Isn't it just baffling when someone hurts us? The pain feels so unique so completely only for us that we buy the lie that no one will understand. That NO ONE has ever gone through this before. That you are crazy for experiencing this offense when
not a single human being on the planet has ever experienced it before you.
And then we hear someone share their own hurt story and we can't believe it! It's the same! They understand! You aren't crazy after all! There is such relief in knowing that someone has done this before, that someone walked the path you are on and lived to tell about it. Our own Pain Pioneer, if you will.
Does that mean we have an obligation to share our own hurt stories?
I struggle with that.
Especially when the hurt story involves characters that I love and have loved. That I trust and have trusted but some that I just
don't
trust anymore.
I struggle with the ouchiness of declaring out loud that which was so hard to admit to myself, alone, in the dark, staring at the ceiling of my bedroom.
I don't trust them anymore.
Youch!
It can all get so confused as gossip, this sharing of our lives and stories and making each other not feel crazy. Because no matter how you mask the identities of the characters involved, how vaguely you describe the circumstances and situations,
someone might figure it out.
With all the best intentions of support and Christian counsel, of testimony and glorifying God, someone might hear what you are sharing from someone you shared with because they were involved--they were part of the story.
And then the sharing of a hurt story creates hurt.
What are we supposed to do?
Hebrews 12:1-3:
Do you see what this means--all these pioneers who blazed the way, all these veterans cheering us on? It means we'd better get on with it. Strip down, start running--and never quit! No extra spiritual fat, no parasitic sins. Keep your eyes on Jesus, who both began and finished this race we're in. Study how he did it. Because he never lost sight of where he was headed--that exhilarating finish in and with God--he could put up with anything along the way: Cross, shame, whatever. And now he's there, in the place of honor, right alongside God. When you find yourselves flagging in your faith, go over that story again, item by item, that long litany of hostility he plowed through. That will shoot adrenaline into your souls!
--The Message
Isn't that an amazing translation? It stirs me to seek Jesus' hurt story and stop dwelling only on my own. Don't you love that Jesus never lost sight of where He was headed and that that focus allowed Him to put up with anything along the way?
Anything.
Really!
(My anything is so much different than Jesus' anything).
Hebrews 3 tells us that when we find ourselves flagging in our faith to go over that story--Jesus's story, again.
Item by item.
To me, that means, He is our ultimate hurt story teller. He not only wants to share every last juicy detail with us, He wants us to use it.
Retell it.
Live it.
Use it to pump up our souls!
Make our hurt story relevant only because we know the ending to His: And now he's there, in the place of honor, right alongside God.
And because He did.
And is.
I can too.
Strip down, start running--and never quit!
Maybe our hurts are to bring us to the grateful awareness of the precious privilege it is to run this race in the first place. And with the encouragement of those who have gone before.
That's so much better, don't you think?
