Sometime this past week, as I was doing a study on what it means to be "broken" in Christ...I came upon some interesting thoughts in regards to the "purpose of pain." Humor me if you will.

First off, the word "pain" occurs 25 times in the Bible. 9 of those times it is in comparison with a women about to deliver a child. When referring to woman about to deliver - it is intense pain, agony, sorrow, a writhing, anguish. Over and over we see this comparison with what people have had to go through as they experience some hardship or trial or testing. But how many emerge from this "pain of birthing" experience with a sweeter spiritual experience?

In the birthing of something precious/valuable in our lives and characters, there is almost always pain! It began when Eve ate the fruit of the tree in the garden of eden, and it will remain until the end of time. (Both when the men till the soil seeking for increase and when women give birth to children...and lots of other things in between!) Only when the earth is made new will there be no more pain in this process.

"And God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes, and there shall be no more pain..." Rev 21:4

But we still live in a world of sin and pain...so how does one cope today? How does one become "better" and not "bitter" from these experiences. I think, as I read these verses, it becomes easier if we can see the "greater good" and the "greater purpose" behind it all.

A very enlightening verse on pain goes as follows:

Job 33:19-20 "He is chastened also with pain upon his bed, and the multitude of his bones with strong [pain]. So that his life abhorreth bread, and his soul dainty meat. His flesh is consumed away, that it cannot be seen. Yea, his soul draweth near unto the grave, and his life to the destroyers"

At first glance, this verse sounds pretty morbid. But look at it more closely! It actually got me really excited. Through this verse I see that the purpose of pain is to draw us to the eternally important. We need to not be so much worried about the physical bread of life, but more concerned about the spiritual bread of life. We should abhor dainty meat...we should abhor the the temporal things of this world!

Most of all, the purpose of pain is to consume the FLESH, that it be destroyed and no longer seen in the life! Isn't our own "flesh" what so often gets in the way of our spiritual walk? Isn't our own flesh what constantly battles and wars within our soul to keep us from God?

Gal 5:17 "For the flesh lusteth against the Spirit, and the Spirit against the flesh: and these are contrary the one to the other: so that ye cannot do the things that ye would."

Pain is to bring about a "death experience" in that flesh and in our lives. Death to self and the old ways of living, death to sin! We are to die that Christ may live!

So when we read verses like,

Ps 34:18 "The LORD [is] nigh unto them that are of a broken heart; and saveth such as be of a contrite spirit."

Ps 51:17 "The sacrifices of God [are] a broken spirit: a broken and a contrite heart, O God, thou wilt not despise."

We can know that God does not wound us to break us but to make us. He does not kill the flesh to destroy our lives, but to give us new life! Pain is part of the "birthing process" that He uses to bring something more precious than we have yet experienced into our relationship and walk with Him. It doesn't have to make sense, and we don't always have to understand. (In fact, usually we wont!) But ultimately the question is, "Are we willing to be broken so that He can save us...for if any flesh yet remains, we will be lost!"

Deep gulp! Ahhhhhummmm..... "Ok God...chisel away!" ;-)