Pain

As a Pastor, I've often thought and fearfully prayed a line from U2's song "I Need Your Love" from the Rattle and Hum album which goes: "Like a preacher needs pain, I need your love." I remember my dad coming in my room one night somewhere around 1989. I had this album on (yes, album - as in 12" vinyl) and was talking with my dad about it. He picked up the record jacket and was reading through the lyrics, and came across this line and asked "What kind of pain does a preacher need?" My 16 year old brain was stumped.

My 33 year old brain is no longer stumped. Since that day in 1989, I've finished high school, college, moved more times than I care for, had a number of different jobs, gotten married, and am anxiously awaiting the arrival of our 4th child next Spring. I've also logged about 15 years of church ministry (10 vocationally) in which I've seen marriages fall apart, friendships fail, leaders fall and churches split. I've walked through and counselled people who are infertle, who are angry, whose children have run away from home, students that have been neglected, abused, and abuse themselves. For every victory a person celebrates in life, you can count on a list of about a dozen painful moments that are there as well. This is exactly why "a preacher needs pain": because life is full of pain, people are full of pain, and a preacher (pastor) needs to have experienced pain to identify, empathize with, and model how to deal with pain in life.

You see, if my life was pain-free, how could I possibly minister to hurting people? This doesn't mean that I like going through pain, but I know it's accomplishing a few purposes. First, it glorifies God. I believe everything happens for God's glory, whether good or bad. This is a hard pill to swallow, but in the end it's the only pill that makes sense. I'll post on this topic sometime in the near future. Second, it keeps me humble and dependant on God. Naturally, I'm pretty prideful and self-reliant. God knows this. God also knows that this is not a good thing. Sure, it has its benefits sometimes, but left to myself for too long, I'll screw something up. So God brings difficulty into my life to make sure I'm keeping Him #1 and to grow in my faith. Third, my pain will help somebody else. This is the heart of 2 Corinthians 1 where Paul expounds on the reason that we experience the good and bad in life is to bless somebody else by either rejoicing with them and magnifying the good in their life, or walking through the pain with them to make the bad in life more bearable.

I write this mainly because of 2 painful experiences that I am faced with right now. One is a pretty mild discomfort, and one is very painful on the hurt scale. The first has to do with a house we own. I'm in one of my favorite cafe's in Michigan right now writing this...but I live in Illinois, right? Right. Our house in Michigan still hasn't sold after being on the market for 6 months. Not even one offer. So, the family is up here gathering up the rest of our things to bring with us to Illinois as we prepare for the winter. Not a huge pain, but very uncomfortable. It's keeping us from fully being in Illinois and puts financial strain on us. But, the good in it is that I've been able to talk with other people who are in the same situation we're in, waiting for a house to sell. We commiserate together. It makes it more bearable. The difficult situation is a conversation I just had with one of my former students in a previous ministry I oversaw. She's trying to make sense in her life of a painful divorce that her parents are going through. The pain and confusion in her eyes saddens my soul. I have no real words to bring comfort to her...words won't do the trick anyway. She needs (and thankfully has) people to gather around her, feel with her, listen to her, and love her through this extremely painful time. But what can I identify with her on? These things: betrayal...disappointment...hurt...shock... confusion...the list could go on. In the end, I pray for her, hug her, and tell her to hang in there...and do my best to stay away from pithy statements like "God's going to work everything out" because she doesn't need that right now.

I just encourage you to not enjoy pain in your life, but at least welcome it and realize that it really isn't about you. God is reminding you of him, trying to get your attention to trust him a little more, and wants you to share your journey, your story, with others who will need to hear it so they can have some hope.

Grace & peace,

Ryan