This article will provide visibility to the truth about the nature and purpose of pain.
There is not one person who does not experience some sort of pain or grief within the course of their lifetime. We all know what it is like to feel pain as it is a prevalent part of our existence. We see its effects everywhere in our society. People are murdered and die from sickness and accidents every day. Throughout the ages mankind has endured pandemics, famines, earthquakes, fires, inclement weather, and other types of natural trials. The immense pain that is self-created by the terrors of war is historically known. We only need to examine the written history of humanity to verify that fact. All of these things may bring physical pain.
If that wasn’t enough, there is the emotional pain we all seem to suffer from. No one has immunity from the pain wrought by the virus of evil that exists within all of us, either as a consequence of our own actions or the actions of others. CS Lewis, in discussing pain, wrote that “when souls become wicked, they will certainly use this possibility to hurt one another; and this, perhaps, accounts for four-fifths of the sufferings of men.” Sadly, people who are emotionally wounded, find it hard to live with their traumas and continuously seek ways to heal the pain they feel in their souls. Many live a continuous life of emotional pain and carry it to their grave. Yes, grief and pain are a universal affliction we face, and both exist from birth to death.
There are various beliefs about pain and the different approaches that individuals take when dealing with pain, both physical and emotional. Physical pain can be brought on by numerous sources ranging from minor accidents to disease, to old age, to interaction with others, and to the effects of war. It can also be brought on by our own negligence and ignorance to the proper care of our body. What we are mostly concerned with in this article is examining how pain affects us and how we should respond to it. Pain does have a purpose and we need to have a good understanding of it from a spiritual perspective.
The purpose of physical pain is easy to understand. It simply tells us that something is wrong with our physical body. God created within our design the mechanism of pain, whereby we are notified when we have a physical problem. Quite common are accidents that cause physical pain. Disease and deterioration of the body also bring physical pain. When we look for solutions for this type of pain it is obvious that we must treat the body. So, we treat the physical problem with medical or natural solutions that minimize or alleviate the pain. Recovering alcoholics need to be wary of the addictive properties of certain medications.
In sobriety, we learn to minimize future pain by avoiding practices that can have painful physical consequences. Often a change in thinking is necessary to avoid practices that bring the pain. Again, the purpose of this type of pain is to tell us we have a physical problem so we can identify the source of the pain and minimize or remove it. If we are alcoholic the first step is to abstain from alcohol. In time that may solve the physical pain issue. The principle here to understand is that if we have physical pain, we need to treat the body properly. If I have a broken leg from a fall, it makes no sense to kick the rock that I stumbled over. My leg is what needs relief. That’s what the purpose of physical pain is for, an indicator of a physical problem. What would we do without the pain associated with a physical issue? You can just imagine what problems you would have by touching a hot stove and not feel pain. This mechanism that God created in us is absolutely a gift from Him.
One question we need to answer is whether there is any commonality between the solution for physical pain and the solution for emotional pain. We, in recovery, are not strangers to emotional pain. We have been on both sides of the coin, receiving and giving. When we first seek help in A.A. we are not thinking about how we may have hurt others. We are in our own emotional pain and are looking for relief. Where we once found relief in the bottle, it has lost its value as an elixir for emotional pain. As recovering alcoholics in A.A., with the practicing of spiritual principles, over time we begin to have less emotional pain. Relief usually comes from actions we take to change our thinking and our behavior. As we practice the spiritual principles, they start to gain a foothold in us, and we begin to have more truthful perspectives on life. We no longer get into emotional pain over those things that used to devastate us. As our defects are uncovered, we finally understand how our behavior has caused pain to others. In general, what is happening as we progress through the program is that our thinking changes as we trudge through the Steps. With reflection, we find that our thinking spans the range of self-centeredness as we approach Step One, to thinking of others as we practice Step Twelve. And of course, it is progress and not perfection. Along that path, we are encouraged to align our will with God’s Will.
Our program lays a good foundation for doing God’s Will. We get well in A.A. by developing willingness to turn our will and our life over to the care of God. We also renew our mind with some of God’s Truth. A good example is the Serenity Prayer. “God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change; courage to change the things I can; and wisdom to know the difference.” We recite it in most meetings and talk about its wisdom often. This prayer holds the key to relieving a lot of pain related to our thinking about control over others. It is a solid truth that we cannot control what other people do. We can’t make someone else behave with honesty or make someone else make choices based upon selfless morality. The person they are, and their actions is either good or bad and we have nothing to do with it. It is just who they are. All we can really control in life is ourselves by learning to respond properly to someone’s dishonesty or bad actions. If their actions disturb us, we need to investigate the reason for our disturbance (pain). And let us not forget that it is possible that they may be right. When we accept our powerlessness over the behavior of others, it removes a lot of emotional pain built into the fruitless effort of trying to control them. And of course, learning to make good choices about our own behavior requires courage to practice spiritual principles instead of reacting without thinking. Even with thinking, our response can be wrong which is why principles are important to practice.
So a general truth regarding a solution for emotional pain is to renew our thinking with God’s Truth. And since it is our mind that needs renewing, and we are powerless over the mind of others, then we can assume that emotional pain will not be relieved by blaming others. The axiom that we understand about relieving physical pain by treating the pain itself, is also true for emotional pain – that is – treating the mind is the solution and not blaming our pain on outside people, places, and things. Blaming others for our emotional pain is like kicking the rock we tripped over that caused the broken kneecap. Appropriating this understanding will go a long way over time to relieving emotional pain. This understanding confirms the acceptance passage found in the Big Book Page 417:
“Acceptance is the answer to all my problems today. When I am disturbed, it is because I find some person, place, thing or situation—some fact of my life—unacceptable to me, and I can find no serenity until I accept that person, place, thing or situation as being exactly the way it is supposed to be at this moment. Nothing, absolutely nothing, happens in God’s world by mistake.”
