Spiritual Fitness & Living With Chronic Pain

You must be free before you can become who you are created to be.  Free from what you might ask…

For many, the doors to freedom seem tightly shut because of chronic pain.  Restriction and contraction inevitably define the lifestyles for several who are chronically wounded.  On the other hand, you don’t have to become part of the despairing statistics of those who are chained by horrific pain.

The freedom I’m referring to pertains directly to sin.  Sin turns out to be astonishingly nonpartisan and unoriginal.  It affects everyone who has not experienced the conversion from spiritual death onto new life.

And based on this reference, it is for freedom that Christ wants to set you free.  It is the highest ideal of a gift you can ever receive.  Simply, by placing your faith in Him, you will be instantaneously set free to discover your real self and your real reason for living.

Imagine what you probably can’t imagine right now…Your spiritual rebirth will fling the doors wide open to live freely as a new creation, no longer bound by anything of this world. 

I encourage you to deal with chronic pain from this starting point – a place where you are set free regardless…

Keep me on your favorites.  Please click onto www.gordonselley.com for information regarding living with chronic pain, as well as spiritual healing. 

Q: How can you know love when you live in pain?

A: Straight to the point…

Regardless of our pain or the consequences it might render upon our life, love deserves special recognition for what it really is.

“God is love. Whoever lives in love lives in God, and God in him” (1 John 4:16b, NIV).

From a younger age, if given the opportunity to know God through His Son, Jesus Christ, as children, we tend to express our love for God more freely. Usually we’re not inundated with the hardships of this world. Our emotional make-up is ripe, willing to accept others as well.

Yet, as we become adults, there’s a tendency to suppress or de-sensitize our love for God, as well as mistrusting broken relationships, because we are then entangled within the unforgiving world in which we live. As a result, we fall in love with the lusts of this world. Things like the lusts of our flesh, our eyes and the pride of life consume our thoughts and behaviors. We lose the real meaning about love because we lose the real relationship with God and find ourselves isolated from other relationships.

Then when we confront the realities of pain, a question similar to yours enters into our minds, asking, “How can we know love when we live in pain?”

Our emotional instincts about love are skewed, focusing on the importance and protection of self. As the world screams for us to fulfill our needs of approval, security, identity and purpose through its marred venue, we become essentially lost, not knowing where to go or for that matter, not knowing what love has to do with anything.

Nevertheless, the truth about love is found exclusively through Jesus Christ. It’s neither about what we feel in goodness nor how highly we think about our self-fulfillment. And when you believe in the cornerstone of love…Christ will never leave you. This gift of love will always be with you in spite of your pain. Even though it feels like you’re wearing shackles, love promises to set your soul free so you can really know what it is…

God loves us; not because we are loveable but because He is love, not because He needs to receive from us but because He delights to give.

Keep me on your favorites.  Please click onto www.gordonselley.com for more information regarding living with chronic pain, as well as spiritual healing.

Even when the skies might look gray, you can still be a part of a new transformed way of living. We tend to focus on the power and healing of God; instead, I encourage you to meditate on the root, which is the knowledge of the love of God.

What does it mean to “know” something to be true? Well…you can only “know” about truth when you share in the same nature of it. The seed which germinates a new transformed life comes from God. Consequently, when you know God, you’re going to discover the way of absolute transformation. It’s found in the knowledge of the love of God through His Son.

Why are we sometimes attracted to the imperfect and error and dark clouds of the sky? Maybe because that is how you feel. Maybe this has been a way of truth for you for quite some time?

To counteract this way of living, again, I encourage you to know God and His heart for you. The magnetic draw toward righteousness and love will become overwhelming, filled with peace and freedom, even in the midst of your painful suffering.

“Knowing God’s heart means consistently, radically, and very concretely to announce and reveal God is love and only love, and that every time fear, isolation, or despair begin to invade the human soul – this is not something that comes from God.”

