sweep our feelings under while telling ourselves, I can’t let anyone know I am hurting. They will think I’m not a good Christian; that I don’t ‘have it altogether!’
As we repress our true feelings, the slightest provocation sets us off. When they surface, we are shocked! Where did that come from, we wonder?
Comparing ourselves to others, especially the men in our lives, doesn’t work. They are wired differently. They compartmentalize their heartache and move on without a second thought.
As a woman, this method is foreign and far reaching.
Overcome with machine gun emotions pelting us from every side, we quickly retreat to our bedrooms with a box of Kleenexes. We cry until we have a sinus headache, our voices become nasally, and our eyes are bloodshot.
Finding out our teenager is on drugs. Our spouse betrays us by having an affair. Learning our unmarried daughter who is still a kid herself is expecting a baby. A good friend we thought we could trust falsely accuses us. A business partner doesn’t uphold his or her end of the deal. Our spouse gambles away their paycheck leaving us without money to pay our rent. We read about an innocent child abused by a parent.
Pretending our emotions do not exist is not the answer.
We must deal with our feelings in a healthy manner. Talking about how we feel with a trusted friend or our spouse and praying about them is crucial. It’s okay to be honest and ask the Lord to help us work through the issue we are struggling with.
God created us to be emotional beings, but balance is key.
What do we do with all of the pain when it becomes unbearable, causing us to feel we can’t take another shard of glass? Stuff it? Run from it? Pretend it doesn’t exist?
1. Talk to the Lord about it in prayer!
2. Share with a trusted friend, get their feedback, & pray together.
Our pain, when given to the Lord, is never wasted. It has a purpose. If we choose to embrace it, it will make us stronger and make us more like Jesus.
A stranger asked a Silversmith who was refining silver “How do you know the right amount of heat needed for the refining of the silver?”
He looked up and said, “When I can see my own reflection.”
The Lord refines us through pain and difficult circumstances for the purpose of eventually seeing His reflection in us.
Through it all, even our crazy emotions have a purpose. They remind us we are frail human beings in need of the daily grace and strength of God. As our trust in God increases, we come to realize, we are never alone…
He rides the waves of our raging emotions. He knows what we are going through and He’s not afraid of our feelings! After all, He’s the God of the Universe. Sometimes He calms the storm. Other times, He calms the child!
By: Carole McDuffee