Pain isn’t always purpose—it can be a warning. Some pain shapes you for your destiny, but other pain comes from harmful choices. The key is recognizing the difference. Let pain push you toward growth, not destruction. If you’re willing to change, even self-inflicted wounds can lead to healing. Don't just endure the pain—let it transform you.
Scripture References:
Romans 8:28
Romans 5:3–5
2 Corinthians 12:9
Episode Overview:
00:00–06:00 | Church updates and lighthearted intro
06:01–12:00 | Is all pain productive?
12:01–20:00 | Dysfunction and God's call to change
20:01–28:00 | Joseph and Job: pain from obedience
28:01–35:00 | Pain from poor choices
35:01–End | Responding to pain with repentance and faith
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
Welcome to the Ocala Church podcast with Pastor Ryan
Brister. Today we are talking about pain.
Is your pain pushing you towardsyour destiny or towards your
demise? All right, welcome back
(00:30):
everybody to the Ocala Church Podcast.
We are so excited to have our next video podcast.
Next video podcast, I need to remember it's a video because as
soon as I finished up intro and I was like, man.
And then I was like, oh, they'rewatching me.
Yeah, yeah. Got to keep the looks off the
face. You can kind of feel it when
(00:53):
people are watching you. So we.
I just think of a song. It's doing Max song, but I think
he heard it from somebody else. I always feel like somebody.
I'm sorry, I don't know. Like early 2000s but.
(01:14):
We are. We had an incredible Mother's
Day service this week and good things are happening in Ocala
very good things are happening in Ocala and we are so excited
for all of the incredible thingsthat have been going on.
And if if you are wondering where the favor of God is, I can
(01:37):
tell you and it is at Ocala Church.
If you were, if you were wondering at all, you're.
Curious that. Is where it's at, and so.
We're we're thankful. We are very grateful though, God
is good to us and and you can taste.
The favor of God. In an Ocala church mug.
The aroma. You can taste it, smell it.
(02:01):
The only problem is it's left-handed.
It's a pleasing aroma unto God or something.
Like that it really is smell like savor sweet smoke.
That's what we're looking for. So if you have any questions for
us here on the Ocala Church Podcast, I know we've we've had
some questions roll in. I know many of you were waiting
(02:22):
until we had video to ask your questions.
And so now that we have video, you can go ahead and ask.
You can go ahead and ask and man, leave a review.
Yes, man, we, we've got some, I don't know these, this, this one
guy that's really left us a lot of reviews.
(02:42):
It's like, I can't remember, it's like Brendan.
Base or. Something base or something like
that, I don't know. But anyway, he's he's and he's
done his part. He's.
Not doing. It so, but we need some other
people to to come alongside thisunknown Brendan base.
Partner with us, yeah. And leave us some reviews.
(03:09):
Our Venmo is OK. Yes, leave a review like share,
subscribe all the algorithm thingies.
All the algorithm. And and God will give you the
same favor that's on this Ocala Church coffee.
Amen. You will see the podcast and
(03:31):
we're going to get into it here in just a second, but you're
going to see the podcast in video on Spotify.
It will be coming very shortly as well to YouTube I believe.
YouTube. Apple Podcasts.
Apple Podcasts, It'll be there. Any other platform that
supports? Video Any platform that supports
video so and so, but we are ready to get into our topic of
(03:53):
the day. Very interesting topic.
So, well, I had this kind of go through my spirit the other day
as I was studying and I I got tothinking about the subject of
(04:14):
pain and it's something that is preached on quite a bit.
There's a lot of those really catchy titles when it comes to
the subject of pain. There's power in your pain, or
(04:34):
you know the purpose behind yourpain and all of these kind of
things. But I believe it's important to
understand that not all pain means you are moving towards
something positive. Right.
Yeah, Now I. For for.
(04:57):
The ones who don't understand that, what do you mean by that?
Well, what I mean by that is sometimes pain is a is a
positive force in your life thatis moving you towards you're God
(05:23):
called God ordained destiny. God uses pain to take us from
where we are to where he has designed for us to to be in our
life or he uses pain to shape usand mold us mold our character
into something useful in his Kingdom.
(05:49):
But not all pain is that pain. Sometimes the pain that we
experience is because we're doing dumb.
Well, talk about it. We've all been there.
This is spoken from experience. This is the voice of experience
(06:13):
talking the best teacher. Yeah.
I was never really good at doingthat whole A wise man learns
from his mistakes, but a wiser man learns from the mistakes of
others. Most of what I learned, I
learned from my own mistakes. But pain can be just a sign that
(06:40):
I am hurting myself. I know that's a powerful idea,
but it it doesn't have to mean that because I'm in pain that
I'm on my way to a miracle. I could but be on my way to a
grave based on why the pain is coming into my life.
(07:03):
So if if if I'm cutting myself, that pain is probably not an
indicator that something positive is about to happen in
my life. It probably means I'm about to
bleed out. Right, right.
The pain that comes from cirrhosis of the liver probably
(07:28):
doesn't mean that there's something really special on my
horizon. It probably means I need to put
the bottle down. Wow, you know the the pain in my
mouth from a toothache probably means I need to lay off the
sugar. Don't touch that one.
