Ouch!

Pain is a recurring theme in my life...I've learned though that it isn't all bad. Most of the time people naturally think of pain as being a bad thing, and then try to convince themselves of the opposite with slogans like "no pain, no gain" or "pain is weakness leaving the body." Pain can be a good thing or a bad thing. Here are some examples in my life:

- I'm training for my next bike race and as I sprint for the twentieth time in an hour my legs are burning like crazy, but that's a good thing because it means I'm strengthening my muscles.

- Now I'm out training again, but this time it's in the middle of the winter and my hands and feet hurt like crazy because of the numbness, which could potentially turn into frostbite...that's bad pain.

So what is pain? Pain is a catalyst for change. I think I'm sounding like a certain politician right now...anyways. Catalyst is an over used and under-understood word. Originally a scientific term it's used in chemistry to describe something that speeds up a reaction between substances. And a reaction is...believe it or not...where two or more substances react to form different substances. In other words a catalyst speeds up stuff changing. Which is what pain does also. So lets go back to the real life examples:

- The pain in my legs from exercise signals that my body is changing...specifically my legs are getting stronger.

-The pain in my hands and feet tells me that my digits are turning into ice cubes and therefore I need to change the temperature of their surroundings before they turn blue and fall off.

Now the whole point of me talking about this is this - When we experience pain rather than just moaning and groaning about how miserable it is, we need to look for what reason God is causing this pain. Does he want us to go inside and warm up our toes or does the pain mean we need to make something right with a friend. Lately I've been limping around and whining about the pain from my last bike race where I got in a wreck...I think God's wanting to change my attitude toward pain and maybe get a little better with my bike racing skills.

Shut Up and Listen!

So as a good Christian, you've probably been to a lot of retreats, conferences, and other events where you have a great inspirational speaker come up and tell you that you need to ask God to show you where to go with your life and listen to his will. However, when you get home it just doesn't work that way. If you happen to think about it with a big decision, like where to go to college, you'll say something like, "God please show me what college you want me to go to." Then if he doesn't put up virtual stop signs, road closed signs, armed guards or any other obvious roadblocks, you go to the college you think is best. This isn't listening to God, this is talking away and figuring if he wants you to listen to him he'll shout at the top of his lungs.

I work once a week with three to five year-olds. Something they make clear to you is that if they are talking...they aren't listening. This is true for adults also, we just like to pretend otherwise. With God this means taking time to listen to him, not "taking time to talk to God" or "taking time to spend in his word" but actually shutting up and "taking time to listen to God."

What God has shown me in my life is to use three steps:
First; Recognize that you yield your life to God, so you'll do whatever he wants you to do with it. Then ask him to show you.
Second; Shut up! This means cutting out some other stuff in your life, like checking your email this morning or grabbing that snack you don't really need. Basically, you've gotta create a vacuum of time.
Third; Listen! In this vacuum of time you've created fill it with sitting somewhere where no person...or pet...or iPod will interrupt and listen to what God has to say.

Burnout

It's something that happens in life. Some people have it happen all the time, some people only have it happen once or twice. The fact is though that it's our fault.

Recently I got a really bad case of burnout. My life is so hectic, I'm doing so many good things that I run out of energy and the "go" to do it. I start to turn into a stress case, which unfortunately for my family will randomly blow up, because I just have so many things to do and make sure it all works. However, there was a reason I burned out...cause God wanted me to.

In order to show me that "I" was taking responsibility for everything and depending on "my" energy and go to do all these good things, he let me try to depend on myself and discover I was vincible (opposite of invincible). I had to recognize that I, in truth, am nothing in Christ; even if I was doing all the things God wanted me to do I was going to fail unless I did it in His strength.

As I return to relying on God's strength to work through me as his tool, He has put in me "His" energy and "His" go. I don't have to stress, I don't have to worry about tomorrow. Instead I can focus on doing the best I can with today, knowing that he will give me what I need for tomorrow.