It’s just after 8:00 Good Friday night. I’ve chosen to spend some time in solitude and silence. For most of my Adult life I’ve not observed the disciplines that so many of Jesus Followers practice during the 40 days of Lent. But, in recent years, I’ve done so.
The primary reason I’ve chosen to do so is that I want to know Jesus more intimately. To have true intimacy with someone you really have to live with them. Living with Jesus is a little different from living with my Wife. I can’t touch Him as I do her. I can’t have a “face-to-face” conversation with Him. Still, by reliving aspects of His life, I can enter into His experiences spiritually. With the help of Walter Wangerin Jr. and his marvelous book, Reliving the Passion, I’ve been able to enter into the events leading up to Jesus crucifixion and the dreadful details of His execution as if I were there. Tonight I’m feeling the weight of it all.
I’ve been through it all before and it’s been hard. But, for some reason, it is heavier for me tonight. It’s all over now. Joseph has wrapped Jesus in linen and placed Him in his own tomb. All of the 11 surviving men who followed Him for 3 years have disappeared into the Sabbath night. The women who were with Him through the entire ordeal were still nearby. They’d watched Joseph place Him in the tomb. I’m trying to enter into their experience now. How utterly hopeless they must be!
Last Week I held a man who’d lost his Wife. She was only 50 years old. She’d been diagnosed with a rare disease but it wasn’t supposed to take her life so soon. He was completely distraught. He told me, as I hugged him, that he didn’t think he could go on. He was disheveled and pale. His shirt was hanging out and below his sport coat. I really was concerned for his well-being. He is, tonight, in my mind, a real example of how the men who’d followed Jesus must have felt as they relived, again and again, his awful death. The women too were completely devastated by all they’d witnessed. Wangerin captures the pathos of Mary Magdalen,
“What do I do? I don’t know what to do. Nothing. The Sabbath has started. So what? So, if I pray I’ll be mouthing the sounds. Nothing. And if I pray a vain repetition, what then? Will Heaven be offended? Well, Heaven has offended me!
Joseph’s stone is like the period that stops the sentence. Boom! – the story’s done. And when the story’s over, the very air is empty. No place for me. No home for my soul. Silence. Why do I keep standing here? It’s dark. It’s midnight. Everyone’s gone home. Except me. Abandoned. Nothing.
Why can’t I leave the tombs?
Because the whole world is a graveyard. Because this is the one that has my Lord.
Jesus! Jesus! Without you I am a nothing in a nowhere!
Your are dead.
My world is annihilated.
And still – I love you.
And still the man I held that afternoon loved his dead Wife – still …
When I released my embrace of him and lead him to the graveside I prayed for supernatural assistance in caring for this wounded soul. I was given that assistance. As I described for this broken Husband and his Family and Friends the new life his Wife – a Christ-follower – now enjoyed he looked up at me. His eyes seemed like dark pools brightening in the light of the morning sun. When the service was finished he gripped my hand and said, “Thank you! You’ve given me hope! You’re the one who was supposed to do my Wife’s Service.”
I’m remembering this now – Good Friday night – because it is a dramatic illustration of why I – we – need to “relive the passion” of Jesus. We need to relive it because only when we experience the utter heartbreak and absolute despair those present went through will we have the joy that filled their hearts when He appeared alive on Easter and the 50 days after. Remember, “weeping may remain for a night, but rejoicing comes in the morning.” (Psalm 30:5) True joy comes only in the aftermath of pain. When and only when our hearts have been broken at the cross will we understand how such a horrible day could come to be known as “Good Friday.”
As I prepare now for the “joy” of Resurrection morning I’m remembering a favorite Easter song. It’s a Don Francisco song that reveals what might have been going on for Peter that miraculous day. The lyrics are readily available on the Internet so I’m comfortable sharing this remarkable story with you.