(07:51):
Y'all were with me when I was onthat alcoholism and stuff, and
then y'all musician's gone. No, but that that does not.
That kind of a pain is an indicator that something's
coming, but it may not be good. Right.
(08:13):
Unless you do something about it, a lot of times people people
continue to live in ways that are damaging to themselves,
damaging to their families and their futures because they have
(08:39):
wrongly believed that the pain in my life, if I can just suffer
through it long enough, eventually it will turn will not
necessarily the pain is a is a cry to you to change.
(09:00):
Right. Something's wrong.
Something's wrong and you need to fix it.
When you have a toothache, it isyour body's way of telling you
there's something wrong with your tooth and you better go to
a dentist and you better change the way you've been eating.
And you better change, you know,eating 12 bags of candy and you
(09:23):
better make sure you're brushingand flossing correctly.
There needs to be a change in your behavior or your teeth are
going to fall out. Right.
Yeah, right, right. You think it's because some
people adapt to the pain that. They're in adapt to it.
Humans are extremely adaptable. You know, that's why there's so
(09:44):
many different types of humans across the world, because they
have adapted to certain climatesand certain ways of living.
People adapt to not just Geo Geoliving in certain geographical
locations or different weather conditions, but people are very,
(10:10):
very good at adapting to chaos. They're very good at AI mean
some people, their their families are so dysfunctional
that function, they're afraid offunction.
Right, right. It looks like pain to them
because they're so used to what they're in and it's hard to see
(10:31):
it until you get outside of it. Dysfunction has become normal,
right? And, and when you get out of
that, it it's like like pieces, pieces chaos to somebody that
has never experienced peace. It's like, it's like if someone
(10:51):
that listens to loud music all the time, if you get in the
vehicle and just turn the music off and just ride down the road,
they'll go out of their mind because they're used to the
noise. And so you, you have to, you
have to understand what pain is screaming at you.
(11:13):
I think I don't remember who it was Charles Spurgeon or somebody
like that made the quote many, many years ago.
That pain may even CS Lewis. Pain is God's megaphone to
arouse a sinful world to repentance.
Wow. But, but we live in a society
(11:36):
where we just push through the pain and then each generation
waxes worse and worse and worse.And we're dealing with, you
know, extreme emotional issues and, and extreme emotional
traumas and perversion on a completely different level.
(11:58):
Because the, the, as we go through the generations, we're
not using the pain of the traumaof the last generation's sin to
'cause this generation to turn towards God and the things of
God, we're just, well, Mama and daddy was this way.
(12:18):
So I'm this way. And the next generation
generation never just lives at the level of sin that Mama and
daddy lived at that always take it.
What Mama and daddy do in moderation, the children always
do in excess. And so it's just a vicious cycle
(12:38):
that continues to grow worse andworse and worse.
And it's, it's, you know, you know, it, it has been propagated
by, by certain elements of the Christian world today that if
you just, if you just sow into my ministry, or you or you, you
(13:01):
know, shake the preacher's hand or, you know, sign the church
card, become a member of the church that your pain is pushing
you to purpose. Well, it's not pushing you to
purpose if you don't change, right?
Somebody needs to tell you that if you don't change, you're
going to die. That is why the first step in
(13:25):
the gospel message is repent. Right change it's.
Dying. Changing.
Change. Anything that's not changing is
dying. And humans literally would
rather destroy themselves than change.
We hate change so much. We would rather sin eat our
(13:48):
minds apart. It's sin is corrosive and it,
it, it, it gets us. It's got us in a position now
where you know, 80% of the opiates in the world are
consumed by people in America. Americans consume over 80% of
the opiates in the world. We're depressed, we're anxious,
(14:09):
we're full of anxiety and fear. We're, we are not emotionally
well and we're, we're suffering a lot of emotionally and
emotional and spiritual pain that is a direct result of
living against the ways of God. And the pain is screaming at us.
(14:31):
You've got to do something different.
And we are, we think that if we just, if we'll just go to church
on Sunday, but just continue living like we've always been
living, that the, the pain is magically going to lift one day.
And the pain is just something Igot to get through until I get
(14:52):
to my miracle. Well, maybe, but maybe not if
the pain is not drawing you to repentance.
Is it be some sort of action that you're taking?
Yes. Well, I mean, it's it's, it's,
it's not, but it's been called the definition of insanity.
Right. They say somebody years ago
(15:14):
coined the phrase that doing thesame thing over and over and
over again, expecting a different outcome is the
definition of insanity. It's not really, but it's a it's
a, it's a good saying anyway. Yeah.
You, you can't expect something different by doing the same
(15:40):
things. Yeah, so here, here's AI guess a
good illustration would be this.If I've if I've been staying up
all night, sleep, sleeping late,eating Little Debbie's.
(16:02):
That'll do it. Talk about pain.
You know, just consuming tons ofjunk food and then all of a
sudden I'm starting to deal withpain in my body.
Yeah. That's just what happens when
you get older. It's just you.
