As much as we try to ignore it, we all have pain in our lives. And we all touch the pain, one way or another, for better or worse, in each other’s lives. Yet as universal as pain is, we typically don’t talk about it, for a couple of good reasons.
First and most obvious, we don’t want to. Who wants to talk about their pain? The other person will think there’s something wrong with me. They won’t understand. And that will just compound my shame. But what we don’t realize is that the other person is often thinking the same thing.
Second, often it’s not safe. What I italicized in the previous paragraph might be true. It’s not safe to be honest when the other person can’t handle our honesty. It’s wisdom to carefully select who we share our pain with.
But the truth is, everyone needs to talk about their pain to someone. We were created in the image of God, who, within the Trinity, has community within Himself. We were created to need and to heal in community. That can be scary, because often community caused our pain. But healthy community is the environment needed for pain to heal.
So we all need to share our pain, even if it’s just with one other safe person. And we all need to become safe people who can receive someone else sharing their pain without doing more damage.
When someone finally takes the risk to share their pain, so often we unknowingly just do more damage and we compound their shame because we don’t know how to receive someone’s story well. We’ve never been trained.
A first step in remedying this problem is understanding 2 universal, Kingdom-of-God laws about pain.
Shout-out to Aundi Kolber, whom I first heard express these so eloquently (at a Broken to Beloved Gathering.) Aundi’s books Try Softer and Strong Like Water have been game changers for me, and I recommend them often.
Law #1: All pain deserves to be honored.
That’s counter-intuitive, isn’t it? We typically try to:
- Stuff our pain. Push it down. What? Pain? Nope, no pain around here. I’m good.
- Hide our pain from everyone else. Q: How are you? A: I’m so blessed!
- Medicate our pain. Feeling nothing is better than feeling the pain!
- Shame our pain. I shouldn’t feel this way!
- White-knuckle our pain. If I can just try harder…
But honor our pain? What kind of crazy talk is that?
But it’s true. All pain deserves to be honored. Because it’s your story. And you matter. So your story matters.
Although those things listed above may bring temporary relief, none of them brings healing. Honoring our pain brings healing.
To bring healing to others, we need to be a two-fold witness for them:
- Witness that their pain is valid.
- Witness that what they experienced was wrong.
Being a witness means letting them hear you speak it. Out loud. Their ears need to hear it because their heart needs to hear it.
- “Wow, that must really hurt.”
- “He should not have said that.”
- “It’s wrong that you grew up without a dad.”
- “It’s wrong that your voice was shut down like that.”
That’s how a wounded heart screaming to be heard begins to heal.
Ok, but where is that in scripture?!?
Right here in Romans 12:15: “Rejoice with those who rejoice, weep with those who weep.”
But too often, we act as if that verse says this: “Rejoice with those who rejoice, and tell those who weep why they shouldn’t weep.”
We give advice or platitudes, or even scripture, because we don’t know what to do with someone else’s honest pain:
- “Just choose joy!”
- “Have faith, God’s got this.”
- “It’ll be ok, God won’t give you more than you can handle.”
- “God works all things together for good.”
This is called spiritual bypassing – when we put a spiritual bandaid on a bleeding artery, in the form of a quippy quick-fix or even scripture, because we don’t know what to do with someone’s pain. Although we don’t intend it to be harmful, it is. It dishonors their pain and their story. It communicates that we don’t understand their pain, and they need to learn to hide it better so they don’t get shamed further for it.
Instead, if we want to bring God’s healing, honor their pain, like this:
- “Thank you for sharing that with me. That was very brave.”
- “That sounds really hard.”
- “You’re not a bad Christian for going through this.”
- “Tell me more about that.”
Although the red bullets above might be true, that’s not what they need to hear first. First, honor their pain, and then you earn the right to ask if they’d like some ideas from you.
It’s really important we, as the Church of God, Jesus’ hands, feet, mouth, and heart in the world, get this right. Because if we don’t honor their pain, we’re doubling it.
Law #2: Our pain doesn’t give us the right to hurt someone else.
Hurt people hurt people. It helps to understand someone’s painful behavior when you know their story, and the pain that behavior is coming out of. But someone’s pain, ours or anyone else’s, doesn’t give the right to inflict pain on others.
Often people react to their own victimization and abuse by abusing some other victim. If I’m abusing a victim, I must not be one, right? But obviously, this is not a godly response to pain.
The truth is, we all need to do our own work. Trauma that is not transformed is transmitted.
Your Turn
Does this resonate? Has someone dishonored your pain with spiritual bypassing? How did that feel? Or have you (unknowingly) dishonored someone else’s pain, and then wondered why they withdrew? Honest moment – I have. How have you seen these two laws of pain play out in your story? Tell us in the comments and please share this post if it would bless someone else.
Do You Want Help?
Are you carrying pain that’s never been honored? Has your pain been shamed instead? I am so sorry; that’s not what you, as a Child of God, deserve. Reach out to Dave and Janet for an inner healing session. We use a combination of Biblical truth and brain science to facilitate a safe, gentle way to experience a two-way connection with Jesus, get unstuck, and receive the healing he has for you.
Please Share
Please share this post if it would bless others. You are a critical part of helping us get this message out to those who need it.
Thank you so much for this.
I grew up in church, I was a zealous congregant attending prayer meetings, youth group etc. without fail. I did this out of my own volition. Christ was (and STILL IS) my greatest treasure.
However when I left for university and dealt with really bad mental health issues I felt like a loser. My mother shared my struggles with a church leader who questioned my faith. It seemed like the suicidal thoughts and subsequent attempts were due to a lack of faith.
Church never felt the same after that. I’ve always felt like a pariah, not just in church but everywhere. But church was supposed to be different right? Unfortunately it wasn’t.
To this day, 4 years later, I struggle to find community in church or anywhere else really. But it’s okay, I’ll give it all to God. He’ll heal this tattered and bruised heart of mine.
Oh, Michelle, I’m so sorry for what you’ve gone through. Your pain deserves to be honored, not shamed, and I’m so sorry that many churches don’t know how to do this well. The truth is, your suicidal thoughts, and subsequent attempts, *are not* a lack of faith. They are a sign of wounding that that Jesus wants to heal.
I highly recommend the book I Love Jesus but I Want to Die by Sarah Robinson.
And please feel free to reach out to Janet and me. We use the Immanuel Approach, a gentle way to connect with Jesus without shame. It’s very effective for healing trauma.
We look forward to hearing from you. You are not alone.
I grew up believing pain was not to be honored and only healthy people carried their pain hidden in form -so that they may be a blessing to others. It was never okay to show that you hurt because if you did, how could you be a servant to others? The problem however, is denying the pain in our own lives leads us to a fatigue far greater than it ever was in the beginning. We also begin to push away our Creator, who wants to get close to us and carry us at times in our hurts. We come to a point of hurt so tangled in shame, that we don’t know how to crawl out and through it anymore. God never meant for his flock to be in perfect form to care for another. Our own painful experiences, when cared for in a healthy manner, grants us the tools to empathize so well with another’s pain. We can utilize our scars to care for others, bringing them closer to their own healing.
Thank you for sharing this beautiful truth.
Thank you so much for these beautiful thoughts, Janelle! You said it so well. It’s only in acknowledging our own pain, doing our own work, that we get Jesus’ transformation and can be a true blessing to others.