I think a lot of us have asked this question, even if we didn’t say it out loud: “God, if You knew this would hurt me, why didn’t You stop it?” That question doesn’t come from a place of rebellion—it comes from trying to understand how a good God allows something that feels so painful to touch our lives. It comes from the tension between what we believe about His love and what we’re actually experiencing in real time. And if we’re honest, those moments can shake us a little, because we expect God to protect us from pain, and not allow us to walk through it.
We get ourselves into some pretty heady situations if we’re honest. God tells us not to think unloving thoughts, yet we entertain them more than we’d like to admit. He calls us to walk in love, but it doesn’t take much for us to get heated, frustrated, or thrown off. And before we’ve even slowed down to process what’s happening, our emotions are running the show, sitting in the driver’s seat and making decisions our spirit never agreed with. That’s where the enemy finds opportunity—not creating something out of nothing, but working with what we’ve already opened the door to. He throws fuel on fires we didn’t realize we were already kindling, and then we look up wondering how things escalated so quickly.
We have a real enemy who is calculated and deeply opposed to anything God is doing in our lives. But instead of recognizing his influence, we sometimes turn around and place that weight on God, questioning His goodness in situations where He was never the source of the damage. That’s a deception that has to be corrected, because if we misunderstand God’s role, it will affect how we trust Him, how we come to Him, and how we grow in Him. Rerouting that thinking—learning to discern what is coming from God and what is not—is not optional. It’s essential. Because the way we see God will shape the way we walk with Him, and if that foundation is off, everything built on it will be unstable.
God doesn’t cause our pain, but He doesn’t always stop it either. And if we’re being real, life be lifing—that’s just the truth of it. It’s dynamic, unpredictable, full of highs and lows that don’t always make sense when you’re in the middle of them. Jesus never tried to hide that from us. In John 16:33 (NLT), He tells the disciples: “I have told you all this so that you may have peace in me. Here on earth you will have many trials and sorrows. But take heart, because I have overcome the world.” He was clear—life on this earth is going to come with trials, pressure, and moments that stretch you in ways you didn’t expect.
But what I love is that He didn’t stop at the warning—He followed it with truth. He reminds us that even in the middle of it, we’re not powerless, and we’re not alone. The same Jesus who acknowledged the weight of life also declared that He had already overcome it. That means we’re not just surviving hard moments—we’ve been given the authority to stand firm in them. Not because we feel strong every day, but because we’re rooted in the One who already won the victory.
And when you really let that settle in your soul, it will shift how you see what you’re going through. The situation may still be real, the pressure may still be there, but you’re no longer approaching it from a place of defeat. You’re standing as someone who has already been positioned to overcome.
God is not careless with our lives, and He is not distant from what we feel. What He does, though, is use what we walk through in a way that reaches deeper than our comfort ever could. That discomfort we try so hard to avoid is often the very place where something in us is being strengthened, corrected, or matured. Scripture doesn’t hide that from us either. James 1:2–4 (NLT) says, “2 Dear brothers and sisters, when troubles come your way, consider it an opportunity for great joy. 3 For you know that when your faith is tested, your endurance has a chance to grow. 4 So let it grow, for when your endurance is fully developed, you will be perfect and complete, needing nothing.” That passage isn’t telling us to enjoy pain—it’s revealing that there is purpose working underneath it, something God is developing that could not grow any other way.
Galatians 5:16 (NLT) tells us, “So I say, let the Holy Spirit guide your lives. Then you won’t be doing what your sinful nature craves.” That verse reminds us that we are not meant to navigate these moments from our flesh or our emotions alone. Left to ourselves, we will justify staying the same, we will rehearse what hurt us, and we will even give ourselves permission to resist the very thing God is trying to teach us. But when the Holy Spirit is leading, He doesn’t just comfort you—He teaches you. He shows you what needs to change, what needs to be released, and how to walk forward differently so you don’t stay bound to the same cycle.
So when trouble comes, the goal isn’t to immediately escape it—it’s to understand what God is doing in it. It’s taking a moment to pause, to reflect, and to ask, “Lord, what are You showing me here? What in me needs to grow? What needs to shift so I don’t stay in this same place?” Because once you learn what the season is trying to produce in you, you don’t walk away empty—you walk away strengthened, clearer, and more grounded than you were before. ■
Scripture quotations marked (NLT) are taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Inc., Wheaton, Illinois 60189. All rights reserved.
“When It Hurts and God Doesn’t Stop It”, written by KLizzie, edited by Reverend Fran Mack, for Sundie Morning Sistas ©2026. All rights reserved. All done to the glory of God through Jesus Christ, our Lord! SMS is dedicated to inspiring and encouraging Christian Women through the Word of God.