Just I'm just. Unless you don't do that, you
(16:23):
know. That that I eventually that is
going to bring pain into my life.
It will. But that pain does not
necessarily an indicator of something good is on its way,
right? Unless that pain preaches to you
to change. Unless the message you get from
(16:47):
that pain is I'm about to turn my life around.
On the other hand, if I wake up at 5:00 in the morning, I I
lubricate my body and my system with purified water.
(17:07):
I go hit the prayer room and then I go hit the gym.
When I get done at the gym, there's going to be pain, but I
know that something better is onthe other side of that pain
because that pain was produced by something that I did that was
(17:29):
good for me, not harmful to me. And when I participate in things
that may cause me pain in the temporal, but is good for me, I
can be confident in the fact that I'm going to have a better
result on the other side of thatkind of a pain.
(17:51):
I can't have the same kind of confidence when I'm
participating in physically destructive things to give me
the same kind of a better outcome on the other side of
that. And so it's it's I thought about
Joseph. Oh, that's a.
Good one, Joseph. The Bible says that his daddy
(18:17):
told him to go out and see how his brothers were doing.
Go. Check them out.
Go. Yeah, go talk to them.
Go talk to your brothers and bring me a report back.
He was obviously he was Israel'saccountant or Israel's auditor.
(18:41):
Everybody loves an auditor, especially when they have this
beautiful robe on with a bunch of colors and you don't have
one. Exactly.
And Joseph, because he is just out doing what his daddy said,
walking in obedience, that's what we're supposed to be doing,
right? He winds up in a pit, then he
(19:03):
winds up sold into slavery. Then he winds up in Potiphar's
house being accused of somethinghe didn't do by Potiphar's wife.
Then he winds up in prison. All of these things happened to
him, and they were extremely painful.
But Joseph shows an extreme amount.
I know there was fear attached to this.
(19:24):
There had to have been, you know, sleepless nights attached
to this. There had to have been some
anxiety attached to all of this.But you know, in every
situation, Joseph figured out a way to make the best out of what
he had been handed. Because he knew that I'm dealing
with this pain, not because I did something wrong, but because
(19:49):
I was just obeying my father right.
And he and he knew that because at the end he's like, you know
what you had meant for. Evil.
What you meant for evil, God meant for good.
So through the entire process, it's frustrating, It's it's
painful. But I know something good's
(20:10):
coming on the other side becauseof how I got into the pain in
the 1st place. This pain is a result of me
doing the right thing, not doingthe wrong thing.
Hold on. You mean to tell me that
becoming a Christian, I mean, doesn't mean you never have pain
again? Well, the.
News to me I. Know you don't never dealt with
(20:32):
anybody. Yeah.
Yeah. Yeah, so, so another example of
this same idea is is job. Yeah.
God said he's perfect, a perfectand an upright man.
(20:52):
I don't know that God's ever said that about me, but he said
that about Job. I don't mind you telling.
The people about that. But just don't tell.
It to certain. People Satan's like, Oh yeah.
But job, Job fought for his integrity.
He did because he knew he had integrity.
(21:12):
He knew the pain that he was facing wasn't something it was
not self induced. And all his friends could say
is, if you're dealing with this much pain, you must have done
something wrong because pain only comes from living like the
devil. Like they told Jesus, like who
sinned? Was it him or was it was it
somebody? Else related to exactly.
Had to be sin if you're in pain.If you're in pain, if you're
(21:36):
dealing with an issue in your life, it must be because you've
done something wrong. No, it may be because you did
something right. Wow.
But if it's if the pain came because I did something right, I
know that something better is waiting on the other side of
that for me. That's what Paul was saying in
(21:58):
Romans 8. And we know that all things work
together for the good. I don't know that it's going to
work together for the good. If you don't love God, if you're
not called according to his purpose, if you're not living
according to his ways, I don't know that it's going to work out
all right with for for you. If you've been living in sin,
(22:21):
living against the ways of God, if you've been lying and
cheating and stealing, and if you've been neglecting your
family, if you've been neglecting your wife, if you've
been neglecting your children, Idon't know that those
relationships are going to work out good for you.
But if you have and there's trouble, you can have confidence
(22:44):
that it's going to work togetherfor your good.
You know every couple has problems in their relationship,
you know, not me, but you know all of you.
Every. Man, yeah.
Every. To answer your question.
Every every young man goes into marriage thinking he's going to
(23:06):
be the Messiah of. Marriage.
I showed up I'm. Here, everybody did it wrong and
I'm just going to show you how to do it right.
But no, when you it's, it's it happens in marriage, it happens
in finances, it happens in in all things in life, People,
(23:30):
people blame things on the devilthat don't have anything to do
with the devil. The way I know something is a a
spiritual attack that I something I can, you can blame
it on the devil sometimes, but there's some qualifications to
(23:54):
that and that is the pain that I'm dealing with.
Did I 'cause it? Yeah.
Yeah, that's the job is he had to ask that.
Did I 'cause it? No, I didn't.
So, so people will come to me with financial issues and they
will say, Pastor, the devil's fighting me in my finances.
