Who's the Dictator?

"Pain demands to be felt." The Fault in Our Stars has recently put this quote on my mind. This quote makes me imagine pain to be a dictator. Over the past few years, pain has been my dictator that places restrictions on my ability to experience life to the fullest. As a result, I have spent my time searching for the protagonist in my life.

In Kyle Idleman's book Gods at War, he states, "When someone or something replaces the Lord God in the position of glory in our lives, then that person or thing by definition has become our god." A desire for physical comfort is a natural desire. However, my pursuit of comfort has overruled my pursuit of God frequently. Therefore, I have been worshipping the god of all comfort.

The god of all comfort was not to be found in treatments. Not  in a boot, not on crutches, not in therapy, not even in surgery. The god of all comfort left me wanting. He got my hopes up for nothing. He reduced my hope for relief to nearly nothing. The god of all comfort tells me each morning to stay in bed--the only place where my pain is truly limited--and to avoid the unnecessary discomfort of stepping into a world with hurt and without hope.

On the other hand, the God of all comfort makes Himself available to us.

2 Corinthians 1:3-10Holman Christian Standard Bible (HCSB)

3 Praise the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of mercies and the God of all comfort. 4 He comforts us in all our affliction,[a] so that we may be able to comfort those who are in any kind of affliction, through the comfort we ourselves receive from God. 5 For as the sufferings of Christ overflow to us, so through Christ our comfort also overflows. 6 If we are afflicted, it is for your comfort and salvation. If we are comforted, it is for your comfort, which is experienced in your endurance of the same sufferings that we suffer. 7 And our hope for you is firm, because we know that as you share in the sufferings, so you will share in the comfort.

8 For we don’t want you to be unaware, brothers, of our affliction that took place in Asia: we were completely overwhelmed—beyond our strength—so that we even despaired of life. 9 Indeed, we personally had a death sentence within ourselves, so that we would not trust in ourselves but in God who raises the dead. 10 He has delivered us from such a terrible death, and He will deliver us. We have put our hope in Him that He will deliver us again

The god of all comfort's intention is to get my hopes up. The God of all comfort's intention is to be a foundation for my hope (v. 10) and to cause a ripple effect in others (vv. 6-7). God doesn't want me to be comfortable and complacent; He wants me to find my strength in Him.

The question is who dictates your life: the god of all comfort or the God of all comfort?