I preached this sermon in 2008, thinking it was not one of my better ones.
Afterwards, several people told me it was just what they needed to hear.
Since many folks I know and love are going through some pretty rough stuff right now, I will repost it.
“Why Is My Pain Unceasing?” - Dealing With Despair
Jeremiah 15:15–21, Matthew 16:21–28
By Alison Longstaff
St. James Lutheran Church, New Dundee, Ontario
Sunday, August 31, 2008
One nice thing about pain is that it feels so good when it stops.
The reason my pain is unceasing is that I recently started Ashtanga yoga, and I can barely move. But that is not why we are here today.
In our Scripture readings, we heard a lot about suffering. We heard a pain-filled cry to God to end the suffering in Jeremiah. In the gospel reading, Jesus is warning the disciples about the terrible suffering he will endure. Peter objects, and Jesus shouts at Peter, “Get behind me, you Satan!” in a shocking, very un-Jesus like moment. He says, “You are a stumbling block to me; for you are setting your mind not on divine things but on human things.”
Peter was the voice of the tempter when he declared that such suffering and death should never happen to Jesus. Jesus knew it was imperative to focus on the spiritual work about to be accomplished and not on the suffering. He had to focus on His Divine mission and not be distracted. Perhaps Peter was the voice of the demon attacking Jesus, trying to convince Jesus to opt out of the suffering. This would explain the intensity of the rebuke.
Jesus had to keep his eyes set on the Divine to accomplish his mission.
Life on this earth includes suffering. Even here in North America, with our health-care and insurance policies, relative wealth and myriad safety measures, we can’t seem to escape suffering. We often think we shouldn’t have to suffer. We keep creating more ways to protect ourselves, as if constant comfort and total security were the answer to all our problems.
So why are we still so restless and unhappy?
Some of the countries that rank highest for overall national happiness are places like Nigeria and Bhutan. What’s that about? Nigeria suffers from extreme poverty, and many people live in mud huts. How can they possibly be happier than us? Well, it seems they have a deep reliance on God. They are a very Christian country, and they live their faith in every way they can. They are desperately poor, yet they sing and pray and share the little they have with each other, and they are happy.
Toronto journalist Jonathan Power interviewed Olusegun Obasanjo, a Nigerian who became a Christian and a preacher after being unjustly imprisoned. In his three years of captivity, Obusanjo became a sort of chaplain to his fellow prisoners. He says, “The time I had real joy in my life was when I was in prison. I felt then that there was just God and me, and my fellow prisoners whom I must try and help." Extreme hardship robs us of everything- but God. Perhaps this is why some of the most loving and deeply spiritual people are also people who have suffered great hardship.
My one objection to books and philosophies like The Secret and A Complaint-Free World is the way they can promote the idea that we are solely responsible for what happens to us in our lives. The idea is that if we cultivate a good attitude, we invite good things into our lives, and that we invite misfortune by having a bad attitude. The logical conclusion to this is that if we just work hard enough to have a great attitude, nothing bad will happen to us. But if it were true, those Indonesians must have had one bad attitude to invite that tsunami onto them. Every victim of every tragedy could be blamed for their misfortune. I’m afraid it doesn’t work that way.
No, such a philosophy falls too easily into a judgmentalism toward the suffering. “It must be their fault. If only they were positive like me, they’d be okay.” This is a lie. It demonstrates a strong reliance on one’s own efforts for “salvation,” and no reliance on God.
My mom has been in chronic physical pain for over twenty-three years. She has fibromyalgia and rheumatoid arthritis, which means “everything hurts.” And she has depression. (Well, duh. Poor thing. Who wouldn’t?) She’s on all sorts of medicines, which have their own strange side-effects and cause other problems. I don’t know how she manages. I can’t hack chronic pain for even a day. I get grumpy and whiney and can be very impatient when waiting for my next dose of pain reliever. But twenty-three years?! Did I mention that she also gets regular migraines? She has tried every treatment in the world, from steroids to vitamins to acupuncture to moose meat, and nothing helps.