(24:17):
Like, no, you, you financed a Saint Bernard and you couldn't
pay your light bill last month. Yeah, the devil's not fighting
your finances. You are right.
Right. And this is not going to turn
out better for you unless you change.
(24:39):
Sell the Saint Bernard. Yeah, my gosh, people do that.
I didn't know that, but people do that.
Finance at St. Bernard finance a dog at like
2530% interest. Oh sheesh.
Yeah, it's crazy. That's unnatural affection.
(24:59):
That's that's a lot of. Affection.
So that's you fighting your own finances.
The devil didn't have to. You're doing it for him.
But when you've been paying yourties, giving offerings, doing
everything you know to do, and then all of a sudden you've been
(25:20):
budgeting you, you've been, you got the Dave Ramsey app and
you've been you've been accounting for every dollar that
comes in and goes out. You you hadn't been in a
restaurant. What's he saying?
Unless you unless you're workingthere.
You're blessed better than you deserve.
So if if you're in those conditions and you are being a
(25:41):
wise steward of what God has given you and then something
goes wrong in your finances, that might be the devil that
that might be a spiritual attackthat.
But you know that if it's that, you're going to win the victory
over that, right? Yeah, God's God is testing you
(26:03):
to see if you can go through hard times and still give.
He's testing you to see if you can go through hard times and
still be a cheerful giver. But on the other side of that, I
promise you blessings coming. Blessings.
Coming, I promise you, and we know that this pain is going to
(26:24):
work together for your good every single time.
I don't have to wonder about it.I got confidence in it, Yeah.
Job was given. Double what he had.
And he was. Wasn't he already?
There he was already. There he just got double.
Richest man in the land then he got double then.
He got double. But he had to lose all to get
double. Yeah.
(26:46):
But that's like the whole thing,which that's a whole other
topic, but maybe we could talk about it one day is like the
crushing of the olive, I believeto get the oil out.
Which we did. We did a podcast on that.
Yeah, yeah, we did. It wasn't video, though they
could. See it we're going to have to
redo. It olive it here.
We do it on the video. We can crush olives on the video
(27:08):
and let people see it. No the when when a before a.
Before a olive can become oil, it has to be crushed.
Before a grape can become wine, it has to be crushed.
So you you got to deal with pain, but you got to make sure
that it's you're not just an olive on the ground getting
(27:32):
trampled under foot, but you area olive in the press being
prepared for destiny because pain.
Pain does lead to destiny. It does, yeah.
But it can lead to demise. The source matters.
Yes, the source of the pain matters and Paul made mention in
(27:57):
in Romans 5 where he said we glory and tribulation also
knowing that tribulation workethpatience.
He he didn't say we glory in ourown stupidity, but in in
tribulation. That is, this is not a self
caused thing, but we're going through something, but we know
that it's going to work, patience and experience and
(28:20):
experience hope and and hope maketh not ashamed because the
love of God is shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Ghost.
Yes, which is given us. And so he said, I, I, I am
looking at the situation that I can understand and glory in like
how how are you going to glory in pain?
(28:41):
Yeah, well, when you know what? Yeah.
When you know what comes on the other side is good.
Yeah. When you know that I'm not, this
isn't just pointless, right? This isn't just this is
something that I know is going to grow me and I can also be
confident in that it is going togrow me.
How do I know that? Or I self reflection like Job
and say, all right, it wasn't mysin that caused this.
(29:03):
I wasn't I wasn't being stupid and made something happen and
stabbed myself in the foot. But this is a tribulation that's
come the pain is being caused. I can be confident and we know.
He said, he said God gave me a thorn in the flesh.
I asked him three times to take it from me, and he won't take it
from me. And he said, My grace is
(29:24):
sufficient for you. My strength is made perfect in
your pain or in your weakness. And he said the the purpose for
this is so that the power of Christ might rest upon on me.
You said you wanted to be anointed.
Yeah, wow. Now the pain's getting you
there. There is no such thing as
(29:45):
anointing the olive the the without the crushing.
Somebody said that God doesn't create strong men by give them
easy weights. That's exactly right.
You're in the gym, you're not going to get muscles by lifting
the pounder, you know? You actually ain't going to get
muscles unless you feel the burn.
Yeah. Yeah, you got to go beyond what
(30:06):
you've done before. Yeah, yeah.
So be careful to tear the muscledown so it can rebuild.
And so I want to end with this, you know, I, I'm, we've made
this distinction between self-inflicted and, you know, a,
(30:27):
a spiritual attack or, you know,pain that leads to your purpose.
It's not something that is self-inflicted.
But I will say that if you're experiencing pain and you're
honest enough to say that it is a self-inflicted wound.
Yes. I've been there, I've done that.
(30:49):
It can propel you into purpose and it can propel you into
destiny, depending on how you decide to respond to it.
That's good. That's what repentance is for.
Judas and Peter both denied Christ and betrayed him when he
(31:16):
needed them the most. One man's pain pushed him to
laying on his face in the in a back alleyway and weeping and
repenting. The other man's pain pushed him
to the end of a rope. And so you've got to decide
(31:41):
where the pain of your mistakes is going to push you.
