Healing Through Pain

We are about an hour from heading to the hospital for Isaiah’s surgery. He has holes in each of his eardrums that need to be repaired. Three months ago, he had surgery on one of his ears that was unsuccessful, so they have to redo that ear, and then move onto his other ear. We are praying that both ears heal completely.

As I was praying this morning for that healing, God brought to my mind a principle that I often forget: There is pain in healing.

Healing is something we all desire. Healing is something we all pray for. Healing is something God longs to give us, but healing comes with a price.

As a father, it breaks my heart to see my son scared. It breaks my heart to see him hooked up to a bunch of machines and needles and to think about having the doctor cut open his head right above his ear. It breaks my heart to see him struggle to come out of anesthesia, and then feel the pain as the anesthesia wears off. It brings me to tears just typing it.

The truth is, he could survive without this surgery. He could live without going through all that he will go through today. What parent wants to see their 7-year old go through that? He will always have ear infections. He will continue to have loss of hearing that will worsen, as he gets older…but he can survive; he will live without it.

I don’t want my son to survive, I want him to heal. I want him to be whole. I want him to live free from the problems that he has experienced his entire life because of the holes in his ears.

That is what our heavenly Father wants for us. He wants us to be whole. God wants us to live free from the hurts and the brokenness and the heartache that we have experienced our entire life. But often, to find healing, we will have to experience the pain of surgery. We have to allow God to repair those parts of us that continue to prevent us from being whole. But the truth is often that process hurts.

You can by-pass the pain. You can skip the heartache; you can take a shortcut to healing, but you won’t find wholeness. In my own life, I have often stopped short of true healing because I wanted to avoid pain. What I’m reminded of today is that my ability to endure pain in the short term provides me an opportunity to experience wholeness in the long term.

God’s heart breaks as you hurt. Like a father, God doesn’t want to see you in pain. But God often will allow us to go through pain and discomfort because that is the path to healing.

I’ve often asked God to heal me from my pain rather than asking him to heal me through my pain.

I don’t know what your situation looks like. You might be struggling with a hidden sin. You might be hurting because of someone else’s choice. You might be broken because you refuse to allow God to heal you. Can I encourage you today that healing is what we long for and healing is what we need, and wholeness is God’s desire for us, but often those things come with a price. But the pain of healing is so much better than the enduring pain of brokenness.

Just as I’m praying for my son’s surgery, I’m praying for the surgery that God longs to do in you to pave the way to healing.