Sharing Space in the Schoolhouse of Suffering

Well, everybody hurts sometimes,
Everybody cries.
And everybody hurts sometimes.
And everybody hurts sometimes.
So, hold on,
Hold on.

The words by William Berry, Peter Buck, Michael Mills and Michael Stipe (aka R.E.M.) are familiar to anyone who listened to much pop music in the 90s. "Everybody Hurts" was written as a song to comfort teenagers going through the pains of growing up (including the heartbreaks associated with first love). The song was actually so influential in Great Britain that, according to Wikipedia, the British charity the Samaritans actually published a brochure advertising their suicide hotline with only the lyrics to the song and the hotline number.

There's something about that concept that helps us in our pain: "Everybody hurts," not just, "I hurt." I think it's because there's an isolating factor to pain. When we hurt, we feel like no one understands us--like no one else could have ever felt what we feel; or at least they don't appreciate the extent of it. The poet Ella Wheeler Wilcox wrote these even more famous words:

Laugh and the world laughs with you,
Weep, and you weep alone;

For the sad old earth must borrow its mirth,
But has trouble enough of its own.

We laugh together but cry alone. And yet, according to Wilcox, there are more lonely tears than common laughter in "the sad old earth." So we're alone but there are a lot of us here "alone" together.

"Everybody hurts." There really is something comforting about that. We're not really alone. But as comforting as it is for a moment, it's not quite enough for the long dark night that strangles the light out of our souls on an ongoing basis. Pain is relative. Pain is not fairly distributed. Some of it just goes on and on and isn't so big in individual doses but really stymies us when we seem to be struggling in ways others aren't (this is more the kind of pain that I deal with and have been dealing with lately--usually related to rejections, regrets and failures). Some of it is really, harshly, world-shakingly rough (like my mentor, who lost his wife to cancer last night or my friends whose baby died the day he was born two weeks ago). But it's each our own pain and suited to us individually.

And while it's a small comfort to say, "Everybody hurts," is there something better we can say? Can we offer something that fits each and every one of us and can get us through any hurt, something that lasts. And is there a reason for it all. How about this? The same God who created this whole universe loved us enough to enter into our pain. And HE understands. And not just because He knows what He's doing and the plans He has for us, but because, in the Person of Jesus, God Himself has actually been through it. Consider these words from the writer of Hebrews:

In the days of His flesh, He [Jesus] offered up both prayers and supplications with loud crying and tears to the One able to save Him from death, and He was heard because of His piety. Although He was a Son, He learned obedience from the things which He suffered. And having been made perfect, He became to all those who obey Him the source of eternal salvation, being designated by God as a high priest according to the order of Melchizedek.
Hebrews 5:7-10 (NASB)


This is perhaps one of the most amazing and perplexing passages in the Scripture. Jesus prayed to the Father who was "able to save Him from death, and He was heard" (v. 7). But wait a minute! Jesus prayed to be spared from death if possible BUT HE STILL DIED! How can the writer of Hebrews say that, "He was heard because of His piety," by, "the One able to save Him from death?" If God heard Him, why didn't He save Him? And that's not the only problem: Jesus was God Himself, the Son of God, who always submits to the Father, so how could it be that, "He learned obedience from the things which He suffered" (v. 8)?

Tackling the latter problem first, it seems to me that this "learning" of obedience refers not to learning how to obey (Jesus always obeys the Father) but rather to gaining an experiential understanding of obedience and the price it carries--He learned what it really would mean to Him personally to obey by the sufferings He underwent. He obeyed the Father by coming in human flesh to suffer and die--something that is impossible for His God nature but is the norm for humanity (and thus made possible by Jesus' own human nature). And in His sufferings, He learned what that true measure of obedience was. If Jesus' sufferings taught Him what obedience means when He always obeyed perfectly to begin with, do we have any less to learn than Jesus Himself?

