The Pain That Ends Something Is The Pain That Begins Something
John 16:20-22 Amplified Bible (AMP)
20I assure you, most solemnly I tell you, that you shall weep and grieve, but the world will rejoice. You will be sorrowful, but your sorrow will be turned into joy. 21A woman, when she gives birth to a child, has grief (anguish, agony) because her time has come. But when she has delivered the child, she no longer remembers her pain (trouble, anguish) because she is so glad that a man (a child, a human being) has been born into the world. 22So for the present you are also in sorrow (in distress and depressed); but I will see you again and [then] your hearts will rejoice, and no one can take from you your joy (gladness, delight).
Today during our devotional time my husband and I were listening to Bishop Noel Jones, during his sermon he said something that caught my attention; he said “the pain that ends something is the pain that also begins something.” Immediately I remembered the process of labor and delivery that I went through as I was giving birth to my two children. I remember the pain in those moments that seemed unbearable and life threatening at times that started at the beginning of labor and went through delivering each child, even though medications that were designed to eliminate the pain of the moment. Pain signified the start of labor but it also signified the end of being pregnant. It signified the end of labor and delivery the beginning of being a mother. It ended a process of carrying someone in my body, and started a process of holding someone in my arms.
Over the last few days, there have been some things that have been thrown at me, they began a process of pain, but what I realized from a text my mother sent me, was that it also started a process of deliverance. Just as when I started to work out again it began a process of pain, but it also began a process by which I was beginning to get my weight under control and my health in order. We often see the pain and what it may be ending, like relationships, life, a job or adventure, but we don’t see what it may be starting. We are programed to associate pain with the negative, and never see what God may be bring out of the pain that is of a positive nature. Many times pain will end something or cause a death to something, but it is also causing a start and a new life, a new perspective and situation. Many of us have been hurting trying to carry around things that are long overdue, instead of letting the pain, tell us or inspire us to push, change, move, or get rid of so that we can begin again. All many of us are seeing is what we are losing, we are not for one minute seeing what we may be gaining. I know that is why many of us stay when we should go, hold on tighter when we should be letting go.
I am learning pain is designed as a sign that ends but it is also a sign of something beginning. Just as when we peel away skin from our body, the pain in that moment ends the existence of the skin being present, but it also begins the regeneration process, and new skin forming. Some of us will remain right where we are because instead of allowing the pain that is ending to move us to a beginning we have allowed it to paralyze us and keep us right where it is. I remember getting to a part in my labor and delivery with my son after over 24 hours I was exhausted and the pain was overwhelming and I thought I could not go any further, but my mother leaned over to me and said Lisa do you remember who can help you, and my reply through tears and pain was Jesus can help me. It is the same with each one of us; Jesus can help us come to the completion of a thing that brings new life!
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