He's Alive
by Don Francisco
THE GATES AND DOORS WERE BARRED AND ALL THE WINDOWS FASTENED DOWN
I SPENT THE NIGHT IN SLEEPLESSNESS AND ROSE AT EVERY SOUND
HALF IN HOPELESS SORROW AND HALF IN FEAR THE DAY
WOULD FIND THE SOLDIERS BREAKING THROUGH TO DRAG US ALL AWAY
AND JUST BEFORE THE SUNRISE I HEARD SOMETHING AT THE WALL
THE GATE BEGAN TO RATTLE AND A VOICE BEGAN TO CALL
I HURRIED TO THE WINDOW AND LOOKED DOWN INTO THE
EXPECTING SWORDS AND TORCHES AND THE SOUND OF SOLDIERS FEET
THERE WAS NO ONE THERE BUT MARY SO I WENT DOWN TO LET HER IN
JOHN STOOD THERE BESIDE ME AS SHE TOLD US WHERE SHE'D BEEN
SHE SAID THEY'VE MOVED HIM IN THE NIGHT AND NONE OF US KNOWS WHERE
THE STONE'S BEEN ROLLED AWAY AND NOW HIS BODY ISN'T THERE
WE BOTH RAN T'WARD THE GARDEN AND THEN JOHN RAN ON AHEAD
WE FOUND THE STONE AND THE EMPTY TOMB JUST THE WAY THAT MARY SAID
BUT THE WINDING SHEET THEY WRAPPED HIM IN WAS JUST AN EMPTY SHELL
AND HOW OR WHERE THEY'D TAKEN HIM WAS MORE THAN I COULD TELL
SOMETHING STRANGE HAD HAPPENED THERE JUST WHAT I DIDN'T KNOW
JOHN BELIEVED A MIRACLE BUT I JUST TURNED TO GO
CIRCUMSTANCE AND SPECULATION DIDN'T LIFT ME VERY HIGH
'CAUSE I'D SEEN THEM CRUCIFY HIM, AND THEN I SAW HIM DIE
BACK INSIDE THE HOUSE AGAIN THE GUILT AND ANGUISH CAME
EVERYTHING I'D PROMISED HIM JUST ADDED TO MY SHAME
WHEN AT LAST IT CAME TO CHOICES I DENIED I KNEW HIS NAME
AND EVEN IF HE WAS ALIVE, IT WOULDN'T BE THE SAME
SUDDENLY THE AIR WAS FILLED WITH A STRANGE AND SWEET PERFUME
LIGHT THAT CAME FROM EVERYWHERE DROVE SHADOWS FROM THE ROOM
JESUS STOOD BEFORE ME WITH HIS ARMS HELD OPEN WIDE
AND I FELL DOWN ON MY KNEES AND I JUST CLUNG TO HIM AND CRIED
HE RAISED ME TO MY FEET AND AS I LOOKED INTO HIS EYES
LOVE WAS SHINING OUT FROM THEM LIKE SUNLIGHT FROM THE SKIES
GUILT AND MY CONFUSION DISAPPEARED IN SWEET RELEASE
AND EVERY FEAR I'D EVERY HAD JUST MELTED INTO PEACE
HE'S ALIVE, HE'S ALIVE,
HE'S ALIVE AND I'M FORGIVENHEAVEN'S GATES ARE OPENED WIDE
(REPEAT CHORUS TWO MORE TIMES)
HE'S ALIVE, HE'S ALIVE, HE'S ALIVE . . . HE'S ALIVE …
Today is “Good,” for another reason. It is, for Jews, Purim. The significance of it is described in the story of Esther chapter 9 verses 20 – 32. Purim is 2 days, as the historian explains, “when the Jews got relief from their enemies, and as the month when their sorrow was turned into joy and their mourning into a day of celebration.”
He has, for time and all eternity, “turned our mourning into dancing!”
Friday, March 21, 2008
The Cleaning Power of Pain
Robert Fulghum, in his simple yet often profound bestselling (1989 & 90) little book All I Really Need to Know I Learned in Kindergarten, writes of a Saturday night in the Laundromat:
“Sitting there watching the laundry go around in the drier, I thought about the round world and hygiene. We’ve made a lot of progress, you know. We used to think that disease was an act of God. Then we figured out it was a product of human ignorance. So we’ve been cleaning up our act – literally – ever since. We’ve been getting the excrement off our hands and clothes and bodies and food and houses. If only the scientific experts could come up with something to get it out of our minds. One cup of fixit frizzle that will lift the dirt from our lives, soften our hardness , protect our inner parts, improve our processing, reduce our yellowing and wrinkling, improve our natural color, make us sweet and good.
Don’t try Cheer, by the way. I tasted it. It’s awful.”
Inadvertently, this modern day sage put his finger on an important part of the process of lifting the dirt from our lives. “It’s awful.” Or to change the metaphor a bit, “It’s painful.”
Scott Peck, a psychiatrist and widely read author, writes in his book The Road Less Traveled:
“Discipline is the basic set of tools we require to solve life’s problems … It is through the pain of confronting and resolving problems that we learn. As Benjamin Franklin said, ‘Those things that hurt, instruct.’”
Jesus put it a bit more bluntly.
“If your right eye causes you to sin, gouge it out and throw it away. It is better for you to lose one part of your body then for your whole body to be thrown into hell.” (Matthew 5:29)
In this era of “self-help” and “self improvement” and “self enrichment” and “self mades” it has been overlooked that personal development is painful. Another Biblical metaphor for the process is “refinement.” A cleansing “by fire.” The psychologist’s call it “catharsis,” or “purgation.” Whatever the metaphor true inner change requires painful removal of things that corrupt or mar what they’ve infiltrated. The sin of our race can only be removed by a radical and costly process.
