Pain Is Not the Problem

Nobody wants to be here right now.

That’s okay. You don’t have to want to be here. You just have to be here.

What happened tonight was real. The loss was real. The way it happened was real. And whatever you’re feeling right now — disappointment, frustration, embarrassment, anger — that’s real too.

I’m not going to try to fix that. I’m just going to sit in it with you for a minute.

Read this passage slowly.

Let that sit for a second before you move.

The verse doesn’t say the Lord fixes the brokenhearted. It says he’s close to them. Near them. Present with them in the pain.

That distinction matters tonight. You don’t need someone to fix this right now. You need to know you’re not alone in it.

Pain after a loss is not the problem. Pain means you cared. Pain means it mattered. The team that doesn’t feel anything after a hard loss is the team that stopped caring — and that’s a much bigger problem than tonight’s score.

What you do with the pain is what matters. Not tonight. Tonight you feel it. But the pain that gets processed — that gets sat with honestly and then directed forward — becomes fuel. The pain that gets buried or ignored or covered over with false positivity comes back later in worse forms. Don’t bury it. Feel it. And know you’re not alone in it.

The Lord is close to the brokenhearted. That includes this locker room, tonight.

Make participation genuinely optional. Some athletes will talk. Some won’t. Both are fine. The question creates space, not pressure.