Finding Comfort in Discomfort

Silence. Unfamiliar places. Strange looks.  If you’re like most of us these things cause you discomfort.  We tend to distance ourselves from discomfort.  That is, until we don’t.  Sometimes we run to it.  Really?  Yes, really.  For today’s blog I am sharing with you another excerpt of my new release Genesis Three World.  In it I explain the “really”.

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The conversation in my Men’s Life Group continued, but I was disconnected. I wasn’t daydreaming; I was pondering. Moments before, Kevin (not his real name) shared how, in his darkest days of alcohol and drug addiction, he found “comfort in discomfort.” He continued by saying, “Whatever [substance] I could get in my body to numb the pain.” Using discomfort to numb the pain. That habit did not originate with Kevin. It is as old as the hills. It is also as current as today. The numbers, while not all-telling, indicate a problem.

• Almost 21 million Americans have at least 1 addiction, yet only 10% of them receive treatment.
• Drug overdose deaths have more than tripled since 1990.
• Alcohol and drug addiction cost the U.S. economy over $600 billion every year.
• About 20% of Americans who have depression, or an anxiety disorder also have a substance use disorder.

Source: AddictionCenter.com

And those numbers include only addictions to drugs and alcohol. Addiction comes in near endless varieties: sex, power, distraction, social media, cellphone games, work, recreation, hoarding. We are comfort seekers.

The freed Hebrew slaves longed to return to the discomfort of enslavement rather than face the unknowns of the wilderness. All the Hebrew spies, except Caleb and Joshua, voted to stay in those same unknowns in order to avoid a new adventure in a promised land. Solomon’s addiction to sex overrode his wisdom and killed his kingdom. King Xerxes’ love of drink led him to pronounce a death sentence on the Jews. The discomforts of life continue to provide comfort.

John withholds his name but shares his story.

John 5:1-6 (NIV)
Some time later, Jesus went up to Jerusalem for one of the Jewish festivals. Now there is in Jerusalem near the Sheep Gate a pool, which in Aramaic is called Bethesda and which is surrounded by five covered colonnades. Here a great number of disabled people used to lie—the blind, the lame, the paralyzed. One who was there had been an invalid for thirty-eight years. When Jesus saw him lying there and learned that he had been in this condition for a long time, he asked him, “Do you want to get well?”

What a strange question for Jesus to ask! But was it? The biblical text informs us that the man “had been an invalid for thirty-eight years.” The man was limited in mobility for nearly four decades. Why would Jesus ask him if he wanted to be healed? Perhaps the man found comfort in discomfort. As an invalid, he received food from good-hearted passersby and perhaps family members. Healing would mean taking up his mat and walking into a life of responsibility – finding a job, showing up to work, creating new habits, etc.

Physical disability is not required in choosing to stay. In this Genesis Three World, far too often people choose to continue in a life of discomfort, ignoring Jesus’ invitation to take His burden that is light rather than the burdens of this world. Flowing from the gospel are freedom, security, rescue, redemption, restoration, cleansing, forgiveness, and salvation. Yet some (more often than not) choose to continue to live in their discomfort.

#ordinarylives

Follow this link to order your copy of Genesis Three World.