But even besides that, what a comfort it is to think that God actually understands our needs experientially:

For we do not have a high priest who cannot sympathize with our weaknesses, but One who has been tempted in all things as we are, yet without sin.
Hebrews 4:15 (NASB)

He pled with God for His life but He submitted to the will of the Father in His death. "He was heard". . . and the answer came back, "No, but I will accomplish My will in You." Jesus submitted as He always did and died so that God's plan of salvation might be actualized.

But Jesus isn't the only servant of God to ask to be released from sufferings. And He's not the only one whom God denied. Consider Paul, to whom the Lord had revealed the glories of heaven. But then, suffering came to teach Paul, even as it had the blessed Son of God Himself and just like Jesus, the Apostle pled to be spared:

Because of the surpassing greatness of the revelations, for this reason, to keep me from exalting myself, there was given me a thorn in the flesh, a messenger of Satan to torment me—to keep me from exalting myself! Concerning this I implored the Lord three times that it might leave me.
2 Corinthians 12:7-8 (NASB)

But as with the Father had with Christ, so the Lord had other plans for Paul:

And He has said to me, "My grace is sufficient for you, for power is perfected in weakness." Most gladly, therefore, I will rather boast about my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ may dwell in me. Therefore I am well content with weaknesses, with insults , with distresses, with persecutions, with difficulties, for Christ's sake; for when I am weak, then I am strong.
2 Corinthians 12:9-10 (NASB)

And so suffering--the great teacher of Christ Himself--taught Paul as well. It taught him, "to keep from exalting" himself (v 7). It taught him that the grace of Christ "is sufficient" for our needs (v.9). It taught him to be "well content" with all the trials he would face "for Christ's sake" (v. 10). And it taught him that his weakness leaves room for Christ to exercise His strength in him (vv. 9, 10). What have we to learn that only suffering can teach us? Praise God that He understands our weakness and loves us so much in the midst of it!

Father, forgive me for crying out against the great teacher Suffering. His wounds instruct me just as they instructed my Lord before me. Thank you for granting to me not only faith but suffering so that I can learn what it means to obey and so that Your strength may show through in my weakness. Teach me not to exalt in myself; and I pray that You would continue to refine me in the cauldron of suffering, not maliciously or excessively but only as much as it takes to make me more like Christ, obedient and used by You. Thank You for blessing me with so much more good than I could ever deserve and for submitting me to so much less suffering than I surely do deserve. I am in awe of You, Lord. Please comfort my friends who are hurting, Lord. I love You. Teach me to love You more. Amen.

MUST READ: From Acts 29: "A Child's Heart for Church Planting"

Ravi, when I go out and plant a church, I want you on my team, buddy!

http://www.acts29network.org/acts-29-blog/a-childs-heart-for-church-planting/

Seriously, if that doesn't give you hope for the future of the Kingdom, I can't imagine what would. And why don't you send your $5 along to:

Acts 29 Network Ravi Matching Fund
3524 NE 95th St Seattle, WA 98115

Praise God for what He's doing in the hearts of even the little ones! What a time to be a part of His work in this world!

Why am I still surprised...

...When God blesses me in spite of myself? I keep thinking I'm such a screw-up that nothing can ever go right with me in life or ministry and He keeps saying, "Well, of course you're a screw-up, but I'm GOD! HELLO! All you have to do is trust Me! I do the work! I get the glory! That's how it works!"

Well I can't say those were His exact words (actually Jesus explained it with this whole thing about a vine). But He sure is good, isn't He?

I trust HIM.
HE does the work (HIS way).
HE gets the glory.

That's what changing the world is really all about. Seriously, you'd think I'd get that already...

"But how do you love the 'more lovable?'"

I promised to be honest with this blog and so I'll let you in a little closer than I normally would and tell you about a recent experience where my own fallen-ness got in the way of me:

I was driving down Creedmoor Road in Raleigh when I passed a runner. I took a quick look at this guy and got an image of someone who spends a lot of time on his own body. He was tanned and toned--ripped, even. And as I saw him run by, I realized the immediate reaction I had to him and his appearance with some regret:

I hated him.

