Life Hacks: Hacking Pain With Meaning

all right nice to see you guys today we want to welcome our henderson location our Summerlin and sunrise mountain and Southern Highlands location as well as our Kingman family those who are watching online those who are joining us in our partnership with God behind bars and different prison facilities good to have all you guys with us today hey this is week 4 of a teaching series we've been in called life hacks and we've been looking at some biblical solutions to some common problems that we all face in our lives and we're gonna continue that today but but you know life hack is just a simple solution to a common problem and we've looked at how we can hack worried with trust we've looked at how we can act satisfaction with generosity do they I want to talk to you about how we can hack pain with meaning but before we get into that I want to look at a few life hacks that are really practical for ways to deal with pain any of you ever had a paper cut and we got the paper cut man there's is there anything more annoying than a paper cut you know really it's sort of like fingernails on the chalkboard you know just going down the chalkboard right you feeling me here like that's what a paper cuts like and it hurts like crazy you know it just sort of opens your whole finger up and you're like oh my goodness you actually don't say oh my goodness but oh here's a life hack you get a paper cut all you have to do is grab chapstick everyday chapstick and put it on the cut and immediately the pain goes away now I wasn't brave enough to try that but that's what all the life hackers say so there you go here's another way to deal with a burn if you need to get burned you burn your hand or your arm they say if you put it under cold water within 15 seconds it not only relieves the pain but it also reduces the severity of the burn life hack there you go there's one more you ever get brain freeze you know like your is Slurpee or an ice cream or whatever and then all of a sudden you're just like you get that mini migraine you know I'm talking about just the whole like I got one a while back I was you know an ice-cream and I was walking in our kitchen and it was just like ah ah you know my kids are like what's going on like brain freeze just you know like it's horrible but here's how you can deal with brain freeze first of all the best way to deal with it is to get a glass of warm water the problem is when you have brain freeze you're not thinking like I'm gonna casually go over here and get a glass of warm water you're thinking oh my gosh I'm dying so here's another thing you can do apparently brain freeze happens because cold hits our throat in a certain way and there are nerve endings and everything else to connect to the brain but if you put your tongue up on the roof of your mouth that can make a huge impact on brain freeze so you just put your tongue up in the room or if you're really desperate put your thumb on the roof of your mouth that's like next-level brain freeze solved then you go back to your ice cream and your Slurpee and just take it a little more slow this next time moving forward so there's some life hacks for you I want to talk to you today about how we can look at the issue of pain in our lives and hack pain with meaning I think pain is something that we all wrestle with different kinds of pain some of us it's it's more physical sorts of pain some of you wrestling with chronic pain some of you've been wrestling with a recent pain you're not even sure why it's there you just got up one morning and there was the pain right your knees started hurting your elbows started hurting it didn't go away you got the crick in your neck I was one comedian says that when you're like 20 years old and you go to the doctor if your ankle hurts and they'll build give you all kinds of treatments they'll offer to do surgery all the stuff he says when you hit 40 and beyond he says it's all over you go to the doctor and the doctor looks at he's like hey man does an x-ray of his ankle and the whole thing and then when he's done he goes whoa you know what's the deal he goes yeah it's worn out and he's showing him on the x-ray you see right here this is where it's all worn out you see that that's where it's worn out he goes okay well what can I do to fix it and he goes well you can do some stretching for like like half an hour a day you can stretch your ankle out he says okay how long will that take to fix it he goes oh it's not gonna fix it because that's just something that you do now for the rest of your life until you and your bum ankle die that's how I can feel sometimes as you get older things start breaking down he said at one point in the minister this doctor appointment he says look um should I you know is there nothing else I can do the guy says well you can take a leave you know just take as many and leave as you need to deal with the ankle pain it goes as many as I need to go so just just take as many as you need it goes well if I take that many Aleve isn't it I've heard that stuff messes with your intestines he goes oh yeah it'll eventually do damage to your intestines but you just gotta weigh that against how much you don't want to deal with the ankle pain now we're just sort of weighing options right between kind of bad and worse and so pain is something we don't deal with physically and also emotionally you know some of you wrestling with with loss and with hurt and with depression and just the emotional pain that maybe you carry from your childhood and it's there and it's present maybe pain that you've experienced even recently and it weighs you down and it's heavy we all face pain we all Russell with pain and if you haven't wrestled with very much pain live long enough and you will right live long enough and you