Pain

The photo of the woman above has popped up on my Facebook feed multiple times related to the story of a drug bust near my home. I made the mistake, as many of us do, to read the comments. People trying to be funny, edgy or maybe their inner a**hole is showing. I get it. This person is an addict. Their choices are their own. We’ve heard it all throughout school, drugs are bad. Yet when I look at this picture I don’t look at the silly saying on the shirt or the pock marks on her face. I don’t see a druggie, I see a human being. Do me a favor, take a moment and look in her eyes. Can you see it? Can you see the sadness, the hurt, the pain? This woman is suffering, not because she’s been caught but because she’s drowning. There is no hope in her eyes.

We all make choices. We all make mistakes. We all have to suffer the consequences of both. I don’t know this woman’s story or what got her to this point. I don’t know why she started using drugs. Maybe she did it to mask the pain. Maybe it was peer pressure. Some people are more prone to addiction than others. All I know is she is hurting and the last thing she needs is for someone to poke fun of her plight. We do it thought don’t we? We laugh at someone else’s misery. I’m not sure why people are wired this way. Possibly it’s because deep down we’re miserable too so it’s nice to see someone who we deem to be worse off than us. It’s that whole “misery loves company” thing (think Nelson on “The Simpson’s”).

Can you imagine what would happen if we changed this thinking? If instead of worrying only about ourselves and reveling in someone else’s misery we instead became cheerleaders and champions for each other? Here’s the thing about life, it all ends the same. We may take different paths and have different journeys, but at the end of it all it all ends. If you believe as I do, then you have hope that life will continue on once this one comes to a close, but while we’re on this earth why not work together to make this life better for everyone?

Back to this woman. Her visible pain reminds me that there are many who walk this life and do a great job of hiding the pain inside. They’ll mask it with things they think will make them happy. They’ll hide it well when they’re around others. Deep down though, they’re hurting. They feel helpless or powerless, hopeless or alone.

Let me encourage you to do something. Look into the eyes of others. I think we’d be surprised what we’d find if we took the time. I’ll admit I’m terrible at eye contact as many of us are, but let’s take a moment to connect with people when we have the chance. Look into their eyes. Smile at them. Engage in small talk. If you spend a lot of time online, look for signs that someone is hurting, you’ll know. There’s another saying that goes “Helping one person may not change the world, but it may change the world for that person.”.

Giving Thanks

Tomorrow is Thanksgiving, a day when Americans unbutton their pants and turkeys run for cover. It’s also a time for families, both biological and not, to gather around the table and offer thanks for the blessings they’ve been given. For some finding things to be thankful for is an easy task to undertake, for others not so much.

I was having a conversation with one of my coworkers about the situation of another associate we work with. After discussing the fact that he is a new father she made the a comment along the lines of how it kind of puts your own life into perspective when you realize you don’t have it as bad as you sometimes think you do.

1 Thessalonians 5:16-18 says: “Rejoice always, pray continually, give thanks in all circumstances; for this is God’s will for you in Christ Jesus.” I’m reminded all the time that no matter how tough life can seem at times it could always be worse. So instead of whining about what I don’t have, I want to start being thankful for what I do have.

I have two beautiful daughters who think the world of me. I have a girlfriend who loves and cares for me despite my flaws. I have a family who loves me no matter what stupid things I do. I have old friends who have stuck with me through thick and thin. I have new friends, mostly coworkers, who have opened their lives to me and welcomed me in. I have a job, that while I keep hoping and praying for more, has allowed me to be further along this year than I was last year. I have my health, because this time last year I was sick and didn’t know it.

I also have a God who loves me no matter what mistakes I make in this life. A God who loved me so much that He gave His son to die in my place. A God that listens when I pray, and even though I may not get everything I ask for, gives me just what I need.

Because of my faith in God I have hope. I have hope that I’m not alone in this life. A hope that my life isn’t meaningless and that I’m alive for a purpose. A hope that a better day is coming. A hope that one day, when I take my last breath, He’ll be waiting there on the other side.

What are you thankful for? Take a moment to count your blessings, there’s probably more than you think!

Immunization

The past few weeks have been difficult for me. Honestly it’s been a tough year overall, mostly brought on of my own doing. But what has been most difficult for me is that the past few weeks I’ve been trying harder to get back where I need to be with God. I’ve been trying to pray and listen more. This is not the difficult part. The difficult part has been feeling like nothing changed with my prayers. I just felt like the ceiling was getting thicker and thicker, like God really didn’t care about my petty needs. I soon found myself wondering if maybe God was punishing me for my mistakes or if I was still not doing something right.

I can remember when my daughters were little and taking them for immunizations. It’s the hardest thing in the world to sit there while you see them in fear and pain, with their eyes looking up at you as if to say “Why are you letting them do this to me?”. You know that it’ll all be over in a moment and that ultimately it’s for their own good, but you also know that given the chance you’d willingly take their place.

This reminds me a lot of what Christ did for all of us. God knew that something needed to be done and that humanity was in need. So he sent his Son to earth to take our place. To walk in our shoes for a bit and tell us that a better way had come. Then in the ultimate act of love and sacrifice he took our place. The cross should have been ours, but Jesus stepped in. Romans 5:6-8 says: “You see, at just the right time, when we were still powerless, Christ died for the ungodly. Very rarely will anyone die for a righteous man, though for a good man someone might possibly dare to die. But God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us.”

I originally created this post hoping that some good news was coming my way in the form of a promotion at work. Unfortunately I didn’t get the promotion I was hoping for and to be honest I’m still struggling with that fact. But I decided to finish this post because I think there are a lot of others who feel like me. You keep hoping and praying for something good to happen and you see little glimmers of hope but then the hope fades and you are just left disappointed.

I’m not sure why God does this other than maybe He’s preparing us for something greater. I’ve been hearing people say this to me for the past year as I see a continued string of disappointments. I keep hoping that it’s true but my patience and resolve wears thin. It’s very difficult because there is that part of me that just wants to give up, cut my losses and run. The problem is if I were to do so, I’d be running from everything and everyone who has supported me through my difficult time, including my girlfriend, my family, my friends, my coworkers and most importantly God. I can’t imagine going through what I’ve gone through without all of them and knowing that God is indeed there. I do know there’s a new plan for me and I continue to hope that it comes to light soon. In the meantime, I must keep my faith and continue praying that God will give me the strength to make it through.

Christian musician Rich Mullins wrote this line in his song “Hard to Get”: “I can’t see where you’re leading me, unless you’ve led me here, where I’m lost enough to let myself be led.” Maybe in the end that is what this is all about for myself and anyone else who’s been struggling with this issue. Maybe we all need to lay down the plans we’ve made for our lives, and allow God to led us to where He wants us to be.