Pleasure And Pain

TUES., JUNE 18, 1991, 6:51 AM
CARROLL COLL., WISCONSIN

Your title is one of the great theological questions: what of pleasure and pain? Is pleasure from God, and pain from some other source, or is God responsible for both, or for neither? How does a Christian balance pleasure and pain? How can one who has little pain really empathize with one who has much, or severe, pain?

You were surprised when a new form of your pain returned, reminiscent of your original back pain of 10 years past. What would have provoked such a return? No action that you can recall should have brought on pain. Hmmm. Your balance was the pleasure of doing your session yesterday in a loose, free-flowing style. You had all you needed, the group was willing, and you felt real pleasure at the close. You are not quite as confident about your responsibility today, but it is unlikely to be painful. Give it another quick look after the noon meal.

From feelings of pleasure, which originally can be quite emotional, come the gift of joy, one of My best contributions to human happiness. Again, the Scriptures do not say this in as direct a way as they should: the experience of joy is a high point in any human life, and it is a gift from Me. Whether the person acknowledges Me or not, the offer holds. How could I, a loving, fun-loving God, who has created ALL of the universe and all that is on this earth, and ALL humans, not bestow such a marvelous, necessary gift?

I knew, from the beginning, that unless I restricted humans grossly, there would be pain. How long do you think Adam and Eve lived in the Garden before I provoked them to the action that brought on their expulsion and their experience of pain? The first two sons (presumably), and one kills the other… yes, again provoked by Me.

Then, humans were having pleasure, but this was, presumably, causing Me pain. The flood came… pain replaced pleasure, and then earth life was over for most. Noah sought pleasure from his wine, and this, eventually, caused great pain to Ham and his descendants. And so it went, down through the Scriptural story. Those who tortured and tormented Samson were eating and drinking in pleasure when he brought down the roof upon them, ending his painful life, ironically, in pleasure.

Today, in your culture, journalists and social critics emphasize the pain that rocks your society. Your mechanized society has too many useless people, but most of these yearn for “the good life” – the life of pleasure. There are few legitimate ways for these to achieve this goal, so there is violence and crime. I can offer no easy solutions. I can say there are too many humans, but I can offer no answer to this… that Christians would accept from Me. The pleasures of doing what you could do, now must give way to the pain of doing what you must do.

This would be very painful if it were not for human spirit. This is also My “gift”. You are a creation out of matter, which I am not. Yet I gave each of you a bit of Myself, to nurture, to develop. One purpose of this human spirit is to ease the transition from pleasure into pain, to endure pain, and to see the best route from pain back to pleasure. The more highly developed your spirit is, the less time you spend in pain.

You feel your pain returning. This is bothersome, but do not let it hinder your enjoyment of this day and the insights that shall be offered therein. Sometimes it is good to deal with pain early. Often, however, it is better to let the pleasure of the time and circumstance overpower the pain. Then you can deal with it later. Seize the day. Look to the positives of any experience before dealing with the actual or possible pains.

This is not a new admonition to you. You follow this prescription most of the time. Hear Me again: you must never resent pain, but should let it remind you of all the painfree years of life you have enjoyed. I just must expect such from you, not grudgingly or because I told you so, but because you genuinely appreciate the good, relatively painfree life that you and I have created.