Author: Adventures

At this point in the course, we’re going to move from processing our own personal pain, to understanding from a broader perspective why pain exists. So we’ve inventoried our own pain, we’ve grieved and processed it. And now we’re looking at ourselves as a subset of humanity whose condition looks and feels like our own. People the world over are often in terrible pain.   If you talk to people about the reasons that they doubt there is a good God who cares for them, one of the first things you’re likely to hear is “Why would a good God allow so much...

  In our last session, we wrestled with the question of “Why pain?” Why do the people I love struggle so? Where is God in the midst of the pain?   Today let’s look at some of the answers that the Bible and Christian thinkers give in answer to that question.   As I’ve shared with you guys, at times in my life, I’ve been in such pain it felt overwhelming. There were just no answers. Each new day felt as miserable as the one before it. And you have each shared that you have felt the same way. We are not unique – if we’ve felt isolated...

Our journey in this course has not been easy to this point. But some of you are starting to sense hope. Maybe you’ve felt a measure of the comfort you’ve been looking for. I’ve watched all of you pressing into your pain, even though you may have wondered “is this going to be worth it?” You’ve chosen to take a clear-eyed look at times of intense pain in your life. Some of you had to numb it or even wall yourself off from it just to cope. But then, leaving it buried and festering can be like when the doctor discovers an infection in the body – he has...

We are finishing a season of winter. Outside, everything outside turned dull and brown. The wind is whipping and there has been  frost on the windows. Coats and sweaters have been the wardrobe.   Winter is a time when all the evidence points towards death. In winter, the parts of life that were beautiful and growing fell to the ground. Cold air blows away everything green and vibrant. And sometimes our inner emotional life can mirror the weather. It can be a season where pain is our constant companion. We come to expect it. During winter, you can feel like the sun will never warm the earth...

This is directly from Seth’s blog:  As a leader, sometimes I’m called upon to inflict pain. I have to make decisions that hurt people in order to achieve some larger purpose. The danger in doing so is that I can keep that pain at arm’s length. I can delegate it to someone else. Or I can simply fail to empathize. Yet, that’s what good leaders do. It’s hard for anyone, whether they are just leading themselves or a thousand people, to embrace pain, even when that may be what God is asking of them. One of the hardest things about my leadership position at...

A foundational truth that we’ve emphasized so far is that God wants to take our pain and redeem it.  Unfortunately, evil wants to do the opposite. It wants to use the pain in your life and use it to separate you from all that is good. Evil is real and has targeted you for even greater pain. Evil wants to take all that you own, including those who are precious to you and even your own life. It wants to chip away at you until you are cynical, neurotic and depressed. It will target you and fill your mind with negative thoughts that you in turn slime others with Pain that festers...