How Do We Love When We’re Hurting?

I sat on the blue exam table facing my physical therapist. Something inside my right hip was in a ranting, angry fervor – probably waving a white flag after being tasked with overcompensating for my left knee prior to its partial replacement. As I sat there describing the struggle, involuntary tears formed, betraying my anxiety that such intense pain resided somewhere new on the heels of such a difficult surgery.

After my physical therapist finished her impressive Twister-like assessment, she looked into my tear-filled eyes and offered four words of hope: “We can fix this.”

Then she said, “You aren’t going to stay here. You are going to get stronger. And in one year, you’re going to be in a different place than you are today.”

Her pronouncement traveled past my knotted, tired muscles and aching bones and settled into the deepest places only God sees: You aren’t going to stay here. You are getting stronger.

She spoke words of hope. Though my physical therapist spoke about my hip, my heart heard so much more. My soul needed this promise.

It might be easier to pretend it would fix itself, but when pain is debilitating, it doesn’t go away. It grows.

That’s true for hips and knees. And hearts.

When pain steps in front of our normal life and makes us curl into ourselves, not only is it difficult to live, but it’s difficult to love.

Inner pain steals our ability to love outside ourselves. Unseen hurt keeps us from living out the fruit of the Spirit from deep within us. Finding joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, gentleness, faithfulness, or self-control can feel far when pain is close and love is hard.

But if we’re open, when we don’t want to or can’t love others well, our fractures can draw us to the One who can’t be broken. Our healing begins when we surrender our pain.

Only He can calm the storm to a whisper and still the waves (Psalm 107:29). He answers us, encourages us, and gives us strength (Psalm 138:3). He loves us into wholeness.

Friend, when we’re hurting, we can turn to Him:

For HIS love.

When we can’t love, we need to receive His love. Our pain and hurt can keep us looking inward, but when we look to Him, we can’t help but discover His joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, gentleness, faithfulness or self-control. Because God is love, when we live in Him, our love grows. We can love each other because he loved us first (1 John 4:16b-17, 19).

For HIS strength.

When we’re weak, we don’t have to be strong. Rather, we can simply recognize and admit our need for His strength, which He gives freely. When we hope in Him, He gives us HIS strength to run and not grow weary (Isaiah 40:31).

For HIS mind.

When our minds are weary, He gives us His. We have the mind of Christ available to us (1 Corinthians 2:16), which means His Spirit in us instructs, speaks, guides, and reframes the thoughts and pain we hold, turning what we battle into truth and healing (John 16:13).

For HIS restoration.

When we’re broken, He restores us. Our hearts and our bodies crack and crumble. But He will restore us to health and heal our wounds (Jeremiah 30:17). His restoration often looks different than we hope — our individual stories may take shape in hard, sometimes unwanted, ways. Sometimes, the stories we live aren’t the stories we’d choose. But He works through them, even through the pain, to redeem us every time.

Just as Jesus did for the heartbroken woman at the well, the woman against whom the stones were raised, the woman whose desperate tears washed His feet, our Savior will restore us (1 Peter 5:10). Our healing begins when we surrender our pain to Him. When we lay down our water jug at the well, when we raise our eyes to meet His, when we break open the alabaster jar, we are freed to receive Him.

Every night, after the house gets quiet, I lie down on the floor to do my hip exercises. They’re simple exercises, but when I do them regularly, the pain stays away. I will probably have to do them for the rest of my life, but my physical therapist was right. I’m stronger now.

In the same way, when we take our pain to Jesus, He quiets it, strengthens us, and does not leave us where we are.

He has more for us. His Spirit meets and heals and restores. When we take our deepest pain to Him, we are healed to love with whole hearts.

Friend, when you’re hurting, take the broken to Him. You will not stay here. You will be restored.

“And after you have suffered a little while, the God of all grace, who has called you to his eternal glory in Christ, will himself restore, confirm, strengthen, and establish you” (1 Peter 5:10).