will my dad used to say when he was in his 80s he'd say son growing old is not for wimps growing old is not for wimps so we wrestle with pain and we struggle with pain how can we kind of hack pain with meaning well I think the Bible is gonna give us some insight into this and so I want to look with you today at second Corinthians chapter 1 beginning in verse 3 second Corinthians chapter 1 beginning in verse 3 this is the Apostle Paul writing and he points to some powerful ways that we can experience comfort in our lives so when we get to the red word I'm gonna ask you to read it out loud with me here's what he says 2nd Corinthians 1:3 says all praise to God the father of our Lord Jesus Christ God is our merciful Father and the what source of all comfort so he's a merciful father and he is the source of all comfort he comforts us in all of our troubles so that we can comfort others you see that Paul saying look there is a cycle to comfort that could happen in our lives I don't know why we all go through pain I don't know why we experience the pain we experience I certainly don't have all the answers as it relates to this but here's what Paul's saying we can experience comfort from God and the reason God comforts us in the midst of our pain is not so that we can just say we're comforted you saw it the reason God comforts us is so that we can comfort others so there's a cycle to comfort God comforts us so that we can comfort others God helps us get through it right some of you say God has brought me through it God brought me through a divorce it was painful it was hard but God brought me through it God brought me through an addiction it was tough it was hard but God saw me through it right God brought me through emotional stuff that I went through in my family God brought me through abuse but listen look don't bury what God brought you through God brings you through it so that you can now help somebody else going through it right God brings you through it he comforts you so that you can now help someone else who's also walking through things in their life so first principle from second Corinthians chapter 1 is simply this lean into God's comfort lean into God's comfort you know I saw this kid's seven-year-old kids answer to this question it was you know my how does your family handle stress positive ways our family handles stress and here was the answer she says suck it up how many of you grew up in this home right you know I got alright I remember that you know I mean messages that were pounded into me when you're sick when you were really sick and you still showed up at work you still showed up at school now we tell kids like not on don't get everybody else infected right but my parents would be like sign of a leader that's right you just you just said this doesn't happen right you just keep going you know you just suck it up and that's that's one way to deal with it but when pain comes into our life emotional pain or physical pain you know we try to deal with in a lot of different ways a while back I ate a tortilla chip and when I bit into this tortilla chip it lodged a part of itself up into my gum sorry to gross you out and I kind of felt it happened I was like on it that hurt that wasn't right you know and so you know I went and I brushed my teeth trying to get this thing out like and I felt like I probably got it all out everything was good and so I went about my day and a few days later I forgot about the chip but my tooth started hurting again and I was thinking maybe it's related to that no I can't be you know and I just kept going on and so my first sort of instinct when it came to pain was to avoid it just avoid it act like it isn't there just keep going it'll take care of itself it'll work itself out do you know what I'm talking about right is this what we do like pain hits and where we are just in whatever but it kept getting worse and it kept getting worse I eventually started eating food out of the right side of my mouth and not the left side of my mouth you know but I just sort of move it all over to this side and and just kind of hope and pray this side brushed more vigorously you know hoping that it would go away right and it kept getting worse and what do you think when you start having physical pain like that you're like I don't got time for this right you ever been there some of you are there right now do we ever have time to deal with this stuff in our lot I don't want to go to the dentist I don't want to go the doctor I don't a lot of time there so I finally you know I try I try to avoid it then eventually I start to medicate it hello advil baby not one not two not three four advil took care of it just fine right so I'm popping advil all day long you know and I'm trying to avoid the fact that my tooth is killing me and and you know I just keep we're just you know it's gonna work itself out I think I even said a prayer in there you know God please make my kids go away you know come on try and do your work don't fight don't try to put it past me out I'll take everything I can get all right come on God you know I'm I'm in I'm doing it well it just got worse and it just got worse a lot of times when we deal with pain we first try to avoid it and if and if we can't avoid it we start medicating it right and then some of us we turn to all kinds of things prescriptions prescription drugs you've turned to other kinds of alcohol drugs things to numb that emotional or physical pain we turn to destructive habits in our lives and and what are we try to do we're trying to avoid dealing with that pain that's going on underneath the surface we don't want to actually face it we don't want to work through it I got sympathize I get it but eventually we got to come to a place when it comes to emotional and physical pain in our life