When Handel wrote the “Hallelujah Chorus,” his health and his fortunes had reached the lowest possible ebb. The right side had become paralyzed, and all his money was gone. He was heavily in debt and threatened with imprisonment. He was tempted to give up the fight. The odds seemed entirely too great. And it was then that he composed his greatest work – Messiah. We can say that Handel’s pain became his platform for ministry. Are you at your lowest moment? Do the odds seem entirely too great for you?

money gone?

ridiculed and criticized?

laid-off?

mounting debt?

failed relationships?

illness?

addiction?

uncertain future?

divorced?

dead-end job?

lonely?

overwhelming pressure on your job?

Are you tempted to give up the fight? Don’t quit! Don’t sulk! Because God is always doing something, cooperate with Him, even in pain. C. S. Lewis said that pain is God’s megaphone; he uses it to get our attention. This could be your moment – the moment where God uses pain to help you compose your greatest work – a symphony of your greatest music for others. Could it be that God is ready to compose Messiah in you so that others might be blessed through you! It is only when we:

Respond to our pain appropriately (count it all joy),

Understand the reasons for our pain clearly (the testing of your faith will develop patience and patience will lead to maturity and maturity will make us ready for anything that comes our way)

Rely on our Source, in the midst of our pain, absolutely (Ask God and He will give you wisdom to understand the reasons “why” or give you the strength when “whys” are not discernible).

that pain can truly become our platform for God’s greater purpose. Let your pain become your platform to listen to God, draw closer to God and to tell others about God.

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Recently, I spoke to some Christian athletes. I asked them how did they normally respond to hardships (torn ACL/ MCL/PCLs, loneliness, being ridiculed for their faith). They responded: fear, anger, “why me?”, self pity, aggression, despair, turning to abusive behavior, apathy, and turning to God. I told them they were carriers – carriers of pain, so they could ultimately be carriers of comfort. Just as I encouraged these athletes, Paul encouraged a group of believers in a town called Corinth.

He reminded them that afflictions were inevitable for the follower of Jesus. Many were being persecuted, imprisoned, and oppressed by unbelievers – all because their relationship with Jesus. But, Paul wanted the Corinthians to know that, in the midst of their trouble, God was their source of divine help. He would come to their side and help them to have godly responses. Then Paul gave two purposes why God allowed suffering: so, they could experience direct and personal comfort from God, and then from that experience, give God’s comfort to others (2 Corinthians 1:3-4). God allowed affliction and brought divine comfort so that the Corinthians might have the capacity to enter into another person’s pain, affliction and sorrow and bring comfort to them.

As we experience sufferings, affliction and pain of all kinds – physical, spiritual, emotional – let us remember that God will bring direct and personal divine comfort to us through his word, by the Holy Spirit and through fellow believers. Thus we are CARRIERS of pain, so we can ultimately be CARRIERS of COMFORT – God’s comfort. Sometimes we carry God’s comfort with consoling words and other times words are inadequate and get in the way. Thus, we must carry God’s comfort by the ministry of presence.

We are not comforted by God to be comfortable. Nor are we comforted by God to become consumers and connoisseurs of God’s comfort; we are comforted by God to be comforters. God comforts us so we can be CHANNELS and CARRIERS of COMFORT.  

How has this been true of you lately? How can your suffering and God’s comforting you through it, help you empathize with others? 

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Written and read by Marvin L. Williams

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I was hewn down and that’s when the process began.
The cuts were sharp and deep. I was not a fan.
The pain was excruciating.
It was a pain like no other.
It was exhilarating!
But running beside my pain
was the joy of the specialness I might gain.
My sculptor did not tell me what I would be;
I just sensed in me that I could be.
I was so common for so long,
and now I was being shaped into something
unique and strong.
The days went by very quickly.
From the cuts, scrapes and pounding, I was sickly.
I felt the impact
of a sharp blade go up and down my back,
“Whack!”
Then a hack on my back,
another attack,
without tact and
with lack of love.
But I truly knew
I was being made into something
special and new.
As the day of completion approached,
I wondered what I would be.
I was anxious to see.
Would I be a masterfully carved antique face
or would I be the first plank on the royal stair case?
Was I an emblem of some great god?
Or was I the spitting image of some Greek body?
This type of musing was to exhausting for me to take
so I slumbered into a deep sleep and dreamed about my fate.
I was awakened to a new twenty-four
and thought, ”what will people say
when he walks with me through the door?”
I smiled with elation and brimmed with great anticipation
for this was the day when I would see me, feel me, love me,
a masterful creation.
“Finished at last” the artist sighed.
I wanted to cry because for the first time
I felt complete inside.
I felt honorable and famous.
But what was I? I don’t know.
I can’t see my face yet.
The pace
was too great
as the artist moved me to another place.
“Slow down, Slow down,
so I can see what you made me to be.
It was as if he heard me.”
His steps were now methodical, unhurried, and tamed
as the weight of my biology
was buried and pressed into his weak frame.
I looked to the right and there, in a mirror of some kind,
That?!
He wasted His time!
When I saw my reflection
I felt dejection
and depression from
the rejection
that I would receive
from people’s impression of me.
I was not famous, but infamous.
I was not unique, but ugly.
I was not a picture of fame but an emblem of suffering and shame.
I was not a bed where great men would lie.
I was a rugged piece of wood where murderers, thieves
and a man named Jesus would die.
I was diabolical, theological, paradoxical
I was a Cross! A Cross!
An ignominious, beautiful and glorious Cross!

What or who is God making you to be? Is it what you thought it would be? How has he used your pain to make you into something beautiful? Something useful? Something and someone who gives life?

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