Robert Fulghum, I have “GOOD NEWS.” The “scientific experts” have not been able to “come up with something to get it – the excrement – out of our minds … the dirt from our lives … make us good and sweet.” But God has! A very close Friend of Jesus, whom He nicknamed a “Son of Thunder,” wrote this. “(T)he blood of Jesus, (God’s) Son, purifies us from all sin.” (1 John 1:7) There is a “cleansing agent” that will remove the “stain” of sin from our innermost being. It is the very “life blood” of Jesus the cosmic “sacrificial lamb.” And the word John uses – he’s writing in Greek – for “purifies” is “katharizei.” This is the root of our word “catharsis.” It means, as I’ve noted earlier “to cleanse,” “to purge.” Spiritual “catharsis” is possible. The application of the “blood of Jesus” will accomplish it. This same “Son of Thunder” wrote the Revelation; the last Book of the Bible. In it he describes a “multitude” too vast to count. He notes that they are “wearing white robes.” (See Revelation 7:9) He later notes that their robes were white because they’d been “washed” and “made white” in “the blood of the Lamb.” The Lamb, of course, is Jesus whom John the Baptist introduced as “the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world.” (John 1:29) The term John – the Son of Thunder – uses for “washes” in this instances means, literally, to “launder.” Again, the “blood” of Jesus is described as a cleaning agent. This infinitely plentiful, miraculous substance; the life blood of the “cosmic sacrificial Lamb,” has the properties to remove “sin” and all of its attendant stains, restoring the perfect color God gave us originally. It is the “fixit frizzle” Fulghum longed for. If you soak in it you will come out “pure,” “as pure as the driven snow.” This miracle substance has been made available at great personal cost. Jesus had to die the cruelest of deaths to make it available. It is, after all, His life’s blood. But that’s what makes its availability such “GOOD NEWS!” There is enough of it for everyone. The “Son of Thunder” also said that He, Jesus, “takes away the sins of the whole world.” (1 John 2:2) His blood has the marvelous properties it has because He, personally, suffered every painful consequence brought upon us – all humanity – by our sinfulness. He hurt in all the ways we hurt because of our wrong choices. He felt the public shame we spent our lives trying to cover up. Like an antibiotic that has the antibodies to fight off disease because it has, itself, been diseased so He, “who was sinless” became “sin.” He was you on the cross that day. He was me there then. He was “sin for us, He who was sinless, so that, in Him we might become the righteousness of God.” (2 Corinthians 5:21) So, we can be “purified.” The detergent; the serum is available. But it’s costly!
For me to receive His life’s blood I have to die. The most prolific of New Testament writers, Paul, wrote “I have been crucified with Christ and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me.” (Galatians 2:20) Oswald Chambers writes about that “crucifixion.”
“The inescapable spiritual need each of us has is … to sign the death certificate of our sin nature. I must take my emotional opinions and intellectual beliefs and be willing to turn them into a moral verdict against the nature of sin; that is, against any claim I have to my right to myself. Paul said, “I have been crucified with Christ … .” He did not say, “I have made a determination to imitate Jesus Christ,” or, “I will really make an effort to follow Him”—but—“I have been identified with Him in His death.” Once I reach this moral decision and act on it, all that Christ accomplished for me on the Cross is accomplished in me. My unrestrained commitment of myself to God gives the Holy Spirit the opportunity to grant to me the holiness (righteousness … goodness … virtue) of Jesus Christ.” (My Utmost for His Highest)
This “catharsis” doesn’t happen over night. And it is painful. It is a crucifixion of an old enemy, my “sovereign self,” by degrees. As, with refinement, the purity of the metal, is gradually evident in its brilliance, so the old corrupt self is replaced with a new self that reflects, as in a mirror, “the Lord’s … likeness with gradually increasing glory.” (2 Corinthians 3:15) My “natural color” is being “improved,” as His perfection displaces my imperfection. Not only do “those things that hurt instruct,” they “perfect.”
“Sitting there watching the laundry go around in the drier, I thought about the round world and hygiene. We’ve made a lot of progress, you know. We used to think that disease was an act of God. Then we figured out it was a product of human ignorance. So we’ve been cleaning up our act – literally – ever since. We’ve been getting the excrement off our hands and clothes and bodies and food and houses. If only the scientific experts could come up with something to get it out of our minds. One cup of fixit frizzle that will lift the dirt from our lives, soften our hardness , protect our inner parts, improve our processing, reduce our yellowing and wrinkling, improve our natural color, make us sweet and good.
Don’t try Cheer, by the way. I tasted it. It’s awful.”
Inadvertently, this modern day sage put his finger on an important part of the process of lifting the dirt from our lives. “It’s awful.” Or to change the metaphor a bit, “It’s painful.”
Scott Peck, a psychiatrist and widely read author, writes in his book The Road Less Traveled:
“Discipline is the basic set of tools we require to solve life’s problems … It is through the pain of confronting and resolving problems that we learn. As Benjamin Franklin said, ‘Those things that hurt, instruct.’”
Jesus put it a bit more bluntly.
“If your right eye causes you to sin, gouge it out and throw it away. It is better for you to lose one part of your body then for your whole body to be thrown into hell.” (Matthew 5:29)
In this era of “self-help” and “self improvement” and “self enrichment” and “self mades” it has been overlooked that personal development is painful. Another Biblical metaphor for the process is “refinement.” A cleansing “by fire.” The psychologist’s call it “catharsis,” or “purgation.” Whatever the metaphor true inner change requires painful removal of things that corrupt or mar what they’ve infiltrated. The sin of our race can only be removed by a radical and costly process.