Now mind you, I didn't (and still don't) know this guy from Adam. He could be a hard-working guy just trying to get by in the world. He could be an athlete in training. He could be a brother in Christ headed for the mission field or a young father out for a run to keep the stress down so he can be there one hundred percent for his wife and kids. But at that time, none of that crossed my mind. All I could think was how in my heart--for just a moment--I despised him.

Now in case you haven't picked up on this, the reason for this flash of hatred was jealousy. I looked at this guy and it seemed clear to me that here was a man who could have his pick of women (and likely has), while I personally seem to live somewhere between loneliness and rejection all the time (rejection being the worse of the two but risking rejection being unfortunately the only way to escape loneliness). I don't exactly tend to do well with the girls in general and worse yet right now I'm not in a place where I'm likely to meet someone new anyway. It seems like lately all the women that attract my notice are either too young or married already (or in the really scary cases that I'm seeing more of lately, both). And if guys like this are the ones getting the girls, an argument could be made that I have some grounds for hating "Running Stud" here and all his ilk.

Except I don't. Not at all. Not even a little bit. I don't have the right to choose who I will or will not love. Jesus made that abundantly clear when he applied the second part of the great commandment (the part about loving our neighbors as ourselves) to Samaritans and Jews (pretty harsh rivals, to say the least). So, while I get the concept of loving the unlovely or the unlovable, what about those I see as more lovable or desirable than me? The ones who seem to get all the breaks I don't get? We're all made in the image of God and that image is not any clearer or more obscure in a "beautiful" person than it is in an "ugly" one. And oh yeah, lest I forget and think I deserve so much better than I get, I should note that I'm a flat-out gross sinner whose only claim to anything good is that God loved me enough to send His Son.

So I had to pray and ask forgiveness. I'm not proud of such thoughts in myself, but they do show up from time-to-time. There's no excuse for it, but right there it is. If that was you running on the side of the road, I'm really sorry, man. You didn't deserve my animosity. My own insecurities aren't your fault or anybody else's. They're based on me believing the lies of the evil one that no one could love me and that I've got to be in competition with other guys to get by. Thankfully, I'm still a work in progress and God hasn't let go of me yet.

Father, you are so good, and I'm so thankful that You never let me go...even when I act like a straight-up idiot and think someone has been blessed more than I or that I have a right not to love any person created in Your holy image. I love You so much, Father. Thank You for loving me first, even though I couldn't ever hope to deserve it.

And even if you're not as big an idiot as I am, He loves you like that, too.

What makes a leader? (1 Sam. 29-31)

I was reading the last three chapters of 1 Samuel today, and it struck me just how differently David (who has been anointed king of Israel but is in exile) and Saul (who is still king when this passage opens) deal with adversity. David had finally left Israel all together to pledge his service to Achish the king of the Philistines, and he is content to remain faithful (mostly faithful, anyway) to him even when Achish is headed out to fight against Israel. But the other lords of the Philistines don't trust David--noting how a strategic betrayal in that battle could put David back in the Israelites' good graces. To whit, they quote the little Hebrew ditty that has caused David so much trouble up to this point:

"Saul has slain his thousands,
And David his ten thousands." (29:5)

Saul didn't like that song much either, which is kind of why David was running from him in the first place. But the song itself was never intended to make Saul look bad, of course. David was Saul's champion, fighting for the same kingdom so Saul should have rejoiced that God had blessed David with such success and thanked God that he had so loyal and effective a captain. Instead he gets jealous and tries to kill him! Go figure.

A couple weeks ago at Crossroads camp, I was in a group of youth workers in a Bible study conducted by Matt Orth when we looked at this song (Matt was the one who coined that phrase about "fighting for the same kingdom"). It occured to me just how much I'm tempted to do the same thing in ministry. I get so self-absorbed sometimes that it's so much easier to complain to God that the church down the street has a bigger youth group or that the young preacher friend (who clearly isn't half the speaker than I am, after all! [guilty sarcasm should be noted here]) gets so many more calls to travel and speak (no doubt because he was saved from more colorful sins than I was or he has better connections than I do [same guilty sarcasm]) than it is to rejoice that God is doing His work through all of us. David just wanted to be faithful to his king both then with Saul and now with Achish. Achish does trust him but the others don't so David is rejected again.

