God Doesn't Waste Pain!

In this episode of the PRESS Movement Podcast with guest host Mmabwe Mulawisha, we explore James 5 and discover a powerful truth: God does not waste pain. James encourages believers to endure hardship, pray through affliction, seek healing, and trust God in every season of life. Using Job as an example, the passage reminds us that endurance is possible because God's mercy is greater than our suffering. 

Mambwe shares deeply personal testimony about loss, grief, and learning to trust God through some of life's most difficult moments. Through the loss of her mother and the challenges that followed, she discovered that pain can either drive us away from God or draw us closer to Him. Rather than allowing hardship to destroy her faith, she learned to pray, trust, and build a relationship with God that carried her through the storm. 

The conversation also highlights the importance of personal prayer, spiritual maturity, and allowing God to work in us through both victories and trials. Whether you're afflicted, joyful, sick, struggling, or simply trying to understand what God is doing, James reminds us to pray.

The message is simple but powerful:

Keep praying. Keep trusting. Keep enduring.

Because God knows what it takes to save, strengthen, and sustain you.

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Transcript

PRESS means to apply force. When God said PRESS, prayer reaches every single situation. He gave us permission to apply force to every situation that we will go through.

And in this podcast, we are going to learn to apply force to what's applying pressure to us. Greetings, everyone. Welcome back to the PRESS Movement Podcast.

2026 has been a year that we do thank God for the highs and the lows. And today in studio, I have with me Sister Mambwe. Hi, everyone.

Hey, she has actually come up through the PRESS ranks in so many ways. That's how we met her on campus when she was a freshman. But she is definitely just a part of the body at this point.

And we love her. And I'm very excited for what she'll share with us today. OK, so I'm honored to be here today.

And the topic that I was given or that was put on my heart is the prayer of encouragement and to pray for healing and compassion. We'll be taking it from James chapter 5. I started at verse 10, but I was technically given verses 13 through 16.

It says, take my brethren, the prophets who have spoken the name of the Lord for an example of suffering, affliction and of patience. In verse 11, it says, behold, recount them happy which endure. You have heard the patience of Job and have seen the end of the Lord, that the Lord is very pitiful and of tender mercy.

But above all things, my brethren, swear and not neither by heaven, neither by earth, neither by any other oath, but let your yea be yea and your nay be nay, lest you fall into condemnation. In verse 13, it says, is any among you afflicted? Let him pray. Is any merry? Let him sing psalms.

In verse 14, it says, whereas you know not what shall be on tomorrow. But what is your life? It is even a vapor that appeareth for a little time and vanisheth away. In verse 15, it says, for that ye ought to say, if the Lord will, we shall live and do this or that.

Verse 16 says, but now ye rejoice in your boastings. All such rejoicing is evil. So I'm going to start from verse 10.

It says, take my brethren, the prophets who have spoken in the name of the Lord for an example of suffering and affliction and of patience. Prophets were people who were called and chosen by God for the edification of the saints. Now, this is a day and age where following God is unusual.

It was challenging and I could say to an extent even dangerous to follow God. And yet they went around preaching the gospel of the Lord to a generation that was fixated and a generation that was rooted in their own gospels. Verse 11, it talks about Job and how he endured.

We see from the story of Job, Job always amazes me because I try to put myself in his shoes. And I honestly can't even fathom, but Job was a blameless man and he was upright. But yet the Lord gave permission to Satan to attack him.

The Lord told Satan that, you know, there's no one on the earth like Job. But it is ironic how, you know, God spoke so well of Job, but allowed for him to go through what he went through. He lost his children, his animals, which back then signified wealth.

He lost his servants, his health was failing, even to the point where his wife was in his ear, telling him like, you know, just curse God and die. But Job's response amazes me. He said, 'The Lord has given, the Lord has taken away, blessed be the name of the Lord.

And I think that we need to carry that same attitude, no matter what comes our way, we will endure. You have to condition your mind to endure and that failure is not an option. In verse 12, it says, But above all things, my brethren, swear not, neither by heaven, neither by earth, neither by any other oath, but let your yea be yea and your nay be nay, lest you fall into condemnation.

We know that Jesus condemned like the wrong prayers, the prayers of repetition and people who think that if they say a lot or say a lot of words that they'll be heard by God. He would much rather, in this case, have a few words along the lines of even like, have mercy on me, oh Lord. It's just telling us not to come before God making big promises, which he uses the word oaths, but instead just ask for his help.

