Sometimes I have to go through an extremely painful situation to learn a valuable lesson. This happened once again last month. And I learned three important things from it.

Left in Pain

On Saturday, September 11, 2021, I woke up in agony. My left shoulder, arm, and left side of my neck were killing me. I don’t know what caused this pain exactly, which made it difficult to know how to proceed.

I desperately wanted to be free from the suffering, so my first solution was to get a deep-tissue massage. That was an exquisitely painful process. It helped a little, but the most useful part of it was that I learned a new stretch to loosen up my shoulder muscles. Those stretches hurt like crazy, but I think they helped over time.

For the next few days, that area of my body remained tight and scorching. I tried icepacks and heat pads, but their relief was fleeting. Pain medicine came next, which took the edge off.

That Wasn’t Smart, But It Does Smart

On Wednesday, September 15, I woke up feeling a bit better. And do you know what I like to do when I feel better? Something really stupid!

I was getting antsy after avoiding my usual exercise routine. I normally do a combined 1,500 sit-ups, pushups, and other exercises every morning, as well as long rides on an exercise bike in the evening. To entirely forgo exercise for nearly a week felt foreign and frustrating.

So when my body felt a little better, I got out my workout mat and started doing sit-ups. On number 68, I felt something pop or jam or something bad in my back when I hit the mat. And the pain suddenly returned with a vengeance. I apologized to my wife when she saw the pain I was in, but she just patiently helped me instead of scolding me like I thought I deserved. What a saint.

Seeking a Miracle

We contacted a couple of members of our church to ask if they could come give me a blessing of healing. They agreed to come that evening. I was so relieved. I had complete confidence that once they blessed me, the pain would finally be gone, and I could go back to normal.

Alas, I had faith in God, but not the perspective of God. Those two wonderful men came and blessed me to eventually recover and gradually have the pain taken from me. That stung. I wanted to be healed immediately, but I wasn’t going to argue with how God would choose to heal me. I was just grateful I’d be healed at all.

Miraculous Healing

Thankfully, the recovery didn’t take long at all to begin. The next day, the pain was dulled remarkably. By Friday, it was even more manageable. Each day brought greater mobility and less agony. It took me about a week to gather the courage to try doing sit-ups again. And I only did 100. But I did them without injuring myself.

In the last week of September, I returned to my usual workout routine, and I’m feeling great. There’s still some tightness in my shoulder, and I’m doing my best to stretch it out. But I can safely say that the miracle I asked for has come to pass.

3 Lessons I Learned from This Experience

This experience taught me three things:

1. Trust in God’s timing. He wants to bless me, but, more than that, He wants me to learn important lessons from my experiences.
2. Don’t focus too much on my body. I like having a strong body, but that’s not the only important thing in life. If I have to sacrifice a perfect six pack to be what God wants me to be, then so be it.
3. Appreciate everything God has given me. Normally, my body does exactly what I need it to do. Whenever it malfunctions and causes me excruciating pain, I learn to appreciate a new part of it I had never thought about before. Now I absolutely love having the ability to turn my head, swing my left arm in big circles, and do pushups.

My trial turned out to be a great blessing. I don’t actively seek out painful experiences, but I try to patiently make it through them. During the worst days at the start, I told God I would never curse Him for allowing me to experience great pain like this. I would just ask Him to relieve my suffering and help me to endure it well. And He did that perfectly, as always. I’ve learned that God always comes through if we patiently exercise faith in Him.

This is the Deja Reviewer bidding you farewell until we meet again.

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