Your story is truly inspiring! Your worship of God, even as you endure chronic pain, shouts loudly the reality of a living faith in Jesus. May He continue to give you hope and peace as you trust in Him. Thank you for blessing me and so many others around the world with your story!

1 year into my military career, I was almost discharged. But God kept me.

7 years into my walk with Christ, 5 years into our marriage, my wife was diagnosed with Sarcoidosis, a rare pulmonary disorder. Shortly thereafter I was informed that I had a degenerative joint disorder (which turned out to be osteoarthritis).

5 years later, my wife’s condition progressed to the place of needing a double lung transplant – pulling me from theater in Iraq and signaling the end to my military career. My wife was living in chronic pain and on oxygen 24 hours, we were refused 3 times to be seen for even the possibility of a transplant. I dove headlong into depression.

I sit here in silent awe of the Lord I serve, tears streaming down my face. It is one thing to believe He will deliver us out of our afflictions, but another to experience it.

I sit here, retired from the military, 8 years earlier than I expected. In chronic pain, but retired. That was God’s fulfillment of a promise made 9 years before it happened.

My wife is out getting her hair done for the first time in months. That’s because for the past three months she’s been in recovery for a double lung transplant.

And as I sit her in silent awe of the God I serve, who suffered for me so that He would know how I’d feel 2000 years later, my own pain is as nothing knowing that He did suffer, and that He will deliver.

And if He doesn’t deliver me from the pain in this body, this light affliction, I know there is a far greater weight of glory waiting for me.

I will share this story where I go, and I thank you, Tom, for reminding me of God’s perfect plan for suffering.

Jesus came to suffer and die. He was a man of sorrow, and He called us to bear His cross. As you said, the Christian life is not a life without pain. I am often tempted to throw the biggest pity party with me, myself, and I, and I drag my whole family with me. But I as I look at each crisis, I see clearer how Jesus voluntarily submitted to suffering on my behalf, and my love for Him deepens. Moreover, through the crises, I see things about myself that could improve or I see how I could have handled others’ sin in a more godly manner. So when I face a trial now, I am starting to ask “what is my take-away from this?”

We are being perfected until the day of Christ, and that does not come without prodding and pain. James 1:3-4 says to be joyful when trials come because in the end we will be perfect, lacking nothing.

It is unheathy to look for suffering, but it is healthy to embrace and accept suffering that comes, as you said, trusting that God knows what He is doing, and that because He loves us, He will work all things for good from the eternal, not material, perspective.

I am very sure our good Lord understands our hurts.