And just pretty much how our mouths get us in trouble. And God condemns us for that. This is a God who knows everything about you, everything you've done, everything you want to do, everything you're going to do.

There's literally no need to make promises to him and not to fulfill it. So don't tell God what you're doing or what you're planning on doing. I think it's important, like you said, just to let God be God.

That's one. When I look at Job, I believe he was a person who understood God's position, that God has the right to make decisions for his life. And I do believe there's a reason he's referenced right before verse 12, where he's saying, swear not neither by heaven nor by earth or any other oath.

He's saying, watch your mouth before me because he has position, because he is God. We don't just come talking any kind of way. It does matter the words we say before him.

And so that's my thoughts looking at this so far. It's interesting that I've met only two people in my life who I asked them, what was the purpose God gave you? They actually told me their purpose was to suffer. And that really shook my heart because the first one, I had never heard that.

But then to watch life as people feel called to suffering and yet understanding that Jesus Christ was born to die and suffering is something he actually understands. So even in thinking about Job, he's not a God who doesn't understand what this is about to cost. And so when he weighs the cost and he lets us feel, he has a way of adding purpose to pain and really knowing how to bring something else out.

But even with those two people, I see both of them responding differently to it because a life of suffering, it appears, can either make you run from him or run to him. I agree to that. I'm thinking of a scripture in the Bible that says, you know, God won't give you much more than you can handle.

Like he knows you, he knows what he's putting on your plate, but you're not going through this alone. If you let God help you, he will help you and help you carry whatever it is that is in front of you. If we go back a chapter, go to chapter four, verse 13 to 16, it says, go to now ye that say, today or tomorrow, we will go in such a city and continue there a year.

Buy and sell and get again. In verse 14, it says, whereas ye know not what shall be on the morrow. For what is your life? It is even a vapor that appears for a little time and then vanisheth away.

In verse 15, it says, for that ye ought to say, if the Lord will, we shall live and do this or that. In verse 16, it says, but now rejoicing in our boastings, all such rejoicing is evil. I compared it to the scripture before, because it just talks about, you don't have to make promises to God.

You don't have to say a whole list of things that you're going to do and then not do it. It's better off for you not to just even say anything and just pray. Just pray that His will be done and just pray and ask Him for mercy.

Because now if you say all this, the Lord is counting such rejoicing as evil. So better off, don't even say anything. Yeah, and just live according to His will.

If the Lord wills. Yes. We're going to move on to chapter five, James chapter five, verse 13.

It says, is any among you afflicted? Let him pray. Is any merry? Let him sing psalms. The word affliction in this chapter, I kind of thought about it in two ways.

Sometimes we tend to compare affliction with sicknesses, but on this scripture, when I looked it up, it says to suffer or to endure hardships or troubles. Everyone has to go through something sometimes in life. Afflictions are bound to happen.

But James is telling us that if you find yourself afflicted, then you have to personally pray. Quite all right. Yes, you can ask believers or counsel to stand with you in prayer, but you also have a part to play.

You also have to personally pray. If you find yourself in a fight, then you ought to pray for yourself. Open up your mouth and speak to it.

Pray and keep praying until the chains break, until the stronghold is broken. Thereafter, it goes on and says that if you are married, then sing psalms, meaning to be joyful or to be of good spirits. Psalms speaks about being thankful and about admonishing.

So no matter what you're going through, psalms, hymns, and spiritual psalms are about being thankful. We're going to move on to verse 14. It says, Is any sick among you? Let him call for the elders of the church and let them pray over him, anointing him with oil in the name of the Lord.

And in verse 15, it says, And the prayer of the faith shall save the sick, and the Lord shall raise him up, and if he have committed sins, they shall be forgiven him. If you are dealing with like any type of sickness in your body, the Bible says to call over the elders of the church and let them pray over you with anointing oil. There's a reason it says elders, because obviously, you know, they're older, but there's always an expectation for them to walk uprightly and live uprightly.

Not saying that all elders do, but at least there's an expectation. And the actual anointing signifies what Jesus did. Anything to add on that? I would add elders is not as much about age as it is about experience, because that is what age tends to give you.