where you accept it where you say okay what I mean by accepted is you say look it's it's real I need some help in this area of my life I can't just keep avoiding it I can't keep medicating it I got to deal with this because this showing up in all kinds of ways in my life so in my case I finally went to the dentist now I grew up drinking like well water and it messed my front teeth up so I've been to the dentist a million times in my life so I am traumatized by going to the dentist I don't you know like I mean it's got to be bad like bad before I go to the dentist so I finally walk in and I sit down they start poking around up in there and I had this abscess and all this stuff and it was all from this tortilla chip so that's what the dentist tells me I'm like you got to be kidding me and I'm like I think he's gonna I don't think I'm gonna have to have surgery this is bad hey don't laugh at me nothing hurts worse than tooth pain people and this was bad like bad bad like throbbing like your heart is beating boom boom boo boo boo boo in your mouth bad right I might have to have surgery he goes no I got to do is you just need to go to the grocery store and buy a water toothpick and just spray the water in your gum twice a day three times a day every day and in the next two or three days you'll feel better I'm like that's it that's it no drugs nothing nope that's it okay so I went and I got the Waterpik and I started spraying it sure enough boom three days later pain-free I'm like awesome wish it was always that easy right you know some of you dealing with chronic pain and physical pain that those of us that haven't dealt with that can't even comprehend you can't even understand what you've gone through and what you've dealt with some of you're dealing with emotional pain and it's a lot more complicated than just something you could buy over-the-counter that's gonna take that pain away sometimes in the midst of our pain it's really you can accept it you can try to get help you can get counsel you can go to a doctor you can see professionals you can reach out for prayer and sometimes the pain doesn't go away it's still there so what do you do we look at the Bible just a few verses after Paul writes these words in 2nd Corinthians chapter 1 he talks about his own experience and listen to what he says about what he went through he was no stranger to pain he says verse 8 we think you ought to know dear brothers and sisters about the trouble we went through in the province of Asia he says we were crushed and what overwhelmed any of you overwhelmed any of you any any of you been overwhelmed in a marriage overwhelmed with your kids right now some of you feel overwhelmed financially right now some of your some of your teams are overwhelmed already and it's like early weeks of the NFL I'm not calling any names do you know what we all know what it is to feel overwhelmed right sometimes that chronic pain sometimes simple pain can grow in your heart and in your mind and get to a place where it just feels overwhelming sometimes it's the emotional pain in our life Paul says we were crushed and we were overwhelmed but look at this beyond our ability to endure you ever been in so much emotional or physical pain in your life that you didn't feel like you could endure it anymore you just didn't feel like Paul saying I get it that's where we were we this is Paul this is a guy who loves God look Jesus is his Savior God's Spirit is just because you trust Christ and God's Spirit is within you does not mean you won't face difficulty and hardship and suffering it doesn't mean that you won't be overwhelmed sometimes people are overwhelmed they think God's judging me God's against me God's not for me why because I'm overwhelmed here's probably like hey look we were crushed we were overwhelmed beyond our ability to do her look we thought we would never live through it come on your felt like I won't live through it I'm not gonna make it I'm not gonna get to the other side of this some of you right now you got teenagers and that's how you feel I understand I'm not gonna make it I'm not gonna get to the other side right so of you right now you're in the midst of stuff with your family and you're like there's just no way we're not gonna get through this we're not gonna get to the other side that's where Paul was not checking out he says in fact we expected to die but look at this but as a result this is good you can be glad you came to church for this right here but as a result we stopped relying on ourselves you see this and we learned to rely only on God who raises the dead check this out and he did rescue us from mortal danger and he will rescue us again all right people here it is I don't know why you're going through what you're going through I wish I could take the pain away but here's what I know in the midst of that pain if you will allow God to show up and work the result of that pain could be a lesson that you and I desperately need to learn and that is the lesson of relying only on God Paul says that's what we learned we were crushed we were overwhelmed we thought we were gonna die we didn't think we were gonna make it through it we thought this is the end we thought there's no hope we thought this thing is over and here's what we learned it wasn't the end and there was reason to hope and God was still moving and working here's what we learned we learned to rely only on God and listen when you've been through the valley and you learned to rely only on God you now stand unshakeable because God's seen you through it and no matter what comes against you you know God will see you through it again now if you're we're honest that's not a lesson I'm eager to learn I want the benefit of that lesson without going through the hardship to get to that lesson do you know what