How Unbearable Pain Can Lead to Your Greatest Breakthrough
Entrepreneur Yvan Mardy recalls having sickle cell anemia, jaundice, gallstones, his gallbladder removed and pneumonia—but despite all of that, rather than running from God, Mardy got closer to Him. Paradoxically, reminding yourself of who God is—a sovereign God who works all things for our good—will help you find purpose in your suffering and thereby move forward with contentment despite negative circumstances.
“I watched something recently where somebody said that nothing happens in your life without going through God’s hands first,” Mardy says. “And that was powerful for me because it started to help me realize that everything that happened in my life, God already knew that it was coming …
“So I’m in college; I missed a month of college because I had had basically a crisis and didn’t know how to take care of myself. I didn’t eat for a week, ended up in the hospital for another week and then ended up home for a month, but God brought me through that and it didn’t really affect me at all,” Mardy says. “I thought it was because the school system was bad, but it was really just God giving me grace in the times that I was sick.”
Rather than looking at his trials as a setback, Mardy saw them as an opportunity to help others, he says on the “Mike Signorelli” podcast on the Charisma Podcast Network. What Satan meant for evil, God used to bring about mental and spiritual healing.
“I didn’t stop doing the things that I was doing because I had an injury. I couldn’t do things physically,” he says. “But I kept giving hope, kept sowing seeds, kept praying, kept helping anybody—anybody that came into my hospital room, I tried to give them some kind of value or something like that,” Mardy says. “And my life exploded from that point. This has been amazing; it’s been a year of more pain than I’ve ever felt in my life, but it’s been a year of more breakthrough than I’ve ever felt.”
To listen to more about how to find a hopeful perspective amid the chaos of life, listen to the rest of the episode titled “How To Play Injured: How To Find Strength In Your Weakness” here.