So David goes back home to Ziklag but the Amalekites had attacked his hometown while he and the soldiers were away and took everything, even the women and children. (And you thought Saul killed them--with Samuel's "help." They're like cockroaches! Presumably these guys are from other cities of the Amalekites besides Amalek itself. And actually David attacked them previously so it's not really that much of a surprise.) Now David has it pretty bad here because BOTH of his wives (the ones Saul hadn't given to somebody else anyway) are taken away, and if that's not bad enough, the men want to stone him because of their own losses. It's funny how the tide turns quickly, huh? These guys were willing to die for David, but when their families and houses are hit because they were away with him at war now they want to kill him (when he's lost as much as they have)! Sadly, even doing your best you can't please everybody, and some of those who should be your greatest supporters wind up behind your back with the knife.

So things look pretty bad for David. But he doesn't screw it up. He could run and cry. He could make promises to his guys that "We'll get 'em, boys! Don't you worry!" and just hope he can deliver the goods (and if he fails again, then go back to the "run and cry" strategy). But instead, he takes it to God and the Lord says "You're good. Go get 'em!" (Evans paraphrase). So David wipes out more of those pesky Amalekites (although 400 get away--like cockroaches I tell ya!) and gets everything back. Then he's generous to the guys that were too tired to go to war but who stayed behind to watch the stuff, which in turn makes some of the ones who actually fought the Amalekites jealous (I wonder if these are the same guys who wanted to stone David previously when he didn't leave anybody to guard the city).

So David perserveres and he's generous, even if it still seems like he can't please anybody. Contrast that with Saul in chapter 31. Even without David's help the Philistines easily beat Saul's forces and he can't take it. His sons die in battle but he's wounded and instead of fighting on and dying like a man the way they did, he gets scared and kills himself. And we know that his failure to do things God's way (which again is so different from David who we've already seen seek God's wisdom before he took action; Saul was a little too impatient for that) is why he's in this position to begin with. So things looked so bad for David that he had even left Israel to join the Philistines, and it just seemed to keep getting worse, but as 1 Samuel ends and 2 Samuel begins, he finally is in position to inherit the kingdom he was promised, and Saul, who caused him so much trouble, is no more.

God help me to perservere and be faithful, to do the work that He's called me to in His way. I'd much rather end up like David than Saul, thank you very much!

Can one blog really change the world? (Nah, but I think I'll start one anyway.)

For anyone who is actually bothering to read this mess of mine, welcome.

This is the very first post of my new blog. I've done a little blogging before but this is my first ever personal blog and if you're actually reading this (and God bless you for it if you are), be forewarned that I'm really not entirely sure where I'm going with this or what it's going to look like. But at the very least, I can offer this first post and tell you the two streams of thought that led to my starting this little endeavor:

The first stream flows from a friend of mine who gave me the idea of blogging as a substitute for keeping a journal. I liked the idea because I've never really been able to get into journaling regularly. It always seemed like I only wanted to write in a journal when I was in some highly emotional state (which usually meant I was obsessing over some girl--the number of journal entries I've written about women is probably about triple the number of entries about anything else, and that is likely to be a very conservative figure). Sometimes the whole journal thing came off as a little narcissistic to me because it gave me an excuse to be a bit self-absorbed, since no one but me would read it anyway (and I don't mean to condemn anyone who keeps a journal--if you find it to be helpful spiritually, then keep it up and who knows? Maybe one day I'll even come back to it myself). Even so, I often wrote the journal entries as if someone else would read them later anyway. So not only do they tend to be self-centered, but they probably aren't even as honest to my actual feelings as they could be. At the very least, they're inhibited enough that they don't usually display my most shocking inner thoughts. With the blog, the nice thing is I actually am writing something intended for others to read (whether anyone actually does or not is another thing entirely, of course) so there seems to be some added value to the endeavor itself. And with other people reading, a certain level of inhibition is actually a good thing. That said, I'll try to be as honest as I can be and still adhere to some small level of tact at least.

