Comfort is Essential

My son wanted to show me the survival kit he put together. It was a combination of very useful things like a torch, a pocket knife and a fire stick (for starting fires). Bear Grylls would have approved. But it also contained unexpected items: three cuddly toys for comfort! My initial (grown up) response was that these were somewhat out of place in a survival kit. But after a few moments I realised he was on to something. Comfort is important. Perhaps especially so when you’re in difficult circumstances. Having a source of comfort in one’s survival kit is probably not a bad idea.

For human beings, comfort isn’t just important. It’s essential. We have an inner need for comfort when we’re hurting. We can all too easily downplay this need. We can pretend to be tough and say that others need comfort, but not me. We could say comfort is only for children, or for women, or for the weak. But all of that is nonsense. Every single human being needs comfort, regardless of who they are. And providing comfort for His people is high on God’s agenda.

The problem when we downplay our need is that it doesn’t just disappear. Instead, we will remain uncomforted, and we will start looking for it in all the wrong places. Many lives have been derailed by looking for comfort in such things as relationships, sex, alcohol, or unreality. When we look for comfort in the wrong things, this can easily lead to bondage and even addictions.

The things of this world give us some immediate reprieve from the inner pain, but they cannot heal our hearts. Instead, it starts to feel like we’re trying to fill a bottomless pit, and despair slowly overtakes our feelings. We continually try harder to meet that inner need, but it is never enough. Many people are totally bound by harmful things, only because they have never been properly comforted.

When we think of comfort we might immediately think of mums. Maybe our mum was the most comforting person we know. Or perhaps it was another motherly figure who was able to provide us with a measure of comfort when we were young. But you know what is amazing? Father God says that He can give us His comfort, which is yet better than anything an earthly mum (or dad) can provide. He can bring comfort in the deepest place of our being. We can ask Him, and we may need to let go of the false comforts we have been drawing on. But we can know from the Scriptures that it is very much in God’s heart to give us what we need.

“O you afflicted one, tossed with tempest, and not comforted, behold, I will lay your stones with colourful gems, And lay your foundations with sapphires” (Isaiah 54:11, NKJV). Needing comfort is not silly. It is not just for little children. God wants to comfort us in all those places where we have never yet been truly comforted.