Robert Fulghum, I have “GOOD NEWS.” The “scientific experts” have not been able to “come up with something to get it – the excrement – out of our minds … the dirt from our lives … make us good and sweet.” But God has! A very close Friend of Jesus, whom He nicknamed a “Son of Thunder,” wrote this. “(T)he blood of Jesus, (God’s) Son, purifies us from all sin.” (1 John 1:7) There is a “cleansing agent” that will remove the “stain” of sin from our innermost being. It is the very “life blood” of Jesus the cosmic “sacrificial lamb.” And the word John uses – he’s writing in Greek – for “purifies” is “katharizei.” This is the root of our word “catharsis.” It means, as I’ve noted earlier “to cleanse,” “to purge.” Spiritual “catharsis” is possible. The application of the “blood of Jesus” will accomplish it. This same “Son of Thunder” wrote the Revelation; the last Book of the Bible. In it he describes a “multitude” too vast to count. He notes that they are “wearing white robes.” (See Revelation 7:9) He later notes that their robes were white because they’d been “washed” and “made white” in “the blood of the Lamb.” The Lamb, of course, is Jesus whom John the Baptist introduced as “the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world.” (John 1:29) The term John – the Son of Thunder – uses for “washes” in this instances means, literally, to “launder.” Again, the “blood” of Jesus is described as a cleaning agent. This infinitely plentiful, miraculous substance; the life blood of the “cosmic sacrificial Lamb,” has the properties to remove “sin” and all of its attendant stains, restoring the perfect color God gave us originally. It is the “fixit frizzle” Fulghum longed for. If you soak in it you will come out “pure,” “as pure as the driven snow.” This miracle substance has been made available at great personal cost. Jesus had to die the cruelest of deaths to make it available. It is, after all, His life’s blood. But that’s what makes its availability such “GOOD NEWS!” There is enough of it for everyone. The “Son of Thunder” also said that He, Jesus, “takes away the sins of the whole world.” (1 John 2:2) His blood has the marvelous properties it has because He, personally, suffered every painful consequence brought upon us – all humanity – by our sinfulness. He hurt in all the ways we hurt because of our wrong choices. He felt the public shame we spent our lives trying to cover up. Like an antibiotic that has the antibodies to fight off disease because it has, itself, been diseased so He, “who was sinless” became “sin.” He was you on the cross that day. He was me there then. He was “sin for us, He who was sinless, so that, in Him we might become the righteousness of God.” (2 Corinthians 5:21) So, we can be “purified.” The detergent; the serum is available. But it’s costly!
For me to receive His life’s blood I have to die. The most prolific of New Testament writers, Paul, wrote “I have been crucified with Christ and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me.” (Galatians 2:20) Oswald Chambers writes about that “crucifixion.”
“The inescapable spiritual need each of us has is … to sign the death certificate of our sin nature. I must take my emotional opinions and intellectual beliefs and be willing to turn them into a moral verdict against the nature of sin; that is, against any claim I have to my right to myself. Paul said, “I have been crucified with Christ … .” He did not say, “I have made a determination to imitate Jesus Christ,” or, “I will really make an effort to follow Him”—but—“I have been identified with Him in His death.” Once I reach this moral decision and act on it, all that Christ accomplished for me on the Cross is accomplished in me. My unrestrained commitment of myself to God gives the Holy Spirit the opportunity to grant to me the holiness (righteousness … goodness … virtue) of Jesus Christ.” (My Utmost for His Highest)
This “catharsis” doesn’t happen over night. And it is painful. It is a crucifixion of an old enemy, my “sovereign self,” by degrees. As, with refinement, the purity of the metal, is gradually evident in its brilliance, so the old corrupt self is replaced with a new self that reflects, as in a mirror, “the Lord’s … likeness with gradually increasing glory.” (2 Corinthians 3:15) My “natural color” is being “improved,” as His perfection displaces my imperfection. Not only do “those things that hurt instruct,” they “perfect.”
Thursday, March 20, 2008
What is it About Pain that We Dislike So?
What is it about pain that we dislike so?
OK! I can hear it now!
“Dahhhh!”
“It hurts!”
You’re right! Pain is painful! And that’s enough to make it unwanted!
But is that the real reason we avoid it so adamantly?
Please understand I’m not about to advocate some radical new form of self-abuse. I’m not a masochistic hermit! I run from pain as fast as anyone else!
What I’m getting at is that there’s something more involved here than the pain. Bearing a child is probably one of the most painful things we humans do. Yet women continue to go about it excitedly. Very few people have died in a dentist’s chair. But who looks forward to their next dental procedure? We welcome the pain that brings another person into the world. We resist treatment vital to our own existence because it will hurt. We’re just not rational about this.
The power pain holds over us is fear. We are afraid of suffering.
Fear and pain serve similar functions in our lives. Just as pain is a built in warning system that protects us from injury – even death – so fear makes us wary of pending danger. The question, in either case, is “how serious is the threat?”
