Sometimes God Speaks Through Pain

Recently I have been walking, sometimes literally crawling, through a difficult time in my life. I have a herniated disc in my lower back, which has been a very painful experience. For the last 3 weeks I've had numbness and acute pain in my left leg too. After x-rays, MRI's, anti-inflammatory medication, ice, heat and chiropractic adjustments, I'm finally starting to get some relief.



I've been preaching a new series at church entitled, "When Love Comes to Town." The main premise of the series is the Greatest Commandment Jesus spoke about, which is to love God with every part of our being and to love our neighbor as ourself. Have you ever heard of the expression God speaks to us in His silence, but He shouts to us in our pain. Well that is exactly what happened to me. God "shouted" to me in my pain through His Word. He said "as the Father has loved the son, so have I loved you." WOW! Have you ever stopped to think about God's love for you? Sometimes God allows events to come into our lives to show His glory. As I sat in my office Saturday night making the final preparations for Sunday, God "shouted!" He loves you and I in our pain, in our frailties, in our insecurities, in our fears, in our doubts, and in times when we don't feel worthy of being loved. God loves us even when we are in open sin. He loves us enough to not let us stay the way we were. Let God love you too, His heart yearns for you to invite Him into the pain of your life.

Attitude Adjustment

This is my first blog entry! I pushed back the blogging "forces" for as long as I could, so I have finally yielded and have officially become a blogger. At first I saw blogging as just one more piece of communication that I would have to manage. My attitude was wrong. I needed to have my thinking adjusted to see the wonderful possibilities and benefits of blogging. One obstacle that I had to overcome was the idea that blogging is a form of narcissism. I thought who in their right mind would want to read about my daily life? Then I realized that this is a great tool to express myself and connect with people on a different level. We all need to have our attitudes adjusted at times, whether it is about our perspective on technology, family, virtues, faith or current world events. Thank God he is in the business of transformation. I'm looking forward to working blogging into my disciplines.