I'm talking about Paul says if you're in it if you're hurting if it's hard let that teach you to rely solely on God because he is the source of all comfort God can comfort you and fill you in the midst of that moment why so that you can then comfort others and that's the second point not only to to lean into God's comfort but then comfort others from your experience comfort others from your experience now we all have experiences we all have things that we go through in life I saw this little girls video that her mother posted and it actually cracked me up of preschool and her sort of first day of preschool experience so you're gonna love this let's check this out together first [Music] classic [Music] I don't know if that was scripted or not but that's funny look we've all been through the first day of preschool right we've all been through the first day of a lot of things we've all had that moment where we're shook right we're shook and that experience we don't know why we went through it we don't know why we experienced it but I think Paul's gonna give us some insight into what we can do with it check this out second Corinthians chapter 1 beginning in verse 4 2nd Corinthians 1 4 he says he comforts us in all our troubles so that we can comfort who others when they are troubled we will be able to give them the same comfort that God has given us God wants to use your pain your experience your hurt your scars your difficulties and he wants us to leverage those experiences in the lives of other people listen if you've been through a divorce then only you are qualified to walk with somebody else going through it at the level of experience right if you've been through a loss you lost a son or a daughter or a family member you love dear dearly their only you are really qualified at the level of experience to walk with somebody who's been through it everybody else can show up with answers right but when somebody shows up who's been through it there's just a whole new level of understanding of connection of willingness to listen and God wants to leverage your unique experience in the life of somebody else that's what will bring comfort to you if you're hurting right now if you're going through things right now the temptation sometimes is to close up the blinds right just sort of pull back just kind of withdraw because you're hurting you're going through things but what would happen if you began to push against that and push forward if you begin to reach out and serve other people in some capacity here's what will happen not only will you share what you have learned but you'll find more of God's comfort in serving others so it's a cycle you want to experience more healing more pain and you're more meaning in the pain then begin to receive God's comfort and begin to serve others from that sense of comfort and then as you do you're gonna receive more comfort and then you can serve others out of Comfort it's a cycle God comforts us we comfort others and sometimes even when we're not feeling comforted when we comfort others it makes a huge difference and impact listen I've had weekend's where I was hurting I've had weekend's where I was going through things in my own personal life and where frankly I just didn't know if I had the strength and the energy to get in the car drive to church get out and walk in but here's what I'll tell you every single time over 20-something years as a pastor every single time somehow in a conversation in the lobby high-fiving somebody between services praying for somebody to counseling somebody pulling somebody side somehow God had a way where I showed up at church listen and I was discouraged and I was frustrated and an hour hour and a half later I drove away and I felt better and I felt encouraged here's what happened you serve others you experience the joy in that moment right you come to minister to others God ministers to you and so friends I'm gonna give you an opportunity today to get involved in some level of service across of our locations one of the greatest ways you can hack pain with meaning is just start using your gifts to do something whether it's on the weekend team whether it's being a greeter two people who come in or working with kids and students are pouring into high school high school students or middle school students or whether it's you know working with with attack whether it's working in the administration side of things using your gifts even in a small amount of time can make a huge impact not only in the lives of others but an even greater impact in your own life because you experience that comfort and then you give it to others and here's what God will do I've seen him do it a million times God will take you and he'll put you in a role and maybe it's not even a role that you necessarily think leverage is your experience maybe you're a greeter and you know you've been through all this stuff in your life but but mark my words God will eventually put you in conversations with other volunteers and other people around the church who have been through or going through what you have been through and then you realize in that moment oh this is a bigger deal God has a bigger plan right there's more involved in this moment the key is you and I the nudge that we need is to just get out and just show up and just start serving and let God do something say well I don't know I don't know how God's gifted me I don't know that there's anything I can do listen all you got to do is show up and God will use you God doesn't call the qualified God qualifies the called and God's call is on the hearts and lives of his people just show up so I got to do just do something anything I never forget Billy Graham you know the famous Billy Graham or the famous communicators and evangelists of the 20th century he said you