Several years ago I was Elk hunting in the Canadian Rockies on the border between Alberta and British Columbia. Because of an important commitment I had to leave the Camp for a day. My original plan was to return before dark. That plan was completely foiled when the 4X4 I was driving broke down. I had no alternative but to drive my own car back to Camp. The problem was that the car was not an “off road” vehicle. I would have to walk the 4 miles from the end of the road to our campsite. I will never forget that trek! This was rugged, mountainous country. We frequently saw signs of grizzlies in the area. Some of our men had actually seen the big bears. There were mountain lions out there. More times than I can recount I saw or heard things that I was sure were one or the other of those predators stalking me. Yes I had a rifle. But I’d left the ammunition in the 4X4. I was now the hunted and every stump the hunter. A tree branch would rub against another. The sound was like the growl of a bear. A twig would snap. The threat was growing with every step. No man was ever more relieved to see the light of a campfire than I was that night. Driving back over that 4 miles of road later in the Week I saw, by the light of day, the things that terrorized me in the night. I felt foolish! My cowardice was exposed by old dead tree stumps and lifeless branches rubbing against each other in the mountain breeze. I’d been reduced to a trembling boy certain that painful death lurked in those dreadful shadows; whimpering to his Father, “Pappa! I’mmmm scarrrred!”. I was afraid of things that posed no serious threat.
Corrie ten Boom lived in Holland during the Nazi occupation of her homeland. Her Family provided haven for Jewish friends fleeing the holocaust. The Gestapo uncovered their activity and they were sent to the dread Concentration camps. Some of them died. Miraculously Corrie survived the terrors of the Camps. Years later she wrote, “If God sends us on stony paths, He provides strong shoes.” If you’ve ever walked on rocky paths you know it can be painful. Sharp stones will hurt your feet; even through ordinary shoes. You can twist an ankle. You can slip and fall on loose shale. Life, Miss ten Boom is suggesting, is like that stony path. Jesus said that “living in this world you’ll have hard times.” Even following Him we’ll come on “stony paths.” If we’ll keep on walking, Corrie promises, painful though it may be, we’ll discover we’ve been given shoes that are strong enough to protect our feet, brace our ankles, and grip the firm base of even the slipperiest terrain. The catch, though, is that it’s only as we follow Jesus off the safe road that we get the “strong shoes.”
Jesus said, “Anyone who hears what I say and puts it into practice – who follows me on my way – will be like a man who builds his house on a rock. The winds, and rain – the storms of life – will beat on that house. But it will not fall.” People who follow Jesus develop character. Like “strong shoes” and “rock solid foundations” they are able to withstand rocky trails and weather severe storms. Few things intimidate them. They have learned that just as it was for Jesus, “who endured the cross,” – pain beyond experience or imagination – “joy comes in the morning.”
Fear not! “What can’t destroy you will only make you stronger!” John Perkins, a black Pastor who suffered great pain and humiliation because of his race, said that. He knew that if your Leader routinely raises the dead nothing can destroy you!
Fear not! There’s no serious threat to immortals.
“Keep your eyes on Jesus, who both began and finished this race we’re in. Study how he did it. Because he never lost sight of where he was headed—that exhilarating finish in and with God—he could put up with anything along the way: cross, shame, whatever. And now he’s there, in the place of honor, right alongside God. When you find yourselves flagging in your faith, go over that story again, item by item, that long litany of hostility he plowed through. That will shoot adrenaline into your souls! … This trouble you’re in isn’t punishment; it’s training …” (Hebrews 12:2 – 7 THE MESSAGE)
OK! I can hear it now!
“Dahhhh!”
“It hurts!”
You’re right! Pain is painful! And that’s enough to make it unwanted!
But is that the real reason we avoid it so adamantly?
Please understand I’m not about to advocate some radical new form of self-abuse. I’m not a masochistic hermit! I run from pain as fast as anyone else!
What I’m getting at is that there’s something more involved here than the pain. Bearing a child is probably one of the most painful things we humans do. Yet women continue to go about it excitedly. Very few people have died in a dentist’s chair. But who looks forward to their next dental procedure? We welcome the pain that brings another person into the world. We resist treatment vital to our own existence because it will hurt. We’re just not rational about this.
The power pain holds over us is fear. We are afraid of suffering.
Fear and pain serve similar functions in our lives. Just as pain is a built in warning system that protects us from injury – even death – so fear makes us wary of pending danger. The question, in either case, is “how serious is the threat?”
Several years ago I was Elk hunting in the Canadian Rockies on the border between Alberta and British Columbia. Because of an important commitment I had to leave the Camp for a day. My original plan was to return before dark. That plan was completely foiled when the 4X4 I was driving broke down. I had no alternative but to drive my own car back to Camp. The problem was that the car was not an “off road” vehicle. I would have to walk the 4 miles from the end of the road to our campsite. I will never forget that trek! This was rugged, mountainous country. We frequently saw signs of grizzlies in the area. Some of our men had actually seen the big bears. There were mountain lions out there. More times than I can recount I saw or heard things that I was sure were one or the other of those predators stalking me. Yes I had a rifle. But I’d left the ammunition in the 4X4. I was now the hunted and every stump the hunter. A tree branch would rub against another. The sound was like the growl of a bear. A twig would snap. The threat was growing with every step. No man was ever more relieved to see the light of a campfire than I was that night. Driving back over that 4 miles of road later in the Week I saw, by the light of day, the things that terrorized me in the night. I felt foolish! My cowardice was exposed by old dead tree stumps and lifeless branches rubbing against each other in the mountain breeze. I’d been reduced to a trembling boy certain that painful death lurked in those dreadful shadows; whimpering to his Father, “Pappa! I’mmmm scarrrred!”. I was afraid of things that posed no serious threat.