It gives you experience. Calling for the elders, you'll start to see that these are things many of them have seen before, or either they have the experience to know God can do it. But yeah, I agree with that.

In James 5, verse 16, it says, Confess your faults one to another and pray one for another that ye may be healed. The effectual fervent prayer of a righteous man availeth much. There's power in fervently praying.

There's power if you're living righteous, you have the power of God. So when you go and pray, you're trusting and believing and you're right before God in His eyes and in His sight. I remember praying for somebody once and the Lord dropped in my heart, as it is in the spirit, so it is in the body.

And I see that concept in scripture. I'm not saying that's always the case, that what they're going through in the physical is reflected in the natural, but for them it was. And so their sickness and what the Lord was taking them through was a mirror, if you would, of their spirit.

And we have to remember when we talk about Jesus, that He's always prioritizing the soul. Absolutely. Even over the flesh, He's prioritizing the soul.

So if they're sick, let them call for the elders of the church, let them pray over Him anointing with the oil and the prayer of faith shall save the sick. But what does save look like? Yes, the Lord should raise them up, shall raise them up. But if you've committed sins, they shall be forgiven.

That is actually the priority of God. That He can use sickness to deal with their wrongs. And I believe you see that employed here, because then He goes on to say, confess your faults one to another and pray for one another.

He's using the sickness to say, okay, let's expose the other stuff. And God does have a way of using our pain to expose what's really in us. And that's where I get that phrase from when I say God doesn't waste pain.

He doesn't waste pain on just hurting. You see that in scripture time and time again, that whatever He allows or whatever He employs, I would say is a better word to afflict you. It is to also save you at the same time.

I could agree to that. Like I said earlier, like God knows you. He knows what you can handle.

He knows what it takes for you to be right and you to be saved. So sometimes He allows things to happen that, you know, like she has mentioned, they might afflict you physically, but spiritually, it might better you as a person. It might change your mentality.

It might change your character. He knows what to give you. I heard somebody say, sometimes God allows you to hit rock bottom so you can understand that He's a rock at the bottom.

Sometimes He puts you in a position where you have nobody to call on but Him, where you have nobody to turn to but the Word of God, but the Bible. And that changes you, builds your character, builds you spiritually. And eventually you become saved in the process through that.

So He takes that pain that was meant to hurt you or to damage you and changes it for purpose. Yeah, He works all things out for your good. He does.

And it sounds so easy to say, and I know somebody's listening, and they're like, yeah, that's easy to say, but I've been in pain for X number of years, or I'm going through this and I don't see a way out, or my physical body is fighting me. But I thank God because I remember in 2016, and I wrote about this in my book, but I always ask the Lord what He wants for me every year. As in terms of sacrifice, I ask Him what I can give Him that year.

That was the year He said sickness. And that year, I mean, I was sick from January 2nd until. It literally was one of the craziest experiences.

I got the mumps on January 2nd, which is technically extinct virtually in the United States. And I went to the doctor. They're like, this isn't even possible.

Like I've had the shots and that was just the beginning. Then it was the flu and then I couldn't walk. And then my eyes turned red.

And then I started having problems with my joints and nodules swelling. And it went on and on and on and on and on. But I remember telling God, if you can tell me it's coming, then you know how to handle it.

And it's not that He took everything away. He did not leave it with the same impact as it had in 2016, but He did leave the arthritis. And so chronically, I've had arthritis for 10 years now, since I was in my early 30s.

And I've learned God to be God of everything. Even when He lets the pain come, because He said it, the pain is then a reminder that He's God. And that's the way I've learned to use it.

I know these things can push you to be far from God, or they can remind you He is God. Okay, I'm going to be vulnerable. Like she said earlier, I got saved through the press.

I am now a senior about to graduate college, glory to God. But even just looking back over my life and everything that has happened since my freshman year to now my senior year, I've been through so many things time after time. But I remember one thing that really shook my world was the loss of my mom.

I was fighting because I had so many questions for God. Like, why did this happen? Why me? How am I going to handle this? How am I going to survive this? But now I'm at a place where I'm just looking back and I'm thankful because I have people now coming to me, like asking me, how did you go through this? How did you endure this? And through that pain, I was able to learn how to trust God, how to have faith in God, how to pray and silence my mind, pray, get on my knees, pray until I fall asleep. I have learned how to fight.

