I’ve been weary this week. Tired of living the same painful day over and over and over again. It isn’t a fun place to be, and if I’m honest, I’m discouraged. I just want to live one day where I can be comfortable. One day where I can live a life that isn’t mine.

Emotions can overwhelm, and discouragement is real. Sometimes I forget that Jesus didn’t walk toward the cross untouched by emotion. In a dark garden, while His closest friends slept close by, Jesus prayed. He knew what was going to happen next, all the pain and torture and weight of darkness descending in on Him. Facing the cross was likely terrifying. And when He  prayed, He asked the Father to “take this cup of suffering from me.” There’s something there that speaks to my heart. Jesus being both fully human and fully God must have been struggling with what was ahead.

The human Jesus didn’t want to endure the suffering that was to come. I can understand this to my core. We are all sufferers in some form, but some of us have been given the calling to live life in physical pain. Jesus, more than anyone, understood all that was to come. If I stand back for a minute and examine the cross, it’s easy to see the physical pain that Jesus would have endured. To this day, crucifixion is considered to be one of the worst methods of torture designed to maximize suffering. The word excruciating in Latin is formed from “ex cruce” which means “from the cross.” Suffice to say that’s the kind of pain that awaited Jesus as he prayed.

The divine Jesus knew that the cross had to be part of the plan to rescue and redeem. And so, facing all that was to come, he continued his prayer and said, “yet not your will but mine be done.” And this is the part that every person called to be a sufferer needs to weigh and obey.

If Jesus could look at the physical pain of the cross and pray the Lord’s will be done, who am I to wallow in despair about mine?

Living life in physical suffering is difficult. Not only is your body in pain, there are negative effects on your mental health as well. I’m heading down a difficult road in my suffering. I’m at a stage where I can’t really walk or stand and I need to consider life in a wheelchair. I’ve prayed many times for the Lord to take my cup of suffering and it hasn’t happened yet. I can’t say that He never will, because I believe one day I will be pain free, even if it’s not on this earth. But maybe it’s time to consider adding to my prayer “not my will, but yours be done.”

It’s not an easy thing to pray. It’s laying down my desire to be comfortable. It is the difficult task of not allowing myself to mope about because everything in life is hard. It’s waking up every day grateful to be alive – even if being alive is painful. It’s asking the Lord to take my suffering and turn it into something good. It’s living day in and day out trusting that God’s ways are better than my ways, even when it hurts.

I’m this season, I’m learning that I can bring to God the parts of me that are tired, bitter, scared, and disappointed, and trusting Him not to turn away. It’s calling on Him every single day to help me choose to keep going, even when my heart feels heavy. It’s believing that God can still make something beautiful out of something broken.