Corrie ten Boom lived in Holland during the Nazi occupation of her homeland. Her Family provided haven for Jewish friends fleeing the holocaust. The Gestapo uncovered their activity and they were sent to the dread Concentration camps. Some of them died. Miraculously Corrie survived the terrors of the Camps. Years later she wrote, “If God sends us on stony paths, He provides strong shoes.” If you’ve ever walked on rocky paths you know it can be painful. Sharp stones will hurt your feet; even through ordinary shoes. You can twist an ankle. You can slip and fall on loose shale. Life, Miss ten Boom is suggesting, is like that stony path. Jesus said that “living in this world you’ll have hard times.” Even following Him we’ll come on “stony paths.” If we’ll keep on walking, Corrie promises, painful though it may be, we’ll discover we’ve been given shoes that are strong enough to protect our feet, brace our ankles, and grip the firm base of even the slipperiest terrain. The catch, though, is that it’s only as we follow Jesus off the safe road that we get the “strong shoes.”
Jesus said, “Anyone who hears what I say and puts it into practice – who follows me on my way – will be like a man who builds his house on a rock. The winds, and rain – the storms of life – will beat on that house. But it will not fall.” People who follow Jesus develop character. Like “strong shoes” and “rock solid foundations” they are able to withstand rocky trails and weather severe storms. Few things intimidate them. They have learned that just as it was for Jesus, “who endured the cross,” – pain beyond experience or imagination – “joy comes in the morning.”
Fear not! “What can’t destroy you will only make you stronger!” John Perkins, a black Pastor who suffered great pain and humiliation because of his race, said that. He knew that if your Leader routinely raises the dead nothing can destroy you!
Fear not! There’s no serious threat to immortals.
“Keep your eyes on Jesus, who both began and finished this race we’re in. Study how he did it. Because he never lost sight of where he was headed—that exhilarating finish in and with God—he could put up with anything along the way: cross, shame, whatever. And now he’s there, in the place of honor, right alongside God. When you find yourselves flagging in your faith, go over that story again, item by item, that long litany of hostility he plowed through. That will shoot adrenaline into your souls! … This trouble you’re in isn’t punishment; it’s training …” (Hebrews 12:2 – 7 THE MESSAGE)
Tuesday, March 18, 2008
Self-indulgence and the Mythunderstanding of Pain
Is pain ever a good thing?
Certainly most of us would say yes!
It is, obviously, a built in warning system designed to protect the human organism from serious injury; even death. Some of us will agree that it can play a role in self-improvement. There may even be a few of us who accept it as a necessary element in the process of character building. But rarely do any of us seek it.
Actually, many of us consider the existence of pain or suffering as primary evidence that there cannot be a good deity. “How?” they ask, “could there be a good god when there’s so much suffering?” How could a “good god” allow little children to die?
In such protests lies a value judgment.
Pain is evil!
But we’ve just agreed that there are instances when it can be valuable. I’ve talked to people who’ve suffered a great deal yet insist that they are better for it. One man, in particular, suffering in the advanced stages of Parkinson’s, said, “If it weren’t for the ‘bug’ I wouldn’t know how important my Family and Friends really are! I wouldn’t know how much I need God!”
How would you account for such differences of opinion on something so common to the human experience?
W.H. Auden is considered to be among the greatest poets of the 20th Century. He was awarded a Pulitzer Prize in 1948. He was a Professor of Poetry at Oxford from 1956 – 61. In 1965 he was acclaimed the “foremost poet writing in English.” One of his longer workds is a Christmas Oratorio titled, For the Time Being. It features all of the characters in the biblical stories of Christ’s birth. At a critical point in this prodigious work one of the characters laments a threat to authority and the degeneration of “Rational Law.” “Knowledge,” he worries, “will degenerate into a riot of subjective vision.”
“A riot of subjective vision.”
How graphic! And how vividly descriptive of the present human condition. Auden wrote these words at the time of World War 2. The “subjective vision” of a “Master Race” engineering utopia had plunged virtually the entire human race into a worldwide war. Still, at no other time, has the “riotous” nature of “subjective vision” been more obvious than this present. Islamist extremists persist in terrorizing the world into acquiescence to Sharia. Tribal visions of power and the restoration of a magical, former way of life inflame nations across Africa. Our Presidential Election is a ridiculous carnival of candidate after candidate pandering to one “subjective vision” after another. “A woman’s choice;” “gay rights;” “black liberation;” “seniors;” “free Healthcare for everyone;” “animal rights.” There is no end.
“What,” you ask, “does this have to do with pain?”
This! A “subjective vision,” is a selfish vision. A vision of an existence where all self-interest is served. Just as my pain is proof that a god, if there is one, cannot be good, so no authority, nor form of government, that fails to serve my self-interest to my complete satisfaction is acceptable. “Ethics,” the humanist insists, "is autonomous and situational.”
