Pit of Despair

A few months back, I wrote an entry titled Empathetic or Pathetic? These words were the result of a conviction that I was worrying too much, and this worry had started depleting my joy. Since then, I have had frequent, unavoidable contact with the intrusive sufferings of this world. Even when God gave me the grace to fight off worry, life threw real, unimagined suffering in my face. It was as if Satan realized that worry was on its way out, so he devised another plan to steal my joy. As imagined suffering lost its potency, real suffering slammed into my consciousness. Despair ensued.

In one of these despairing moods, I found myself washing dishes. The mundane chore gave my hands something to do while my mind fought the emotional attack. Conscious of very real suffering quite near at hand, I mentally searched through the hundreds of Bible verses I had locked in my memory for a verse that promised reprieve in this life. I found none. The hopelessness deepened as I realized that this specific pain – indeed, all pain felt in this life – has great potential to endure until those who suffer from it leave this world. I was taught long ago that the promise made in Jeremiah 29:11 – a verse often quoted by individuals wishing to claim it today – is a promise specific to Jeremiah. God's plans – plans for prosperity and protection, plans for “hope and a future” – are not universal plans for all of His people. Any story about a modern martyr will tell you that. God never promised ease or comfort this side of heaven.

Wrapping my mind around this fact was extremely difficult. I love God deeply. More than that, God is daily making clear to me the depth of His love for me. Even the suffering I have seen has not shaken the hold His love has on my heart, and for that I am eternally grateful. I am unable to ignore God's love. But neither can I ignore the fact that many suffer – and some suffer for the entirety of this life. Now I am faced with the task of placing these two irrefutable facts side by side and somehow making sense of what seems like a giant contradiction. This task is a weighty one, because many have undertaken it and become unconvinced of the first irrefutable fact – God's love.

The fact of suffering has its origin in the fall of man. When Eve and Adam chose to depart from God's perfect design for humanity, God withdrew His perfect presence from mankind's world, and every fiber of its being began to decay. Their rebellion warranted death, and now our lives are steeped in it. As rejecters of our Creator, we deserve such a fate. In response, we must run from this death toward the Creator we rejected and finally accept His offer of life.

The fact of suffering does not refute the fact of God's love. Instead, this well-earned fate provides the perfect backdrop for this perfect love to evince itself. God Himself came in human form – down into our man-made muck and mire – to provide an escape from our perpetual pain. Through the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ, we have a promise that a day is coming without any pain or suffering.

So how do we continue here? How do we live well among this suffering now? How do we maintain a constant joy amid so much pain? Jesus spoke of life more abundant – did He speak only of suffering well until death provides relief?

Paul spoke often of joy amidst his suffering (2 Cor 7:4; 8:2). James even goes so far as to say that the two are related: “Consider it pure joy, my brothers and sisters, whenever you face trials of many kinds.” (Jam 1:2, NIV) Even Jesus, when foretelling the trials His disciples would endure, told them to rejoice (Luke 6:23). Perhaps this life more abundant is joy amidst the pain, not reprieve from it.

Joy is necessary for the life of a believer. It is listed among the fruits of the spirit, coming directly after “love.” Joy is one of the defining characteristics of a person redeemed by the death of Jesus. Joy is what caused the unborn John the Baptist to leap inside his mother's womb in the presence of the unborn Jesus (Luke 1:44). Joy is what the shepherds felt when the skies filled with angels proclaiming the birth of their Savior (Luke 2:10). Joy is the emotion Jesus used to describe the appropriate reaction to finding the kingdom of heaven (Mt 13:20, 44). Joy sets Christians apart from the world – “God, your God, has set you above your companions by anointing you with the oil of joy.” (Heb 1:9) If we are going to wander about on this decaying planet claiming we know the Way, the Truth, and the Life, we'd better have a smile in our hearts that occasionally reaches our faces. No one wants to subscribe to misery.

Joy is possible, even alongside this present suffering. This life doesn't have to be one of misery. Our joy is not dependent on our circumstances. (At this point, I must make note of a slight difference between “joy” and “happiness.” Happiness is a superficial emotion, based primarily upon immediate circumstance. Joy is a foundational emotion, and can be felt alongside sadness, whereas happiness usually cannot.)