Is it going to push you to an altar?
Is it? Or is it going to push you
deeper into the sin that is causing you the pain in the 1st
place? And if you will choose
repentance, if you will choose to change and come out of sin, I
(32:04):
promise you there is a purpose for you on the other side of the
pain that you're dealing with. God bless you.
And musicians come.
Welcome to the Ocala Church podcast with Pastor Ryan
Brister. Today we are talking about pain.
Is your pain pushing you towardsyour destiny or towards your
demise? All right, welcome back
(00:30):
everybody to the Ocala Church Podcast.
We are so excited to have our next video podcast.
Next video podcast, I need to remember it's a video because as
soon as I finished up intro and I was like, man.
And then I was like, oh, they'rewatching me.
Yeah, yeah. Got to keep the looks off the
face. You can kind of feel it when
(00:53):
people are watching you. So we.
I just think of a song. It's doing Max song, but I think
he heard it from somebody else. I always feel like somebody.
I'm sorry, I don't know. Like early 2000s but.
(01:14):
We are. We had an incredible Mother's
Day service this week and good things are happening in Ocala
very good things are happening in Ocala and we are so excited
for all of the incredible thingsthat have been going on.
And if if you are wondering where the favor of God is, I can
(01:37):
tell you and it is at Ocala Church.
If you were, if you were wondering at all, you're.
Curious that. Is where it's at, and so.
We're we're thankful. We are very grateful though, God
is good to us and and you can taste.
The favor of God. In an Ocala church mug.
The aroma. You can taste it, smell it.
(02:01):
The only problem is it's left-handed.
It's a pleasing aroma unto God or something.
Like that it really is smell like savor sweet smoke.
That's what we're looking for. So if you have any questions for
us here on the Ocala Church Podcast, I know we've we've had
some questions roll in. I know many of you were waiting
(02:22):
until we had video to ask your questions.
And so now that we have video, you can go ahead and ask.
You can go ahead and ask and man, leave a review.
Yes, man, we, we've got some, I don't know these, this, this one
guy that's really left us a lot of reviews.
(02:42):
It's like, I can't remember, it's like Brendan.
Base or. Something base or something like
that, I don't know. But anyway, he's he's and he's
done his part. He's.
Not doing. It so, but we need some other
people to to come alongside thisunknown Brendan base.
Partner with us, yeah. And leave us some reviews.
(03:09):
Our Venmo is OK. Yes, leave a review like share,
subscribe all the algorithm thingies.
All the algorithm. And and God will give you the
same favor that's on this Ocala Church coffee.
Amen. You will see the podcast and
(03:31):
we're going to get into it here in just a second, but you're
going to see the podcast in video on Spotify.
It will be coming very shortly as well to YouTube I believe.
YouTube. Apple Podcasts.
Apple Podcasts, It'll be there. Any other platform that
supports? Video Any platform that supports
video so and so, but we are ready to get into our topic of
(03:53):
the day. Very interesting topic.
So, well, I had this kind of go through my spirit the other day
as I was studying and I I got tothinking about the subject of
(04:14):
pain and it's something that is preached on quite a bit.
There's a lot of those really catchy titles when it comes to
the subject of pain. There's power in your pain, or
(04:34):
you know the purpose behind yourpain and all of these kind of
things. But I believe it's important to
understand that not all pain means you are moving towards
something positive. Right.
Yeah, Now I. For for.
(04:57):
The ones who don't understand that, what do you mean by that?
Well, what I mean by that is sometimes pain is a is a
positive force in your life thatis moving you towards you're God
(05:23):
called God ordained destiny. God uses pain to take us from
where we are to where he has designed for us to to be in our
life or he uses pain to shape usand mold us mold our character
into something useful in his Kingdom.
(05:49):
But not all pain is that pain. Sometimes the pain that we
experience is because we're doing dumb.
Well, talk about it. We've all been there.
This is spoken from experience. This is the voice of experience
(06:13):
talking the best teacher. Yeah.
I was never really good at doingthat whole A wise man learns
from his mistakes, but a wiser man learns from the mistakes of
others. Most of what I learned, I
learned from my own mistakes. But pain can be just a sign that
(06:40):
I am hurting myself. I know that's a powerful idea,
but it it doesn't have to mean that because I'm in pain that
I'm on my way to a miracle. I could but be on my way to a
grave based on why the pain is coming into my life.
(07:03):
So if if if I'm cutting myself, that pain is probably not an
indicator that something positive is about to happen in
my life. It probably means I'm about to
bleed out. Right, right.
The pain that comes from cirrhosis of the liver probably
(07:28):
doesn't mean that there's something really special on my
horizon. It probably means I need to put
the bottle down. Wow, you know the the pain in my
mouth from a toothache probably means I need to lay off the
sugar. Don't touch that one.
(07:51):
Y'all were with me when I was onthat alcoholism and stuff, and
then y'all musician's gone. No, but that that does not.
That kind of a pain is an indicator that something's
coming, but it may not be good. Right.