People in recovery have different viewpoints on this passage depending on their individual belief in a real and infallible sovereign God, and whether they accept that they are powerless over the behavior of others. Only when we understand God’s attributes, as defined in the Bible, will this passage make sense to us. These attributes can be summarized as:
God knows everything, has all power, and His total presence is everywhere all of the time. He has no beginning or end and has always existed. He never changes and His ways are beyond our understanding. God’s wisdom and knowledge are perfect and infinite, and His Judgments and ways are unfathomable. He is self-existent, depends on nothing for His existence, and brings about His Will without help. He has no limits, exists totally apart from His creation, and His ways and thoughts are higher than mans. He is in total control, totally supreme, and does whatever he pleases. He acts and does according to His Will in heaven and encourages humans to grow in His Will. He is morally perfect, always does right, is fully sovereign over his creation, is perfectly just and merciful and although He forgives our failures to do His Will, He does not exempt the guilty. He hates all unrighteousness. Justice is the foundation of His throne, and He exhibits active compassion and loving kindness against those who offend His Will. He has absolute righteousness, loves with an everlasting love for those who seek His Will and is long-suffering for man to do His Will. Whatever God says is absolute truth and He is faithful to that truth. All of these attributes are defined in the Bible which God has given us.
The Bible also tells us that God is unwilling to share what is rightfully His, which is His absolute right. He knows that man is totally driven by a universal principle within us that causes us to live unto ourselves. This puts self-will on the throne. Self-centeredness is basic to our nature and the only solution is to gain a new nature. We cannot do God’s Will without His help. He provides a way for man to do His Will, and this is only accomplished through man accepting His plan of salvation. That plan gives us a new nature, an inside helper, and the ability to grow spiritually.
So what does this have to do with pain? If you understand that pain is a created gift from God to help us recognize our defects, both physical and emotional, then our response would be to always look for a solution of the problem within ourselves. And it all has to do with our thinking. Our thinking needs to align with the truth of God. This will take time, but we will eventually gain trust in God with the understanding that He is in charge over everything. We are to doctor the physical pain within our limits of knowledge and doctor the emotional pain by doing the Will of our sovereign physician. Not doing God’s Will, always brings pain in order to move us toward doing His Will. And it all has to do with “idolatry.” It has been said by theologians that idolatry is the most serious and contaminating sin there is. And the reason is because it strikes directly at the character of God. That’s why out of the Ten Commandments, the first three of them are directly related to idolatry, because that’s the beginning of everything. If you don’t have the true perspective on God, you are not in God’s Will. Idolatry in simple terms is slander on the character of God.
The idolatrous heart assumes that God is other than Who He really is, and that is a terrible sin. Idolatry is not just kneeling before an image. Idolatry is assuming God to be something He is not. It is to have either unworthy or erroneous views of God. That’s idolatry. Perversions about who God is defines idolatry. Romans 1:21-23 KJV states: “… they glorified Him not as God, neither were thankful; but became vain in their imaginations, and their foolish heart was darkened. Professing themselves to be wise, they became fools, and changed the glory of the incorruptible God into an image made like corruptible man …” Man has always wanted to make God in his own image. Man always wants to drag God down. We want to turn God into what we are, and act like us. Any unworthy thought about God is idolatry.
We are no different in our own 12-Step program. We cannot create a God of our own making. That is idolatry. We should see the reason for the Big Book statement found on page 87: Be quick to see that religious people are right. They point us to the biblical God who has all of the attributes we defined earlier. A study of the attributes will convince us that God is everything. The Bible speaks of God providing us with what we need for a good life. He designs all things and guides events according to His perfect purpose. This is known as God’s providence. He created us and He has total sovereignty over everything. Both great things and small things are under His care. There are no exceptions. Our choice is to seek and find His Will. We can trust that turning our will and life over to the care of God fits perfectly into His providential purpose which He will carry out.
Any idea of God as a pal with human characteristics is totally false. That’s idolatry, because that makes God less than He actually is. Everybody and anybody who has thoughts of God that are less than true and unworthy of His character, is committing idolatry. God doesn’t want to have to compete with somebody or something else as more important than Him, including any non-biblical religion, family, money, status, sex, and a long list of other things that most of us have the desire for. It all has to do with the proper perspective about our Creator and giving Him the praise and glory that He deserves. We should be continually seeking the truth about Him and His Will – then act accordingly. We are designed to do that, but our own will is operating on an error-ridden belief system. It needs truth. Emotional pain is the mechanism to move us toward truth.
To summarize, the purpose of pain is God’s way of telling us that we have a problem. Doing our own will, brings pain. Doing it His way, which is His Will, brings peace and serenity. And even joy when we are under trials. Emotional pain only has one solution. Seek more understanding of the biblical God and add to your beliefs that He is sovereign over all of His creation and everything is under the providence of His Will. We are powerless over it all anyway. So give it all to Him with all your heart, mind and soul.
“And we know that God causes everything to work together for the good of those who love God and are called according to his purpose for them.” Romans 8:28 NLT
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