Well this is a little daunting. Our beautiful Easter season comes to an end (Pentecost is just around the corner) with a prayer and maybe even a warning. With Jesus’ glorious ascension, we, the people of God, are left to continue the mission of service and love. Make no mistake, Jesus’ prayer in the Gospels is a prayer for strength. This Christian life is hard and he knows it. Peter in his first letter instructs us to “Rejoice to the extent that you share in the sufferings of Christ.” That’s a bit bleak and certainly we feel pain, but it is good to know that it is like the pain of the athlete, a refining pain that makes us stronger, healthier, better.
Recently, I was talking to a friend of mine who is a practicing member of a nondenominational Protestant church. He’s faithful, giving and intelligent, but when we discussed a mutual friend’s illness, I was taken aback and even a little shocked to hear his views on suffering. What followed was a discussion on what philosophers and theologians have dubbed “the problem of pain.” In short, how can a loving God allow for pain to continue in the world? For him, human suffering was to be avoided at all costs and of course he’s right, but I he saw no redeeming power in it. For him God’s message of happiness is about the absolute avoidance of pain. I informed him while certainly no one wishes suffering upon anyone, it could be beautifully redemptive and often instructive. In our journey to holiness suffering is often the first step — we want to change something about our wrong behavior. For him Christ suffered for us and now it is finished—to be eluded. I told him that Christ’s suffering continues as long as we are suffering. He’s suffering next to those beloved children killed in Manchester or the mother not knowing how she is going to pay the rent. To avoid pain is to avoid life and to not suffer is not to have lived.
I’ll be seeing you,
Elliot