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Previous Daily Devotional About dealing with our pain… Matthew 4:24 News about him spread all over Syria, and people brought to him all who were ill with various diseases, those suffering severe pain, the demon-possessed, those having seizures, and the paralyzed, and he healed them. 25 Large crowds from Galilee, the Decapolis,F Jerusalem, Judea and the region across the Jordan followed him. (NIV) Matthew 9:36 When he saw the crowds, he had compassion on them, because they were harassed and helpless, like sheep without a shepherd. (NIV) We are the multitudes. Please hear our cry. We hurt. We seek an end to our pain in alcohol, drugs, sex, violence, and all kinds of addictive and dysfunctional behaviors. We hurt ourselves, sometimes on purpose, sometimes by accident. We hurt others, sometimes on purpose and sometimes accident. At our best, inside of us there is rage, pain, fear, and even panic, but we deny we have these. At our worst, inside of us there is nothing. The pain of our soul is unbearable. Our hurt is so deep we cannot fathom ever getting rid of the pain. We live in fantasy because our reality hurts too much. We cannot bear the thought of facing the world one more day. We cannot control anything in our world that is important so we live from day to day trying to outrun whatever it is that spins out of control inside of us. We are the multitudes. Please hear our cry. If you are one of the multitudes, your emptiness is seen and known by God. He has compassion for you and He weeps for you. Although you might not know it now or believe it now, God has His arms wrapped around you. Although you might not know it now or believe it now, God is pouring His love into your heart this instant. In our pain, we can forget God is alive and we can forget He is on our side. When we hurt, we can lose sight of the reality of God. When we hurt, we can come to believe there is no God. But God understands us and He forgives us for thinking and feeling as we do in our pain. In our intense pain, although we may come to believe God does not know about us or care about us, we must keep a mental picture of Christ sitting next to us. In our pain, we must keep a mental picture of Christ helping us overcome the barriers within our heart. In our pain, we must keep a mental picture of Christ healing us. In our pain, we must remember Christ heals today just as He healed when He walked the earth. The emptiness of your life can be filled with His love and grace. The emptiness of your life can be made into fullness by the power of His love. At the root of all our problems, even when we have hurts put upon us for unknown reasons, is our estrangement from God. What we must always do is always be willing to admit we are apart from God because our sin has separated us from God. Pain put upon us by others and by life should never empty out our souls. However, the reality of life is that pain does empty out our souls. The way to fill our souls is to turn toward God. Of course, we do not always mean to turn away from God, but the result of turning away from God is always the same…emptiness and pain piled on top of pain. To receive God's fullness in your heart and life, turn toward Him and not away from Him. To fill up your life with His beauty, truth, and love, turn toward Him and accept His only begotten Son, Jesus Christ, into your heart. For when you accept Christ into your heart, your emptiness disappears in the infinite love Christ brings to you and pours into your heart. |
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Care Ministries author and webmaster, Rev. Patrick Kelly, is affiliated through
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