(08:13):
Unless you do something about it, a lot of times people people
continue to live in ways that are damaging to themselves,
damaging to their families and their futures because they have
(08:39):
wrongly believed that the pain in my life, if I can just suffer
through it long enough, eventually it will turn will not
necessarily the pain is a is a cry to you to change.
(09:00):
Right. Something's wrong.
Something's wrong and you need to fix it.
When you have a toothache, it isyour body's way of telling you
there's something wrong with your tooth and you better go to
a dentist and you better change the way you've been eating.
And you better change, you know,eating 12 bags of candy and you
(09:23):
better make sure you're brushingand flossing correctly.
There needs to be a change in your behavior or your teeth are
going to fall out. Right.
Yeah, right, right. You think it's because some
people adapt to the pain that. They're in adapt to it.
Humans are extremely adaptable. You know, that's why there's so
(09:44):
many different types of humans across the world, because they
have adapted to certain climatesand certain ways of living.
People adapt to not just Geo Geoliving in certain geographical
locations or different weather conditions, but people are very,
(10:10):
very good at adapting to chaos. They're very good at AI mean
some people, their their families are so dysfunctional
that function, they're afraid offunction.
Right, right. It looks like pain to them
because they're so used to what they're in and it's hard to see
(10:31):
it until you get outside of it. Dysfunction has become normal,
right? And, and when you get out of
that, it it's like like pieces, pieces chaos to somebody that
has never experienced peace. It's like, it's like if someone
(10:51):
that listens to loud music all the time, if you get in the
vehicle and just turn the music off and just ride down the road,
they'll go out of their mind because they're used to the
noise. And so you, you have to, you
have to understand what pain is screaming at you.
(11:13):
I think I don't remember who it was Charles Spurgeon or somebody
like that made the quote many, many years ago.
That pain may even CS Lewis. Pain is God's megaphone to
arouse a sinful world to repentance.
Wow. But, but we live in a society
(11:36):
where we just push through the pain and then each generation
waxes worse and worse and worse.And we're dealing with, you
know, extreme emotional issues and, and extreme emotional
traumas and perversion on a completely different level.
(11:58):
Because the, the, as we go through the generations, we're
not using the pain of the traumaof the last generation's sin to
'cause this generation to turn towards God and the things of
God, we're just, well, Mama and daddy was this way.
(12:18):
So I'm this way. And the next generation
generation never just lives at the level of sin that Mama and
daddy lived at that always take it.
What Mama and daddy do in moderation, the children always
do in excess. And so it's just a vicious cycle
(12:38):
that continues to grow worse andworse and worse.
And it's, it's, you know, you know, it, it has been propagated
by, by certain elements of the Christian world today that if
you just, if you just sow into my ministry, or you or you, you
(13:01):
know, shake the preacher's hand or, you know, sign the church
card, become a member of the church that your pain is pushing
you to purpose. Well, it's not pushing you to
purpose if you don't change, right?
Somebody needs to tell you that if you don't change, you're
going to die. That is why the first step in
(13:25):
the gospel message is repent. Right change it's.
Dying. Changing.
Change. Anything that's not changing is
dying. And humans literally would
rather destroy themselves than change.
We hate change so much. We would rather sin eat our
(13:48):
minds apart. It's sin is corrosive and it,
it, it, it gets us. It's got us in a position now
where you know, 80% of the opiates in the world are
consumed by people in America. Americans consume over 80% of
the opiates in the world. We're depressed, we're anxious,
(14:09):
we're full of anxiety and fear. We're, we are not emotionally
well and we're, we're suffering a lot of emotionally and
emotional and spiritual pain that is a direct result of
living against the ways of God. And the pain is screaming at us.
(14:31):
You've got to do something different.
And we are, we think that if we just, if we'll just go to church
on Sunday, but just continue living like we've always been
living, that the, the pain is magically going to lift one day.
And the pain is just something Igot to get through until I get
(14:52):
to my miracle. Well, maybe, but maybe not if
the pain is not drawing you to repentance.
Is it be some sort of action that you're taking?
Yes. Well, I mean, it's it's, it's,
it's not, but it's been called the definition of insanity.
Right. They say somebody years ago
(15:14):
coined the phrase that doing thesame thing over and over and
over again, expecting a different outcome is the
definition of insanity. It's not really, but it's a it's
a, it's a good saying anyway. Yeah.
You, you can't expect something different by doing the same
(15:40):
things. Yeah, so here, here's AI guess a
good illustration would be this.If I've if I've been staying up
all night, sleep, sleeping late,eating Little Debbie's.
(16:02):
That'll do it. Talk about pain.
You know, just consuming tons ofjunk food and then all of a
sudden I'm starting to deal withpain in my body.
Yeah. That's just what happens when
you get older. It's just you.
Just I'm just. Unless you don't do that, you
(16:23):
know. That that I eventually that is
going to bring pain into my life.
It will. But that pain does not
necessarily an indicator of something good is on its way,
right? Unless that pain preaches to you
to change. Unless the message you get from
(16:47):
that pain is I'm about to turn my life around.
On the other hand, if I wake up at 5:00 in the morning, I I
lubricate my body and my system with purified water.