How could supposedly intelligent people not see the seeds of “riot” and mayhem at the heart of such subjectivity? The raucous, cacophonous squawking of seagulls stuck in a mainsail crying, “Mine!” “Mine!” “Mine!” “Mine!” in the movie Finding Nemo, parodies what comes of it. To think that “I,” should not get what “I” want; that “I” – the supreme “me” – should suffer at all is anathema to the “subjective vision.” In His day Jesus made this astute observation. “How can I account for this self-indulgent generation? The people have been like spoiled children whining to their parents, ‘We wanted to skip rope, and you were always too tired; we wanted to talk, but you were always too busy.’ John the Baptist came fasting and they called him crazy. I came feasting and they called me a lush, a friend of the riffraff. Opinion polls don’t count for much, do they? The proof of the pudding is in the eating.” “Wisdom is proven right by its actions.”
Aleksander Solzhenitsyn is no stranger to suffering. Years of suffering and deprivation in the Labor Camps of Russia almost took his life. Yet he came out of those horrors with a remarkably wise understanding of the value of pain he and multitudes of his fellow “dissidents” suffered. “We have been through a spiritual training far in advance of Western experience. The complex and deadly crush of life has produced stronger, deeper, and more interesting personalities than those generated by standardized Western well-being.” “If,” he wrote, “as claimed by humanism, man were born only to be happy, he would not be born to die. Since his body is doomed to death his task on earth evidently must be more spiritual: not a total engrossment in everyday life, not the search for the best ways to obtain material goods and then their carefree consumption. It has to be the fulfillment of a permanent, earnest duty so that one’s life journey may become above all an experience of moral growth: to leave life a better human being than one started. … It is not possible that assessment of the President’s performance should be reduced to the question of how much money one makes or to the availability of gasoline. Only by the voluntary nurturing in ourselves of freely accepted and serene self-restraint can mankind rise above the world stream of materialism (and subjectivism).”
The writer of a New Testament letter to Hebrew Christians tells us that, “Though Jesus was God’s Son, he learned trusting-obedience by what he suffered.” It was, for Him, as it is for us, “in the crucible” of life’s struggles that we are refined until we become people of a metal so pure it can withstand the “slings and arrows of outrageous fortune.”
Such are the people in whom pain is transformed, as was Christ’s cross, from a tragedy to a source of triumph.
Certainly most of us would say yes!
It is, obviously, a built in warning system designed to protect the human organism from serious injury; even death. Some of us will agree that it can play a role in self-improvement. There may even be a few of us who accept it as a necessary element in the process of character building. But rarely do any of us seek it.
Actually, many of us consider the existence of pain or suffering as primary evidence that there cannot be a good deity. “How?” they ask, “could there be a good god when there’s so much suffering?” How could a “good god” allow little children to die?
In such protests lies a value judgment.
Pain is evil!
But we’ve just agreed that there are instances when it can be valuable. I’ve talked to people who’ve suffered a great deal yet insist that they are better for it. One man, in particular, suffering in the advanced stages of Parkinson’s, said, “If it weren’t for the ‘bug’ I wouldn’t know how important my Family and Friends really are! I wouldn’t know how much I need God!”
How would you account for such differences of opinion on something so common to the human experience?
W.H. Auden is considered to be among the greatest poets of the 20th Century. He was awarded a Pulitzer Prize in 1948. He was a Professor of Poetry at Oxford from 1956 – 61. In 1965 he was acclaimed the “foremost poet writing in English.” One of his longer workds is a Christmas Oratorio titled, For the Time Being. It features all of the characters in the biblical stories of Christ’s birth. At a critical point in this prodigious work one of the characters laments a threat to authority and the degeneration of “Rational Law.” “Knowledge,” he worries, “will degenerate into a riot of subjective vision.”
“A riot of subjective vision.”
How graphic! And how vividly descriptive of the present human condition. Auden wrote these words at the time of World War 2. The “subjective vision” of a “Master Race” engineering utopia had plunged virtually the entire human race into a worldwide war. Still, at no other time, has the “riotous” nature of “subjective vision” been more obvious than this present. Islamist extremists persist in terrorizing the world into acquiescence to Sharia. Tribal visions of power and the restoration of a magical, former way of life inflame nations across Africa. Our Presidential Election is a ridiculous carnival of candidate after candidate pandering to one “subjective vision” after another. “A woman’s choice;” “gay rights;” “black liberation;” “seniors;” “free Healthcare for everyone;” “animal rights.” There is no end.
“What,” you ask, “does this have to do with pain?”
This! A “subjective vision,” is a selfish vision. A vision of an existence where all self-interest is served. Just as my pain is proof that a god, if there is one, cannot be good, so no authority, nor form of government, that fails to serve my self-interest to my complete satisfaction is acceptable. “Ethics,” the humanist insists, "is autonomous and situational.”
How could supposedly intelligent people not see the seeds of “riot” and mayhem at the heart of such subjectivity? The raucous, cacophonous squawking of seagulls stuck in a mainsail crying, “Mine!” “Mine!” “Mine!” “Mine!” in the movie Finding Nemo, parodies what comes of it. To think that “I,” should not get what “I” want; that “I” – the supreme “me” – should suffer at all is anathema to the “subjective vision.” In His day Jesus made this astute observation. “How can I account for this self-indulgent generation? The people have been like spoiled children whining to their parents, ‘We wanted to skip rope, and you were always too tired; we wanted to talk, but you were always too busy.’ John the Baptist came fasting and they called him crazy. I came feasting and they called me a lush, a friend of the riffraff. Opinion polls don’t count for much, do they? The proof of the pudding is in the eating.” “Wisdom is proven right by its actions.”
