Loving God when unexpected pain strikes is really hard, like trying to have kind feelings toward the hammer after it hits your thumb, a bee that stings your arm, or hot grease splattering in your face. But after a short rage which you hope Jesus didn’t notice, you get over it and go back to your more benevolent self.
Under the long-term vise of chronic pain, loving God is the only way to survive. He is our only hope, and we depend on that because we can.
“The Lord is my rock and my fortress and my deliverer, my God, my rock in whom I take refuge, my shield and the horn of my salvation, my stronghold. I call upon the Lord who is worthy to be praised and I am saved from my enemies.” (Psalm 18:1-3)
Thanking God after a long bout of spasms awakened an electric feeling in my soul. There seemed to be something bursting inside of me. With my whole exhausted being, I wanted to sing and dance with joy and see God’s face, to gaze at Him in adoration. David knew what my words couldn’t form -
“ I have set the Lord always before me, because He is at my right hand, I will not be shaken.” “You have made known to me the path of life, in Your Presence there is fullness of joy, at Your right hand are pleasures forevermore.” (Psalm 16:8,11)
What I was experiencing after the wrenching episode of spasms was adoration for Almighty God. How could the peace, praise, and joy pulsating through my veins not make me adore my Father in Heaven who had been at my right hand all along?
God uses hardship, suffering and affliction to show us where true joy can be found. He rescues us so that we will adore Him and know the beauty of His glory. This, too, is another gift from pain, like “honey pouring from a rock” (Psalm 81:16).
In pain is the gift of Adoration