(17:07):
I go hit the prayer room and then I go hit the gym.
When I get done at the gym, there's going to be pain, but I
know that something better is onthe other side of that pain
because that pain was produced by something that I did that was
(17:29):
good for me, not harmful to me. And when I participate in things
that may cause me pain in the temporal, but is good for me, I
can be confident in the fact that I'm going to have a better
result on the other side of thatkind of a pain.
(17:51):
I can't have the same kind of confidence when I'm
participating in physically destructive things to give me
the same kind of a better outcome on the other side of
that. And so it's it's I thought about
Joseph. Oh, that's a.
Good one, Joseph. The Bible says that his daddy
(18:17):
told him to go out and see how his brothers were doing.
Go. Check them out.
Go. Yeah, go talk to them.
Go talk to your brothers and bring me a report back.
He was obviously he was Israel'saccountant or Israel's auditor.
(18:41):
Everybody loves an auditor, especially when they have this
beautiful robe on with a bunch of colors and you don't have
one. Exactly.
And Joseph, because he is just out doing what his daddy said,
walking in obedience, that's what we're supposed to be doing,
right? He winds up in a pit, then he
(19:03):
winds up sold into slavery. Then he winds up in Potiphar's
house being accused of somethinghe didn't do by Potiphar's wife.
Then he winds up in prison. All of these things happened to
him, and they were extremely painful.
But Joseph shows an extreme amount.
I know there was fear attached to this.
(19:24):
There had to have been, you know, sleepless nights attached
to this. There had to have been some
anxiety attached to all of this.But you know, in every
situation, Joseph figured out a way to make the best out of what
he had been handed. Because he knew that I'm dealing
with this pain, not because I did something wrong, but because
(19:49):
I was just obeying my father right.
And he and he knew that because at the end he's like, you know
what you had meant for. Evil.
What you meant for evil, God meant for good.
So through the entire process, it's frustrating, It's it's
painful. But I know something good's
(20:10):
coming on the other side becauseof how I got into the pain in
the 1st place. This pain is a result of me
doing the right thing, not doingthe wrong thing.
Hold on. You mean to tell me that
becoming a Christian, I mean, doesn't mean you never have pain
again? Well, the.
News to me I. Know you don't never dealt with
(20:32):
anybody. Yeah.
Yeah. Yeah, so, so another example of
this same idea is is job. Yeah.
God said he's perfect, a perfectand an upright man.
(20:52):
I don't know that God's ever said that about me, but he said
that about Job. I don't mind you telling.
The people about that. But just don't tell.
It to certain. People Satan's like, Oh yeah.
But job, Job fought for his integrity.
He did because he knew he had integrity.
(21:12):
He knew the pain that he was facing wasn't something it was
not self induced. And all his friends could say
is, if you're dealing with this much pain, you must have done
something wrong because pain only comes from living like the
devil. Like they told Jesus, like who
sinned? Was it him or was it was it
somebody? Else related to exactly.
Had to be sin if you're in pain.If you're in pain, if you're
(21:36):
dealing with an issue in your life, it must be because you've
done something wrong. No, it may be because you did
something right. Wow.
But if it's if the pain came because I did something right, I
know that something better is waiting on the other side of
that for me. That's what Paul was saying in
(21:58):
Romans 8. And we know that all things work
together for the good. I don't know that it's going to
work together for the good. If you don't love God, if you're
not called according to his purpose, if you're not living
according to his ways, I don't know that it's going to work out
all right with for for you. If you've been living in sin,
(22:21):
living against the ways of God, if you've been lying and
cheating and stealing, and if you've been neglecting your
family, if you've been neglecting your wife, if you've
been neglecting your children, Idon't know that those
relationships are going to work out good for you.
But if you have and there's trouble, you can have confidence
(22:44):
that it's going to work togetherfor your good.
You know every couple has problems in their relationship,
you know, not me, but you know all of you.
Every. Man, yeah.
Every. To answer your question.
Every every young man goes into marriage thinking he's going to
(23:06):
be the Messiah of. Marriage.
I showed up I'm. Here, everybody did it wrong and
I'm just going to show you how to do it right.
But no, when you it's, it's it happens in marriage, it happens
in finances, it happens in in all things in life, People,
(23:30):
people blame things on the devilthat don't have anything to do
with the devil. The way I know something is a a
spiritual attack that I something I can, you can blame
it on the devil sometimes, but there's some qualifications to
(23:54):
that and that is the pain that I'm dealing with.
Did I 'cause it? Yeah.
Yeah, that's the job is he had to ask that.
Did I 'cause it? No, I didn't.
So, so people will come to me with financial issues and they
will say, Pastor, the devil's fighting me in my finances.
(24:17):
Like, no, you, you financed a Saint Bernard and you couldn't
pay your light bill last month. Yeah, the devil's not fighting
your finances. You are right.
Right. And this is not going to turn
out better for you unless you change.
(24:39):
Sell the Saint Bernard. Yeah, my gosh, people do that.
I didn't know that, but people do that.