Aleksander Solzhenitsyn is no stranger to suffering. Years of suffering and deprivation in the Labor Camps of Russia almost took his life. Yet he came out of those horrors with a remarkably wise understanding of the value of pain he and multitudes of his fellow “dissidents” suffered. “We have been through a spiritual training far in advance of Western experience. The complex and deadly crush of life has produced stronger, deeper, and more interesting personalities than those generated by standardized Western well-being.” “If,” he wrote, “as claimed by humanism, man were born only to be happy, he would not be born to die. Since his body is doomed to death his task on earth evidently must be more spiritual: not a total engrossment in everyday life, not the search for the best ways to obtain material goods and then their carefree consumption. It has to be the fulfillment of a permanent, earnest duty so that one’s life journey may become above all an experience of moral growth: to leave life a better human being than one started. … It is not possible that assessment of the President’s performance should be reduced to the question of how much money one makes or to the availability of gasoline. Only by the voluntary nurturing in ourselves of freely accepted and serene self-restraint can mankind rise above the world stream of materialism (and subjectivism).”
The writer of a New Testament letter to Hebrew Christians tells us that, “Though Jesus was God’s Son, he learned trusting-obedience by what he suffered.” It was, for Him, as it is for us, “in the crucible” of life’s struggles that we are refined until we become people of a metal so pure it can withstand the “slings and arrows of outrageous fortune.”
Such are the people in whom pain is transformed, as was Christ’s cross, from a tragedy to a source of triumph.
Sunday, March 16, 2008
The Transformation of Pain
Today is the first day of another worldwide celebration of the most important Week in the history of the universe. This Week we remember that Week when Jesus was crucified.
Jesus demonstrated, in the most unlikely events of this never to be equaled 7 days, the reason for His life. Those days, that ended in immeasurable suffering, the most barbaric of all deaths, and His burial revealed the goal of His life! Walter Wangerin, Jr., in his invaluable book, Reliving the Passion, asks why Jesus refused the vinegar offered to him as he hung on the cross. The answer? “Suffering,” he writes. “With a pure and willful consciousness, terribly sensitive to every thorn and cut and scornful slur: suffering. This He has chosen. This He is attending to with every nerve of His being – not for some perverted love of pain. He hates the pain. But for a supernatural love of us, that pain might be transfigured, forever.”
“Pain … transfigured forever”?
Yes!
Jesus has suffered all pain. He’s gotten up. He’s walked away! No longer is pain defeating. It is defeated. He suffered the sum of all pain and walked away the victor! No longer the power of the oppressor, pain is reduced to futility. In His triumph Jesus demonstrated, for all who would see, that through adversity – even the greatest of all tragedies – good can come. His sacrifice established for time and all eternity the power of love!
Who looks ridiculous now? The devil that coaxed Jesus to join Him in a cosmic power move. The religious power brokers who knew they’d end His threat to their cause if they killed Him. The spineless political figures who confused their verdict with something significant. Especially the soldiers and the mob who ridiculed Him.
Do we understand the implications of this? Do we realize what it means to us personally? Do we get that the one who is really in charge confirmed His sovereignty through “the things that He suffered”? Do we all understand what it means to us and the way we live?
Jesus radical teaching and exemplary approach to “pain,” has major implications for us! If we accept it He will teach and empower us to make “suffering” a positive force in our lives. For the next few days I will write about how this can actually happen.
Jesus demonstrated, in the most unlikely events of this never to be equaled 7 days, the reason for His life. Those days, that ended in immeasurable suffering, the most barbaric of all deaths, and His burial revealed the goal of His life! Walter Wangerin, Jr., in his invaluable book, Reliving the Passion, asks why Jesus refused the vinegar offered to him as he hung on the cross. The answer? “Suffering,” he writes. “With a pure and willful consciousness, terribly sensitive to every thorn and cut and scornful slur: suffering. This He has chosen. This He is attending to with every nerve of His being – not for some perverted love of pain. He hates the pain. But for a supernatural love of us, that pain might be transfigured, forever.”
“Pain … transfigured forever”?
Yes!
Jesus has suffered all pain. He’s gotten up. He’s walked away! No longer is pain defeating. It is defeated. He suffered the sum of all pain and walked away the victor! No longer the power of the oppressor, pain is reduced to futility. In His triumph Jesus demonstrated, for all who would see, that through adversity – even the greatest of all tragedies – good can come. His sacrifice established for time and all eternity the power of love!
Who looks ridiculous now? The devil that coaxed Jesus to join Him in a cosmic power move. The religious power brokers who knew they’d end His threat to their cause if they killed Him. The spineless political figures who confused their verdict with something significant. Especially the soldiers and the mob who ridiculed Him.
Do we understand the implications of this? Do we realize what it means to us personally? Do we get that the one who is really in charge confirmed His sovereignty through “the things that He suffered”? Do we all understand what it means to us and the way we live?
Jesus radical teaching and exemplary approach to “pain,” has major implications for us! If we accept it He will teach and empower us to make “suffering” a positive force in our lives. For the next few days I will write about how this can actually happen.
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