It’s time to leave the gray clouds for the wondrous beauty of heaven…

Keep me on your favorites.  Please click onto www.gordonselley.com for more information regarding living with chronic pain and spiritual healing. 

“Leprosy is a disease without pain.  No remedy is found because the nerves don’t work.  Lepers lose their fingers and toes in accidents because they cannot feel any pain.

When the church does not feel pain with those that are part of them, the Church’s nerves also become dead.  Then the Church loses parts of its body.  It loses power to touch souls.  It loses credibility before the world.  On the other side, the suffering church gives the whole church strength to fight for Christ. 

Suffering makes the soul to cry out and look for help, to draw strength for the source of help – Jesus Christ” (Anonymous).

Keep me on your favorites.  Please click onto www.gordonselley.com for more information about living with chronic pain, as well as spiritual healing. 

I am deeply convinced that each human being suffers in a way no other human being suffers.  The way we are broken tells something unique about who we are.  Only Jesus knows the depths of each one of our heart’s story.

When living this new life I’ve talked about, it is imperative that we come to terms that our sins literally attacked Jesus’s soul when He was dying on the cross.  He fully understands every dimension regarding our pain and suffering.

Sympathy reaffirms hopelessness.  And because of Christ’s crucifixion experience, His love and faith transcends mere sympathy, all the while, healing all our diseases.  Remember this…Greater is He Who is in us…This is something very personal…

Keep me on your favorites. Please click onto www.gordonselley.com for more information about living with chronic pain, as well as spiritual healing.

From a friend of mine, whose name is Randall Niles; I share from his facebook blog a quote by C.S. Lewis, “Good and evil both increase at compound interest. That is why the little decisions you and I make every day are of such infinite importance.”

And when experiencing what seems like unmerited tragedy, this is when we are soulfully equipped, like Job, to actually see God’s unmerited grace for our lives. In essence, carry this thought for Sunday…God does care more about our faith rather than our pleasures. So how we respond to trials matters…We’re definitely integrated into the complexities of everyday life and beyond.

“From heaven the Lord looks down and sees all mankind; from his dwelling place he watches all who live on earth – he who forms the hearts of all, who considers everything they do” (Psalm 33:13-15, NIV).

Keep me on your favorites.   Please click onto www.gordonselley.com for more information about living with chronic pain, as well as spiritual healing.

Q: My life’s trashed…Practically speaking, what should I do to start over?

A: Don’t wait any longer to make changes.

Practically speaking…I recommend that you get a blank sheet of paper out and then begin to reconstruct your life. Depending on your marital status as single or married, either start this process by yourself or obviously, share in these life-changing decisions with your partner.

On this blank piece of paper, write down ten things you must have, and then write down ten desires of your heart. Don’t be limited by what you pen on the paper. The sky is the limit. While this exercise might take some time, I encourage you to finish this initial step within one week.

After you, and perhaps your partner, have done this exercise, then lift these requests onto God in prayer. By doing this, God will purify your motives and help to direct you on the right path of transformation. As you make your plans, God will surely direct your footsteps.

With certainty, expect fear and doubt to sharply enter into this process. On the other hand, I again encourage you to stand tall, remain steadfast in belief, and confront your fears head-on. You have nothing to lose, except to walk out a new life. And if you profess the Christian faith, you can assuredly look forward to walking out a new life with a new spirit.

Although making changes pose several difficulties, ponder this point: Very few things compare to being who you really are and doing what you’re really supposed to be doing.

This is a simple way, yet excellent, to practically start your life over again…

Keep me on your favorites. Click daily for updates about living with chronic pain and spiritual healing at www.gordonselley.com.

If your prayers are simply requests for personal needs and/or desires, then I encourage you to examine your life a bit more closely. Especially when feeling ongoing pain or depression, I know how easy it is to fall prey to the desperate need of wanting to get rid of gnawing pain no matter what. Nothing else seems very relevant at this point. Pain then becomes the cornerstone of your thoughts and therefore, your prayer requests.

