Hebrews 13:6 So we say with confidence, "The Lord is my helper; I will not be afraid. What can man do to me?"

All of us have moments when we are attacked on various levels by the darkness and we wonder if life is worth the struggle, the heartache, the grief, and the pain. In our darkness, we must affirm God is real. We must affirm Christ loves us. In our dark moments we must proclaim His Light is more powerful than our darkness. We must not become disillusioned, for even in our proclamations made when we have no sense of God, we must see how we are able to make these proclamations because we believe without evidence. In pain, pure faith makes us proclaim Him.

A Lie: "You will have the same pain tomorrow you had today." The quoted statement is a lie because your pain will not be the same because you will be different…you will have grown…you will have matured…you will have the power live in spite of the pain.

A painful memory you want erased may remain, but God's love can give you new memories to store up and new memories to recall…new memories that will stand in stark contrast to your painful memories. In God's love and grace, the hurt and still will be gone. In the same way, forgiveness by us toward those who hurt us will empower us and take away the sting of the hurt.

A past littered with mistakes, pain, and suffering can be turned into a treasure of wisdom, compassion, and understanding in our desire to be a true child of God. To undergo this kind of transformation requires we use our will to surrender our all to Christ.

In our pain, achieving a oneness with God may take us to a place we would really not rather go because oneness with God requires we do work with our heart, mind, and soul…painfully honest work, yet work with consequences quite profound and life changing. To be one with God requires a surrender of all we are, all we ever hope to be, including the part of us we call sin. When we surrender all, we also must turn away from our sin and all prostrate on the ground at the foot of Christ's cross.

All other signs, all other words of wisdom, all other prophecies, all other truths, even your pain becomes tiny in importance when compared to the suffering Christ endured on the cross just for you.