"Pain is a sign of weakness which is only temporary. On the other hand, prayer is a sign of POWER and STRENGTH. Whenever prayers are answered, the results are permanent. When I think about pain, I think of it as a temporary road construction. Road construction seems to detour you into a direction that you do not want to go. Sometimes during a detour, you may see things that you are not used to seeing, but at the end of the day once you make the detour it brings you back to the same place that you were trying to get to in the beginning. This is how the power of prayer works! Prayer makes your pain become your purpose and your promise. This is what brings us to the pinnacle point of understanding that the power of prayer, our purpose which is God's promise to us always supersedes our pain."
Bishop Michael Shackleford