But what are you going to do if your pain becomes part of your human growth? What if God doesn’t alleviate your suffering after days upon days, months upon months and years upon years requesting remedy through prayer?

Not to diminish the power of God relevant to healing or to that of prayer, but sometimes, the experience of suffering is used for your good, not necessarily for your demise – even if you’re unaware of some of its benevolent qualities.

Edmund Soper writes, “Without the experience of suffering a man’s nature remains shallow. Pain that has been lived through gives to character a depth that seldom comes from the experience of happiness.”

In a sense, your prayer life is an intermediary discussion between God and you. It defines your religious expression with God. The demand of prayer is not for certain wounds to be healed or for financial provisions to be met or for brokenness to be instantly restored. Prayer is much more than this.

Mere reformation does not depend upon your evaluation of God’s performance during prayer. Prayer, in its highest form, purifies your unspoken desires and gives you much more than you can fathom. It leads you into the reality of a new will and a new life to be lived, whether pain or depression are a part of the construct.

To glean another insight from Edmund Soper, he writes, “No desire is ever quite the same after it has been offered up before God in prayer; a desire which has found expression in prayer is inevitably purified and elevated. Prayer, therefore, is the training-ground for character.”

Keep me on your favorites.  For more about living with chronic pain and spiritual healing visit me at www.gordonselley.com.

Part of grabbing this new transformed life, even though you might still experience chronic pain, involves the “push-pull” effect as it correlates to belief and discipline.

What I mean is simply this…No matter your adversities, having personal fortitude – composed of belief and self-discipline – will enable you to “push” beyond natural points of resistance in order to gain better ways of living. Yet, the “push” part of human effort comprises only half of the load. It only drives you so far.

Sure, your belief and hard work can spring you free from some of your unhealthy habits. But the “pull” part of the equation is equally, if not more important as the “push” element, when trying to live an abundant life, despite the possibility of living with chronic pain.

The “pull” part means this…It involves the reality that you’re not alone when trying to overcome gigantic obstacles. Your belief system and your fine-tuned dedication to getting the best results aren’t the only factors involved. The “pull” fraction includes the sovereignty of God.

Sometimes your beliefs are limited by your abilities to produce results. God believes in you far more than you probably believe in yourself. His way to “pull” our “push” efforts are subtle and noninvasive. It’s done in love. It’s grounded in greater belief and far greater power and with even far greater wisdom.

When you start to walk out this new transformed life, realizing the “push-pull” effect includes another helper for redeeming your being, you’ll then experience the miraculous changes of abundant living.

Keep me on your favorites.  For more about living with chronic pain and spiritual healing visit me at www.gordonselley.com.

No matter how poorly you feel or how dilapidated you look today, consider your circumstances differently. And no matter how chaotic things seem right now, deliberately stop for a moment and remain “still” within the disjointedness of your problematic clutter.

Nothing feels secure anymore, especially if chronic pain or brokenness or poverty has brought you to the edge of a cliff. I encourage you to find your center – that place where you can remain “still” long enough to sort some things out.

I have a word of truth and encouragement for you. When you set your mind on the things above, in other words, on heavenly matters, then you can have the perfect opportunity to put your life in better perspective.

Because when you remain laser-focused on your problems, sometimes it’s literally impossible to see your way through the woods. Seemingly, the temporal things tend to stack up against you, squeezing more tightly from the inside, draining you of any energy to do what you’re supposed to do.

It requires a change of thinking to back away from the edge or to crawl out of the pit. Renewed thinking also removes the blinders from your eyes so you can see again from a healthier perspective.

While you’re in the realness of the moment, turn things around by focusing on the eternal realities about heaven. When doing this instead of perseverating about the things you might not have control over, you’ll find an assurance of peace deep within your soul.

For myself, I experienced confident renewal this morning though excruciating pain tried to lead me down an unproductive path of thinking and doubting about God’s faithfulness.

Keep me on your favorites.  For more about living with chronic pain and spiritual healing visit me at www.gordonselley.com