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Explain what is our core suffering. To what extent do you experience this battle as your greatest pain? Why are we often not as aware of this deep distress in our soul as we are aware of the pain of divorce, death, rejection, violence, etc.?
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Our core suffering is the holy tension between what we are right now and what we are designed to be in Christ (what our deepest soul longs for too). We are often not so aware of this real need and this deep distress, because we are not walking closely with God, and Satan has deceived us too about what is most valuable in life.
#SoulCare
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Our core suffering is the holy tension in the gap between the person I am, and the person I long to be in God. I experience this battle frequently. My Christian walk is a stumbling one. I reach out for God every time I stumble. Sometimes it takes a while to reconnect with my new identity, but my new inclination is there after every stumble.
I think we often aren’t aware of our soul distress because it’s covered over with our ‘mess.’ (as in the iceberg diagrams. It’s hidden so deep we can’t see it. But the pain of divorce, loss, rejection etc., is above the water line and seen. Therefore we focus our attention on trying to fix that pain. This is where we need a SoulCarer to help us or time spent alone with God allowing him to delve deep into our soul by his spirit as we journal or talk with him.
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The core suffering is the distance between our flesh and our spirit.
Paul puts this perfectly: “For I do not do the good I want to do, but the evil I do not want to do—this I keep on doing. Now if I do what I do not want to do, it is no longer I who do it, but it is sin living in me that does it. So I find this law at work: Although I want to do good, evil is right there with me. For in my inner being I delight in God’s law; but I see another law at work in me, waging war against the law of my mind and making me a prisoner of the law of sin at work within me. What a wretched man I am! Who will rescue me from this body that is subject to death?”
Romans 7:19-24 NIVI believe we are often not aware of this battle because you are numb, distracted, complacent or isolated.
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The core suffering deep within. The real battle is between the person I am and the person I was designed to be and long to be as a Christian. As a Christian the battle is ongoing. The flesh wars against the Spirit. We are in a constant state of transformation by the Spirit and word of God. As we go deeper in God, we become more aware of who it is He has designed us to be. We are also aware of the things in our flesh that must be surrendered, the thing that must be mortified to be more like God. We are not always as aware of this deep distress because we get caught up, we become overwhelmed or distracted with the issues and problems life bring.
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Our core suffering is knowing the gap between what we think we ought to be and what we see we are. Less than before do I experience this suffering knowing that I am limited and finite.
Our external sufferings we think the cause of our real pain whereas the deeper cause of our pain is our us-caused distance from the sweet God.
