Harbor Church - Mid City

Seth: Why do people cry?
Maggie: What do you mean?
Seth: I mean... what happens physically?
Maggie: Well... umm... tear ducts operate on a normal basis to lubricate and protect the eye and when you have an emotion they overreact and create tears.
Seth: Why? Why do they overreact?
Maggie: [pause] I don't know.
Seth: Maybe... maybe emotion becomes so intense your body just can't contain it. Your mind and your feelings become too powerful... and your body weeps.

I was watching "City of Angels," from which this quote was taken from, and realized just how beautiful it is that God created us to be able to release our emotions - tears! In this movie, the angel Seth is trying to better understand humans. Maggie is a doctor with whom he comes in contact while taking one of her patients to heaven. Without spoiling the ending, Seth learns what it is like to love and lose: What it is like to face emotional pain.

I believe everyone on this beautiful planet has faced emotional pain at some point in their lives, and definitely will at some point if they have not already. No one goes around looking for it to happen, it just does. We lose loved ones, we lose jobs, marriages dissolve, we move away from friends and family, we are unable to have children, we get cheated, we are lied to, we become sick with diseases. Emotional pain is everywhere. We cannot escape it.

So what do we do with it? I have often watched movies where the actor throws his fist at God or screams out at the heavens, "Why?" We may not even think about praying our whole lives, but when we are facing emotional pain it is usually one of the things we do. We ask the question, "Why God?" Why does God allow this in my life?

I certainly don't have all the answers, but I have gone through enough emotional pain to know the ways not to deal with it, and am now learning the ways God wants me to go through it. It first helps to understand why God allows it. There is an all-surpassing power that comes from God when we face emotional pain the way God wants us to.

The most eye opening realization is that Christ experienced the most emotional pain possible. No human has even endured such as Christ, yet Christ never sinned. When you can come to understand that, you will be able to wrap yourself around the truth that God really loves you. For Jesus suffered far greater than you, for you.

Coming out of thinking "Why God?" to "Thank You, Lord, for these trials" is like the transformation a non-believer makes when he accepts Jesus Christ as his Savior. There is a sweet delight to be known in accepting God's will for your life, whatever that may be. Praising God no matter what happens, no matter what the circumstances.

I know in my life when things get too rough for me to handle on "my own" I turn to God. When things are going fine I don't seem to "need Him" as much. Trails are God's way of turning my head towards Him, getting my focus back where it should be. If I were flying in the air with Peter Pan or Superman, I wouldn't dare let go. Why is it that we think we can "fly" through life without holding on dearly to Jesus, to His Word? Yet, I try to do it all the time.

Taking hold of God's goals for your life will help you get through the pain you may be facing. God's goals for you are: to glorify Him, even in the midst of painful circumstances. To draw you into deeper intimacy and dependency upon Him through your trials, to be conformed more to the Christ's likeness through suffering, to serve eternal purpose through your time of trial and through what you learn in your time of testing.

Realize that God loves you, even in the midst of the pain. 2 Corinthians 4:7-9 says, "But we have this treasure in jars of clay to show that this all-surpassing power is from God and not from us. We are hard pressed on every side, but not crushed; perplexed, but not in despair; persecuted, but not abandoned; struck down, but not destroyed." The "treasure" is the trial.
Realize God's grace is sufficient, "But he said to me, 'My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.' Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ's power may rest on me. That is why, for Christ's sake, I delight in weaknesses, in insults, in hardships, in persecutions, in difficulties. For when I am weak, then I am strong." (2 Corinthians 12:9, 10)
God allows the trials in my life to grow my dependency on Chirst and His resources. God is pruning me so that I will produce more fruit, which to me is a wondrous thought. God gives freely His Spirit and His Word to guide me through the times of hardship. God wants me to face, acknowledge and experience emotional pain and use His means to be released from it. "There is an appointed time for everything. And there is a time for every event under heaven--A time to weep and a time to laugh; a time to mourn and a time to dance." (Ecclesiastes 3:1, 4)

I have to learn it is okay to cry, to mourn, to grieve.... God created us to do so. When I let go and let my tears flow, there is beauty in that. When I was younger I would fall into terrible depressions. Once I became a mother and wife I greatly feared doing this, so I trained myself to suppress my emotions. Neither one worked, nor was either response what God wanted me to experience. God wanted me to pass through the pain with Him to become more like Christ, to grieve with Him. For He is the only one who fully understands me and my pain.

"Therefore, those who suffer according to God's will should commit themselves to their faithful Creator and continue to do good." (1 Peter 4:19) The apostle Paul said, "Sorrowful, yet always rejoicing." Paul accepted his circumstances. We must, like Paul, realize Christ's grace and strength will overcome the pain of our weaknesses and difficulties. I often say to myself, "Even if ______ happens, God will give me the grace and strength to go through it." And He will, He does, if we lean on Him and never let go.

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