I love her. I don’t want her to suffer. Sometimes I get really impatient with her. (Surely she’s doing something wrong!) I judge her for not trying hard enough or not trying the right things long enough. My judging comes from how hard it is to see her in pain. But my judging her never helps. My impatience never helps. Again and again, the best and only thing I can do for her is to love her to bits, and spend time with her, and believe with my whole heart that God has a plan. Period.
Has my mom been suffering for twenty-three years because there is some lesson she is refusing to learn? I can’t believe that. She’s doing the best she can. She just got dealt a rotten hand. She didn’t invite this onto herself any more than my classmate’s two-year-old son invited death from liver cancer onto himself. Terrible stuff just happens.
Yes, a positive attitude can greatly improve certain aspects of our lives, and can spin off some nice side effects. Optimism and hope are our wings, and when we have them, they lift us up and over a multitude of life’s hurdles. But sometimes, through no fault of our own, our wings get plucked or broken. Sometimes a hoard of locusts swoops down on that rich and thick harvest of positive thinking and in a heart-beat, strips it to dead stalks. Sometimes we are left walking or crawling down life’s dusty road, not flying, experiencing every bump and ditch and thorn and mud puddle. “The rain falls on the just and on the unjust,” says God in the Gospels. Or, to quote contemporary wisdom, “Shit happens.”
So we must set our minds on divine things, and not on human things.
There is so much in this life over which we have no control. There are all sorts of forces at work around us, and we are far less powerful than we think. Our thoughts are not God’s thoughts. We want a happy, comfy life now. God wants us to have a happy, comfy life for eternity.
We are part of a great tapestry. Stuff that looks bad to our eyes now, is allowed to happen because God sees a bigger picture. But don’t forget, God isn’t some cold, distant artist. When we suffer, God suffers along with us. He knows what it is like to be a mortal. He was one, in Jesus. Jesus suffered to bring a much better outcome for everyone down the road. But, just the way the disciples couldn’t see why Jesus allowed Himself to suffer, we often can’t see why we or our loved ones are allowed to suffer. We can’t see God’s plan, but it is there.
Shit happens, and not all the positive thinking in the world save us from it. No one is that powerful, no matter what we’d like to think. All twelve steppers can tell you that powerlessness is the first and most important thing to learn. We have to embrace and face life on life’s terms, not ours. Facing our powerlessness throws us finally and completely into God’s arms.
God loves us desperately. He doesn’t want us to suffer. But sometimes the most loving thing He can do for us is to let us have our experiences, good and bad. Eliminating the struggle for us eliminates the joy and triumph we will feel when we finally arrive at the finish line. Suffering draws out good qualities in us like endurance, stamina, and patience. It frequently teaches us compassion and opens us up to the Holy Spirit. It is like spiritual roto-tilling, breaking up old and set things about us, turning us upside down and making room for new and wonderful things to flow in.
Suffering helps us more fully appreciate the truly good things in life. It also teaches us how precious are the times of peace and good fortune. We don’t take them so much for granted. Suffering deepens us, whether we like it or not. And it reminds us who’s really in charge of the universe, and that it’s not us. It teaches us to trust in God; and to set our sights on divine goals and not on human ones.
For those of you who are in the midst of suffering, take heart. Every single thing in life is in God’s hands. Not one hair of your head falls without notice. No matter how long the night may seem, the morning always brings new hope.
"Why is my pain unceasing,
my wound incurable,
refusing to be healed?
…They shall not prevail over you,
for I am with you
to save you and deliver you,
says the LORD.
I will deliver you out of the hand of the wicked,
and redeem you from the grasp of the ruthless." (Jer. 18,21)
Amen
Nigeria: Happiest Nation on Earth?
by Jonathan Power, Published on Monday, December 29, 2003 by the Toronto Star
Barbara Merrell Smith passed away September 13, 2008
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