Pain megaphone

Last week my gums were sliced open inside and outside on both my upper and lower jaws, all around my teeth and a big patch of my palette was removed in order for it to be grafted in other places. A front tooth was pulled and bone was grafted in its socket and scratchy stitches now ring my gums. Whenever I eat or drink something hot YEOW! If I eat or drink something cold YEOW! If my tongue touches the roof of my mouth YEOW! My head aches, my tooth socket aches, and I have a bad taste in my mouth.

Thanks for all of the get well wishes after my surgery. I have not been able to tend to e-mail, WFTD, work, et al, because pain has completely dominated my thoughts the past few days. I would describe it as being near-unbearable. C.S. Lewis once said, “But pain insists upon being attended to. God whispers to us in our pleasures, speaks in our conscience, but shouts in our pains: it is His megaphone to rouse a deaf world”.


I was feeling blue about my pain over the weekend and I read a little piece about Helen Keller on the Internet.

Helen Keller was actually both deaf and blind from the age of 19 months, and yet she went on to become the first person who was handicapped in this fashion to obtain a Bachelor of Arts Degree. She became a world famous speaker and author, became good friends of Mark Twain, and met every sitting President from Grover Cleveland to Lyndon Johnson.

It is remarkable to me that someone so handicapped could go so far in life. Most in her condition would have remained mired in their suffering like a rabbit caught in a snare. Helen Keller saw suffering in a different light. She saw the other side of it.

She said, “The world is full of suffering; it is also full of overcoming it”.

If you are suffering today, you should know that the world is full of people just like you and sadly some are even in worse shape. The world is also full of people who are overcoming it. I have decided to get going again today and take a stab at overcoming it. I have asked God to help me not hear the pain so loudly

John 16:33
I have told you these things, so that in me you may have peace. In this world you will have trouble. But take heart! I have overcome the world.