Finance at St. Bernard finance a dog at like
2530% interest. Oh sheesh.
Yeah, it's crazy. That's unnatural affection.
(24:59):
That's that's a lot of. Affection.
So that's you fighting your own finances.
The devil didn't have to. You're doing it for him.
But when you've been paying yourties, giving offerings, doing
everything you know to do, and then all of a sudden you've been
(25:20):
budgeting you, you've been, you got the Dave Ramsey app and
you've been you've been accounting for every dollar that
comes in and goes out. You you hadn't been in a
restaurant. What's he saying?
Unless you unless you're workingthere.
You're blessed better than you deserve.
So if if you're in those conditions and you are being a
(25:41):
wise steward of what God has given you and then something
goes wrong in your finances, that might be the devil that
that might be a spiritual attackthat.
But you know that if it's that, you're going to win the victory
over that, right? Yeah, God's God is testing you
(26:03):
to see if you can go through hard times and still give.
He's testing you to see if you can go through hard times and
still be a cheerful giver. But on the other side of that, I
promise you blessings coming. Blessings.
Coming, I promise you, and we know that this pain is going to
(26:24):
work together for your good every single time.
I don't have to wonder about it.I got confidence in it, Yeah.
Job was given. Double what he had.
And he was. Wasn't he already?
There he was already. There he just got double.
Richest man in the land then he got double then.
He got double. But he had to lose all to get
double. Yeah.
(26:46):
But that's like the whole thing,which that's a whole other
topic, but maybe we could talk about it one day is like the
crushing of the olive, I believeto get the oil out.
Which we did. We did a podcast on that.
Yeah, yeah, we did. It wasn't video, though they
could. See it we're going to have to
redo. It olive it here.
We do it on the video. We can crush olives on the video
(27:08):
and let people see it. No the when when a before a.
Before a olive can become oil, it has to be crushed.
Before a grape can become wine, it has to be crushed.
So you you got to deal with pain, but you got to make sure
that it's you're not just an olive on the ground getting
(27:32):
trampled under foot, but you area olive in the press being
prepared for destiny because pain.
Pain does lead to destiny. It does, yeah.
But it can lead to demise. The source matters.
Yes, the source of the pain matters and Paul made mention in
(27:57):
in Romans 5 where he said we glory and tribulation also
knowing that tribulation workethpatience.
He he didn't say we glory in ourown stupidity, but in in
tribulation. That is, this is not a self
caused thing, but we're going through something, but we know
that it's going to work, patience and experience and
(28:20):
experience hope and and hope maketh not ashamed because the
love of God is shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Ghost.
Yes, which is given us. And so he said, I, I, I am
looking at the situation that I can understand and glory in like
how how are you going to glory in pain?
(28:41):
Yeah, well, when you know what? Yeah.
When you know what comes on the other side is good.
Yeah. When you know that I'm not, this
isn't just pointless, right? This isn't just this is
something that I know is going to grow me and I can also be
confident in that it is going togrow me.
How do I know that? Or I self reflection like Job
and say, all right, it wasn't mysin that caused this.
(29:03):
I wasn't I wasn't being stupid and made something happen and
stabbed myself in the foot. But this is a tribulation that's
come the pain is being caused. I can be confident and we know.
He said, he said God gave me a thorn in the flesh.
I asked him three times to take it from me, and he won't take it
from me. And he said, My grace is
(29:24):
sufficient for you. My strength is made perfect in
your pain or in your weakness. And he said the the purpose for
this is so that the power of Christ might rest upon on me.
You said you wanted to be anointed.
Yeah, wow. Now the pain's getting you
there. There is no such thing as
(29:45):
anointing the olive the the without the crushing.
Somebody said that God doesn't create strong men by give them
easy weights. That's exactly right.
You're in the gym, you're not going to get muscles by lifting
the pounder, you know? You actually ain't going to get
muscles unless you feel the burn.
Yeah. Yeah, you got to go beyond what
(30:06):
you've done before. Yeah, yeah.
So be careful to tear the muscledown so it can rebuild.
And so I want to end with this, you know, I, I'm, we've made
this distinction between self-inflicted and, you know, a,
(30:27):
a spiritual attack or, you know,pain that leads to your purpose.
It's not something that is self-inflicted.
But I will say that if you're experiencing pain and you're
honest enough to say that it is a self-inflicted wound.
Yes. I've been there, I've done that.
(30:49):
It can propel you into purpose and it can propel you into
destiny, depending on how you decide to respond to it.
That's good. That's what repentance is for.
Judas and Peter both denied Christ and betrayed him when he
(31:16):
needed them the most. One man's pain pushed him to
laying on his face in the in a back alleyway and weeping and
repenting. The other man's pain pushed him
to the end of a rope. And so you've got to decide
(31:41):
where the pain of your mistakes is going to push you.
Is it going to push you to an altar?
Is it? Or is it going to push you
deeper into the sin that is causing you the pain in the 1st
place? And if you will choose
repentance, if you will choose to change and come out of sin, I
(32:04):
promise you there is a purpose for you on the other side of the
pain that you're dealing with. God bless you.
And musicians come.
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