Why Hurting Can Be Good

 

Hours before every football game players step on the field. Fireworks don’t announce their arrival. Only a few fans even watch them. This time out proves much quieter but may be the most important part of the game.

Players stretch. Every game. Many times before, during and after the game. It’s almost funny at times to watch such elite athletes do something that appears so trivial and easy.

I hate to stretch. In high school I didn’t mind it, because it was easy and didn’t hurt. It hurts now.

Consistency is the key to stretching; I learned that lesson the hard way. For so long I enjoyed unlimited flexibility. Through high school I practiced gymnastics a few times a week. At every practice coaches forced me to stretch before I worked on anything else. Later in life, with no one demanding I do it, I stopped stretching. I lost range of motion. Muscles tightened, ligaments and tendons locked into place. Consequently, I can no longer do many things I once could.

And there it is … the reason why stretching is so vital.

Our bodies function with higher quality and less pain when we stretch. And I wonder, could it be the same with our hearts?

Sometimes, before God gives His girls marching orders, He stretches us. He prepares our minds, bodies and souls for the task ahead because without the stretch, we can’t fully execute the plan. And sometimes, it hurts.

When God stretches our hearts, He pulls us out of our comfort zones inch by inch. We get to a place that’s a little uncomfortable, hold that position for a while, then God says, “You can go further.” So we take a deep breath, exhale, then push a little deeper – often times accompanied by a groan.

I used to be a reality television junkie. No judging please. I watched them all: The Bachelor, The Amazing Race, Big Brother, the list goes on. It drove Luke crazy and most likely stole some of my brain cells along the way.

I remember when God asked me to quit. The first few were easy to let go of, I mean, after a while The Bachelor can get repetitive. I started having more kids and my time in the evenings grew shorter. Slowly, one by one, I let go of my reality television addiction. God whittled it down to one last show. Then it happened, God asked me to stop altogether.

Ouch! No reality TV at all? I fought it. What is so bad about one show, one night a week? I reasoned. The truth is, it was a happy place for me. A little escape from life and all it’s troubles.

So when the night came for my one and only reality show, I sat down in the chair and turned on the television, determined to ignore the Voice in my heart promising something better. But something surprising happened. In the midst of my protest, instead of finding the fix I waited for all week, I was actually kind of bored.

After a few minutes passed I pressed the big red off button and I’ve been clean ever since. My nights are now filled with much more fulfilling things like prayer and reading and face-to-face time with people I love.

Sometimes our spiritual stretches are as simple as a TV show, yet we still fight them because they seem too trivial to actually matter.

Sometimes our spiritual stretches aren’t as simple as a TV show. Sometimes they involve people we love or plans we’ve made. And we fight them because when God stretches those places, it hurts.

In those moments we can’t see the results of perseverance. We only feel the pain of the present, and it’d be so much easier to retreat. In those moments remember Jesus’ words,

I came that they may have and enjoy life, and have it in abundance (to the full, till it overflows).” John 10:10 (AMP)

Friend, I pray today, wherever you are in this stretching process, you can trust God never stretches us without a purpose. And I pray you will soon see the results of the strengthened and refreshed spiritual muscles God is forming inside of you.

Have you ever been spiritually stretched? Where is God calling, “You can go further?”