14 Days of Strength in Any StruggleMuestra

God’s Comfort When Troubles Don’t Stop by Kathi Lipp

I was behind on everything. I’d tell myself to just do the next thing or to stop being so lazy.

I finally began seeing a therapist because I had such a hard time functioning. I couldn’t be creative or concentrate, and I didn’t want to hang out with anyone else besides my husband and my dog.

My therapist asked some initial questions, and I responded with, “Yeah, this thing happened, but it’s not a big deal.” Or “Yeah, it was hard for me, but other people have had it so much worse...”

She finally stopped me and asked, “Have you heard of compound trauma?”

I hadn’t. She went on to explain. “Yes, any one of those things on their own may not have sunk you. But what it sounds like is that life has been unrelenting, and each of these traumas—and that’s what they are, traumas—has left you without the ability to recover.”

And as soon as I heard this, I, a dedicated non-crier, broke down in a flood of tears.

Yes, horrible things have happened to others, and I will mourn with them. But the magnitude of someone else’s suffering does not lessen my suffering. And until I allow myself to grieve, I cannot recover.

So many of us have been through surprisingly hard things. It doesn’t matter if other people are tougher than you. It doesn’t matter if your friend or your neighbor could handle circumstances better than you could. God has made it clear that to be there for others, we must allow God to comfort us. God comforts us through others who are going through similar circumstances—through other people’s creative acts of kindness. Through the Word, prayers, and the love of the people God has surrounded us with, we feel His comfort.

He calls Himself the God of all comfort, and He proves that over and over again.

Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of mercies and God of all comfort, who comforts us in all our affliction, so that we may be able to comfort those who are in any affliction, with the comfort with which we ourselves are comforted by God. II CORINTHIANS 1: 3-4 ESV

What are you finding God’s strength in today?