"Rate it on a scale of 1-10." That is one of the most common phrases for a nurse or doctor who is waiting on a patient with pain for a variety of diagnosable issues. We know that a 1 is usually something along the lines of a bump into a table and a 10 is a detached limb. But what's so interesting is that what is a 1 to one person might be a 5 to another because we all have varying degrees of pain tolerance and intensity based on varying factors such as nerve sensitivity and lack of previous experience with pain. Do you notice, however, that the doctor or nurse never questions the number given, they just work on diagnosing and fixing the problem from there? Why don't we do that with people around us?

We don't get to decide the severity of another's pain. We just have to trust that if we cannot empathize with that particular struggle, that it doesn't mean it isn't valid and it doesn't mean it doesn't hurt.

This is a concept that I think we have to really be careful of as Christians. Our faith is one that is unique in the sense that it offers freedom to all who accept it. However, I think we get so caught up in helping others using Christianese phrases like, "claiming victory" that we forget that sometimes even after we are saved we can walk through pretty thorny valleys where pain can be all that is felt. Pain is not something we can put on a blanket scale because what is a 1 for one person may be a 5 for someone else.

I also don't think God works on a "pain scale." His word doesn't say, "suck it up and get over it," but rather is says things like:

"You keep track of all my sorrows.
    You have collected all my tears in your bottle.
    You have recorded each one in your book." - Psalms 56:8 (NLT)

"The Lord is close to the brokenhearted;
    he rescues those whose spirits are crushed." - Psalms 34:18 (NLT)

"For everything there is a season,
    a time for every activity under heaven.
A time to be born and a time to die.
    A time to plant and a time to harvest.
A time to kill and a time to heal.
    A time to tear down and a time to build up.
A time to cry and a time to laugh.
    A time to grieve and a time to dance." - Ecclesiastes 3:1-4 (NLT)

Jesus guaranteed us that we would have pain. He did not promise a Christian life apart from pain. But He did promise to be there the entire time and offers hope because He has overcome the world. That's what makes Christians different from the world: we know that we can have hope for the future because of Christ but we still might suffer with some of the very same things that the world does. Christianity merely changes how we suffer. So yes, victory is ours through Christ, but as long as we are on this side of heaven, pain is a part of our journey.

There is a psychological principle that categorizes negative human thinking into somewhere around 10 different styles. The idea is that when we participate and give in to these negative styles of thinking, it can lead to increased levels of anxiety and distress. Most people are commonly subject to around 2 or 3. There is one called "all or nothing" or "black and white" thinking and it is one that I struggle with a lot. The idea behind it is that in this thinking style, the thinker thinks that a situation is either one way or the other; there is no gray area.

When I was in college, I had a sweet friend suggest something to me that has changed the way I view many aspects of life: "Megan, not everything is black and white." The reason this impacted me so heavily was because I tend to ascribe to the idea that with most things there's no middle ground. Needless to say, it's gotten me into some trouble that I could have avoided. But one thing I've learned recently is to embrace the gray area.

The gray area is a place I think many people by nature avoid because we as humans LOVE certainty and we love knowing things. More importantly, we love to be right. There's a reason google is so popular: we can be "certain" and can find the answer to just about everything. There are some things in life that are black and white; like the fact that 2+2 always equals 4 and that a period always goes at the end of a statement. The problem is, there are so many things in life that cannot be easily googled and usually fall into that gray area; like grieving a loss, struggling with an illness, and navigating relationship strife.

There are also a great deal of spiritual things that are black and white, but I'd venture to say there are an equal number of which fall into the gray area as well. There are some things we know about God for sure like the fact that He's good, He's faithful, and He's loving. But there are also things we cannot comprehend like His ornate plan, why He allows suffering and pain, and quite honestly the variety of ways He works in different people's lives and situations can sometimes be mind bending.

It's hard because as humans we look to examples to help guide our decisions and actions in these gray areas, and the most available examples are other people. But the problem is that gives way to comparison and leaves the door wide open to that black and white way of thinking. Because what was seemingly "black and white" for Sally's life may not be as clear in your life and your current situation. It can all be very stressful! And I think the reason it's so stressful to us is because we as humans a lot of times want to be perfect and so we crave that certainty that what we are doing is right.

However, another thing I remember that very same friend saying in a follow up conversation was the following: "It [everything] is [black and white] to God!" This really threw me for a loop because a few days earlier she had just told me that not everything was black and white! It seemed to conflict. But when I really thought about it, I understood; to humans not everything is black and white, but God, in His infinite wisdom, knows everything and there is no gray area to Him. He is perfect and certain; He operates only in the black and white. That can be intimidating if you let it be intimidating, but I think when you let grace come in it stops being intimidating. I don't have to worry about being perfect in the gray area because it's not gray to God.

My mantra recently has been this: "I don't know and I don't have to know." Because so often I will sit and stew over things that I don't know the answers to and will quite literally send myself into a panic over it. It's very unhelpful because usually the things that I'm stewing over I will never know the answers to. It didn't make sense to me. As a good believer shouldn't I have all the answers? Shouldn't I know everything? However, I found comfort in this verse when it was presented to me in a community group session at Passion:

"Oh, how great are God’s riches and wisdom and knowledge! How impossible it is for us to understand his decisions and his ways!" - Romans 11:33 (NLT)

The Message version even goes as far to say, "It's way over our heads. We'll never figure it out."

I didn't even know the Bible addressed that! Isn't it wild how you can read the Bible so much and still find something new each time?

Joyce Meyer put it like this: "Just because we cannot understand what God does, does not stop Him from doing it. We understand God with our hearts, not with our heads." God doesn't need me to understand and do everything perfectly in life or even with Him; He just needs me to do my best in the gray area and allow Him to be the one to operate in the certainty of the black and white and let His abounding grace cover my flaws within that gray area.