Pain Warnings

Would you like to bake some cookies? I want to make them for a surprise for Daddy. Won’t that be fun? Here is his favorite recipe. Let’s first get out the ingredients we need.

Together we measure and mix. Yum, this is good! you say, licking your fingers. Can I put the chocolate chips in? Yes, but why are there only a few left? I thought I filled this measuring cup. Did you eat them? You look down because you are ashamed. Slowly you nod your head. Well, I guess these will have to be for Daddy’s cookies! The rest of us will have to have them plain. I’m sorry I ate them up, you say. Can’t we get more? No, dear. I want to help you remember to ask first next time.

At last the cookies are done. Be careful, this tray is— Ouch! It’s hot! you shout, shaking your fingers. Did you burn them? Here, cold water will help. They still hurt, you moan. I’m sorry you got burnt, but I’m glad you felt the pain. Why? you ask. Because it made you pull your hand away. If you didn’t feel pain, you could have been burned much worse. The pain was a warning to protect you. When people don’t feel pain it is a terrible thing. Often parts of their body get infected and rot, just because they can’t feel!

I’m glad I can feel things, you say. Yes, God gave us pain sensors to protect us. Pain is good in other ways to. Remember how you were ashamed about eating the chocolate chips? That was a good kind of pain, because it helped you see that you were wrong. Do you know what would happen if you told me a lie? I would get in worse trouble, you say. Worse trouble indeed. If you didn’t confess your wrong, the sin of deception would grow in your heart. And the Bible says, “sin, when it is finished, bringeth forth death.”* (James 1:15)

Just think! Sin is like rot inside of you. That is why you have to be corrected and disciplined when you choose wrong, to keep you from becoming rotten inside. Imagine your heart like the old moldy squash by the compost pile. Yuk! That’s gross! you say. Yes, doing wrong is disgusting. But if we are not sorry for sin and don’t feel pain in our hearts when we do wrong, that is just how horrible our lives will become. Aren’t you glad that God gives us pain warnings inside, to help protect us? Be careful to listen to them so that you will be saved from worse trouble and pain later!