So no matter what comes my way, I have experience of what He's done before. And I'm able to trust that He will bring me out the next and the next and the next. And I'm standing here, stuff has happened since then, but I have that experience with God that He works all things out for my good.

He knew what it would take. He strengthened me from the loss of my mom, things that even have happened after that. And I'm just here grateful because He knew what it would take for me.

He knew that this pain would come with so many other spiritual, you know, liftings or spiritual improvements. I can say it for a sense. He knew what it would take for me.

He used my pain for purpose and I'm just so grateful. It's not always the case that you have to go through hard times or endure hardships, but depending on the person you are, if you know, God knows how to deal with you, depending on who you are. He knows what it takes for you to be right.

And I mean like entirely right. And it's not that He just wants bad or evil for us, but it is the scriptures that say it rains on the just and the unjust and that the sun comes up on us all basically. And so things are going to happen in life, but the difference we have is exactly what you're saying, that He's with us, that He adds purpose to it, that He comes closer.

I cannot imagine if God didn't come close. So do I believe like I have arthritis because I'm saved? No, it was probably coming to my body either way. That's the rain that came to me.

Same scenario with your mom. Do I believe it happened because you're saved? No, that was coming either way. But what God does is looks and says, oh, but I can keep her through that.

I'll be with her through that. And I can make up the difference in that. And that is such a powerful testimony and honor.

Yes. It is an honor to have God in the middle. And I believe the scripture is just showing us He can be in the middle of it, in the affliction, in the song, whatever it is, He's there.

Any closing words, my boy? I just want to encourage the listener that, you know, no matter where you find yourself today, no matter what you're going through, you've heard the experiences. I want to just encourage you just to try God and give Him a chance and just trust that He's going to work all things out for your good if you let Him, because He wants to help you. But then if you don't want Him to help you, He's like, okay, you have to ask for help.

Cry out to God, do the things right. Read the Bible. Look at what He's instructing us to do because the Bible has its own requirements.

You can't just do it anyhow. Look at what God wants you to do and do it that way. I can guarantee you that He will keep you, sustain you.

You'll be fine. He will help you, your emotions, everything that's going on. Make up the difference.

He'll make up the difference in so many ways, be it whatever. It doesn't even matter what it is. Just wherever you find yourself today, just knowing that you have God makes up the difference.

And sometimes my heart goes out to people who are maybe not saved or have no interest in God and whatever be the case. Because I think about myself, like if I was going through that and I didn't have God, what would it be like? Where would I be? What would be running through my mind? How would I fight this, not having God? So my heart just goes out. So I just urge whoever's listening today, try God, give Him a chance and do.

Yeah, He'll help you through it. The only thing I'll add to that is that I know some of you have prayed and you've sought God before. Keep seeking, keep praying, keep pursuing, keep pressing.

Because when you apply force, and I mean this literally, I know it's the intro to this podcast, but I mean it literally. But when you apply force and pressure to your situation, don't let up until the situation gives. Absolutely, I agree to that.

But I think about it like, you know, when you're going through whatever it may be in life, I think about it like a surgeon or if somebody was to walk up to me with, I don't know, an object or something, trying to do something, my first response would be like, you know, back off, what are you trying to do? But then when we go to the hospital and we have issues and whatever, a surgeon, a surgeon is going to cut you open, but it's for your good. He's going to fix and operate and do whatever he has to do, but it's going to be for your good and for your benefit. And when it comes to surgeons, sometimes we put so much faith and we allow them to do whatever, do whatever the doctor is saying, do whatever.

That's the same attitude we need to have with God. When he brings whatever and decides to cut us however and just do whatever, just let him have his way and ask him, how do you want me to walk this? How do you want me to fight this? I think that makes up the difference. And when you keep going, you keep pursuing, you will testify that prayer reaches every single situation.

Be blessed. Join the movement. Join the community.

Like, share, and subscribe to this podcast. Visit us at PressToPray.com or find us on Instagram or Facebook. Did you know that when you are quiet, your voice is missing to God's ears? I know some of us have prayed and we're wondering how long should I pray about this? Why should I pray if God already knows? How will I know God is answering? And what do I do when I feel like God's not listening? But God is listening for your voice.

It's too quiet in this world for the troubles we have. You have to raise your voice and God wants to hear from you. It's Too Quiet, a book about prayer, is designed to answer your prayer questions and build your faith.

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