The second stream that led to the blog (and particularly the theme of the blog) was a thought that's been gaining prominence in my mind ever since I saw the film Amazing Grace a few months ago. If you don't know, Amazing Grace is the true story of William Wilberforce, the man who is largely credited with ending the slave trade in Great Britain in the early nineteenth century. The movie gets its title, of course, from the popular hymn by the same name (which was written by John Newton, a former slave ship captain and a spiritual influence on Wilberforce's life).

What is almost unbelievable about Wilberforce (especially in this day and age) is that he was a politician who was moved by nothing more or less than his convictions as a follower of Christ and a concerned citizen of his nation. The abolition of the slave trade was not generally regarded as a wise platform to promote either financially, politically or nationalistically and yet, Wilberforce would not let it go no matter the personal cost to himself (which turned out to considerable) because he was convinced his cause was just. It took nearly twenty years but he was ultimately able (with the help of many other change-minded warriors) to sway opinion against the slave trade, and it was halted. Finally, just three days before his death, he received word that the practice of slavery would finally be abolished in the U.K. entirely (in the U.S. it would be another 35 years and a bloody war before slavery would finally end).

What struck me about seeing Wilberforce's story was the realization that here was a man who was pretty ordinary (for a member of Parliament, at least) who really believed that God would have him follow his conscience rather than popular opinion, and the end result of his obedience was that God used him to change the British Isles--and ultimately the world--forever. Too often I read how God worked in Bible times and it just seems so far away from my life today (a culture totally unlike ours and an age so far in the past as to seem almost legendary). And so, when God works in those stories to change things, in some ways it's just a story to me--inspiring, encouraging but often not much more personal than a fable. But to be reminded by this far more contemporary event that all those things God did in the past are not mere fables but rather they are the reality--that the same Christ who walked the earth in the first century is the same God and Savior who's Spirit dwells in and seeks to work through us today--that inspired me. (Sad to think it took a film to do that when I have always had God's Word on it, but I am a fallen creature after all and a rather visual one to boot.) So as I watched that story play out before my eyes, I realized a thought that has been growing in my head at least since I responded to the call to vocational ministry for the first time way back when I was 16 years old:

I want to change the world.

Before my life on earth is through, in at least one substantial, positive way, I want to change the world. That doesn't mean that I want to be famous like Wilberforce was. I've always struggled with a desire for fame (which really stems from my desire to be loved and accepted) and I'm not saying I'm looking for God to sanctify and honor my own personal lust for recognition and glory. In fact, when it comes to world change, I would certainly hope to be perfectly happy with no one actually knowing I ever did anything of any significance. Even if I myself never know what change God has brought about in the world through my life (and it's safe to say that, to some extent, I won't), it doesn't matter (even though I'm sure that God will reveal to us the true worth of our lives in eternity).

The change itself is the important issue, and the thing that impresses me is that the world changes on such simple things. Think of the people who influenced Wilberforce. Think of people like John Newton. He has a part in Wilberforce's victory and the change God wrought through his life too. Go even further back and think about the spiritual influences in Newton's life. Where does the honor truly lie? Who gets the greatest glory for all of that?

Well the answer is simple, actually: God does.

God gets all the glory for bringing about His will in the world. But He used all those men and women to do something that was far beyond any of them, and so they get to share in that glory. Why? So that they can radiate it back to Him again for all eternity. Please don't think that I'm saying I think God can use me to change the world because I'm anything special. I assure you that I am not (and if you know me personally, you can certainly attest to this). No, I believe God will change the world through me because He is the one who created me, chose me, called me, justified me and is in the process of glorifying me (Rom. 8:29-30). And He doesn't do anything for nothing. Everything He does and everything He creates has purpose. So if He put me here for a purpose (namely glorifying Himself) that must mean that--in some way that I could never hope to understand--His will is accomplished more completely with me in the world than it would be without me. And the same is true for you. You have a purpose and you can change the world--just by being obedient to Him.

So with that in mind (and since I've already written way too much--longwinded as usual), welcome to my new blog. Now, let's get to it! There's a whole world out there to change.