know when there was nobody for him to speak to and nobody he could talk to he just would go out and he would preach to the trees they said one day when he was speaking to the trees he felt like God just laid it on its heart someday all of these trees will be people hey man at least he's doing something right it may just be the trees but everybody starts somewhere who knows what God could do with you if you're just willing to do something I love a story of Larry Walters and I haven't told it in a long time so indulgence so indulge me here Larry Walters was a guy who always wanted to fly his eyesight wasn't very good he wasn't able to fly but eventually as a young man as a middle-aged person he got this idea and he went to the army-navy surplus store and he bought 42 weather balloons these balloons that measure like four feet in diameter and he got his friends over to his girlfriend's house in San Pedro California and in the backyard they took a lawn chair that he actually bought at Sears took a lawn chair tied 42 weather balloons to the lawn chair aired them up with helium anchored the chair down had all his friends there holding it he actually strapped himself into the launch here had a packed lunch that he could eat you know as he flew and a BB gun because his thinking was he would shoot the balloons as he flew and then he shoot one out and you'd float a little more shoot one out he'd float down a little more this really happened there's been like Mythbusters shows about it google it trust me it really happened photos is old oh and this guy cut himself loose from his girlfriend's backyard and shot up into the air he shot up into the air at a crazy rate of speed like a thousand feet per I can't even remember it's like insane and he got all the way up to 16,000 feet 16,000 feet in a launch here Google it you guys do not believe me right now google it 16,000 feet in a lawn chair he's floating around and he's so scared he doesn't know what to do eventually he drops his BB gun this is not looking good and he floats into the flight path of LAX true story TWA pilot is coming in and he sees him at 16,000 feet and radios it in can you imagine this conversation a man I got a guy up here 16,000 feet in a lawn chair with a BB gun [Applause] / and the guy just floating around for hours and hours and eventually he did land he landed in the Long Beach area in a neighborhood there and you know later when when a reporter asked him why he did it right why he would do it I loved his answer he says well a man can't just sit around listen if God has brought you through something anything you can't just sit around can't just sit around just do something anything God can leverage your unique experience to help and encourage somebody else I probably will do it and it's the cycle of comfort God comforts you you comfort others you receive more comfort God comforts you you comfort others you receive more comfort in fact one man described his experience really the life-changing moment that happened to him he'd been a you know person of faith but he said ultimately his life had been all about himself and lived for himself until one day he finally took the challenge to step out and to begin to serve others with his gifts and here's what he says my life used to be about one thing I was a self-serving guy who had neither passion nor purpose I was leading a miserable life throwing away time and money on beer and cheap thrills and then one day I walked into a church and heard the message of Christ give your life away to others and you will find your life I didn't have much to give up so I decided to give it a shot he said that's when my life started the change and Christ became more real to me I started serving teenagers and found a purpose a reason for my existence it was 21 years ago that I wandered into that church 21 years today my life is richer than I ever believed it could be serving others made the difference it was one of the best decisions I ever made I believe serving others is one of the best decisions any of us could ever make so if you want to hack pain with meaning start using and leveraging your experience and your gifts to help others across our locations in just a moment as our experience ends our location pastors are gonna tell you specifically at your location how you can take a step right now to get connected and to get connected to one of these service areas around the church just to do something to leverage your gifts to help another person even in a small way the person that's gonna be the most blessed by you using your gifts is you it's you because you're gonna bless others but you're gonna be blessed in that process God comforts you so that you can comfort others don't bury what God has brought you through share it so that God can use it to bring someone else through what they're going through let's bow and pray together God we thank you for your love we thank you for the kindness that you show us every day and I thank you for just this opportunity to gather to lean into your word to be inspired by your truth and your principles and I pray you will motivate us today to get in the game to step out and serve and use our gifts to comfort others and experience your comfort as we do it we give you thanks and we give you praise in Christ's name Amen

Channel: Central Church

Views: 1,731

Rating: 4.8620691 out of 5

Keywords: Central, Church, centralchurch, love, god, jesus, sermon, jud, judwilhite, itsokay, staycation, centralonline, centralonline.tv, lifehacks, hacks, believe, worry, trust, faith, forgiven, fascinating, drewbodine, drew, christian, christianity, grace, giving, blessed, freedom, family, fun, safe, strong, together, united, loved, caring, welcome, home

Id: QfHQApjlY_g

Length: 30min 14sec (1814 seconds)

Published: Sat Oct 07 2017