Scars that Shape Us

As I look back on eight life decades, the things that have been the most formative are my low points, not the mountaintop experiences. Everything I have learned in these 80 years, everything that has truly transformed me, have been through painful thorns in my flesh, not just the delightful moments God has given me (which I still praise him for!).

Reflect on your life. Which experiences have been the most life-changing?

Here are some of the thorns that have scarred me and the scars that have shaped me:

• The death of our third child, Craig at five and a half months from a cot death. That low point was formative because, for a fleeting moment, I saw what really mattered in life: a close walk with Christ, and abandonment of his mission. And living before an Audience of One, God himself.
• Burn-out. On the way to Queenstown, New Zealand, I was driving too fast and running on empty and crashed through a bridge and into a river. God spared my wife and I, and threw me a lifeline, two years of study at Dallas Seminary. Before that crash, warning lights such as hating things like teaching God’s Word had been flashing on my spiritual dashboard, but I ignored them.
• Three episodes with Trigeminal Neuralgia, each lasting several years. I learned that healing need not be instant to be real and that God’s work in me is more important than God’s work through me.

If you asked the biblical character, Job, what was his most formative thorn in the flesh, he would probably say, “thorns, not just one. Loss of my family and possessions, unbelievably painful sores, and unrelenting accusations from my closest friends.” When you read the book of Job, you hear him lament. His prayers to God are totally honest. If you asked him, “How was that formative?” He would probably reply in the words of Job 23:10—"He knows the way that I take; when he has tested me, I will come forth as gold. Underneath all my heart-cries was a conviction that I was known by God and that the times of unbearable suffering would result in me being a better person.”

The Job story harmonizes with the way James opens his letter to suffering believers. He says, Consider it pure joy, my brothers and sisters when you face trials of many kinds because you know that the testing of your faith produces perseverance. Let perseverance finish its work so that you may be mature and complete, not lacking anything. I believe James might say, there was nothing joyful about the times of intense suffering. I counted each of those painful thorns as joy because of what they were producing in me. My character was being transformed.”

When we are in God’s presence forever and bump into people of faith like Jacob, Joseph, and Naomi, I believe they would testify that their times of unbearable suffering, produced scars in them that shaped the people of faith that they eventually became.

• What are some of the high points in your life?
• What are some of the lowest valleys you have been in?
• How have these low points shaped you?

Excerpts from The Point of Your Thorns: Finding Purpose in Your Pain

By Rowland Forman