Joy amidst suffering is a daily struggle for me. I have a horrible habit of piling burdens too heavy on shoulders too frail. I will not pretend to have mastered this conundrum. Here are just a few helpful tips I have learned along my journey:

We can have joy amidst suffering because of what Jesus has done. He endured the most dramatic suffering – He was beaten and nailed to a tree, an innocent Lamb murdered by those He came to save. In death, He endured separation from the Father, as God ostracized Himself to bestow holiness upon undeserving people. “For the joy set before him he endured the cross, scorning its shame” (Heb 12:2). He didn't stop there. After three days, Jesus defeated death. This pinnacle of suffering, this power feared by all mankind, was powerless to stop the Son of God from bringing joy to those He loves. All of the words in red ink are precious to me, but perhaps the dearest to my heart are these: “In this world you will have trouble. But take heart! I have overcome the world.” (John 16:33)


We can have joy amidst suffering because of Who Jesus left with us. Jesus has conquered this world and left us with the Holy Spirit – the person, fully God, who lives with each believer. With the Spirit living inside us, the sufferings that we experience allow us to grow. This may not make suffering any more enjoyable, but the big-picture perspective may allow joy to permeate. In the midst of this suffering, the Spirit provides the comfort of direction and correction, as David expressed so beautifully in Psalm 23: “Even though I walk through the darkest valley, I will fear no evil, for you are with me; your rod and your staff, they comfort me.” On top of the joy that comes from growth, the Holy Spirit, being fully God, has the ability to simply fill us with joy. Several times throughout the New Testament, joy is stated directly alongside the Holy Spirit (Luke 10:21, Acts 13:52, Rom 14:17). In 1 Thessalonians, Paul tells the church that the Holy Spirit can give joy even in suffering: “You became imitators of us and of the Lord, for you welcomed the message in the midst of severe suffering with the joy given by the Holy Spirit.” (1 Thes 1:6)


Finally, we can have joy amidst suffering because of the hope we have for our future. Paul used the words “joyful in hope, patient in affliction.” (Rom 12:12) Jesus said to His disciples, in an attempt to prepare them for His coming absence, “Now is your time of grief, but I will see you again and you will rejoice, and no one will take away your joy.” (John 16:22) This same joy can be ours – joy based on the same hope. Some day unbelievably soon, we will stand or sit or bow at the feet of Jesus, having been redeemed from our well-earned eternal suffering. “Therefore, since we have been justified through faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have gained access by faith into this grace in which we now stand. And we boast in the hope of the glory of God.” (Rom 5:1-2) This glory of God which gives us hope is the glory belonging to Jesus that was graciously bestowed upon us at the cross. When your joy is based on this hope, “no one will take away your joy.” (John 16:22). Nothing can separate us from the foundation of this hope – the love of Christ (Rom 8:35, 38-39). His love has provided for us a future without pain – eternity with no tears.


The well-known lyrics to the beloved hymn “Turn Your Eyes Upon Jesus” lay out these truths much more beautifully than I ever could:

O soul, are you weary and troubled?
No light in the darkness you see?
There’s light for a look at the Savior,
And life more abundant and free!

Turn your eyes upon Jesus,
Look full in His wonderful face,
And the things of earth will grow strangely dim,
In the light of His glory and grace.
(Helen H. Lemmel)

In order to have true joy in the face of true suffering, we must maintain a constant understanding that this life is short and its troubles are slight in comparison to the glory that awaits us at its end (2 Cor 4:17). Paul, who suffered much for the cause of Christ – and suffered joyfully – did not consider his trials even worth comparison with the coming glory (Rom 8:18-39). When he did compare the two, he concluded that the things of this present life are rubbish (Phil 3:8). I have never met anyone who has suffered more than the apostle Paul, though I'm sure such a person may exist. However, I am convinced that if Paul managed to suffer his trials joyfully in the light of the glorious future of seeing Jesus, we can endeavor to do the same. Paul may have been extraordinarily blessed by a face-to-face with Jesus on the road to Damascus, but we have been blessed with the Holy Spirit – a direct line to the throne room.

There is no ignoring the fact that on this side of eternity, there's going to be more total brokenness than total healing. “Even in laughter the heart may ache, and the end of joy may be grief.” (Prov 14:13) This fact, though ponderously gloomy, can “grow strangely dim in the light of His glory and grace.” The Gospel does not promise to eliminate the sufferings of this world, but instead brings joy into its midst.

Guilty

As a result of my recent trend towards self-discovery, I have become aware an unfortunate aspect of this quirky personality of mine. I had a bad day not too long ago, and found myself in a rare mood of self-pity. As is the premise of this blog, I have a habit of overwhelming myself with pity and compassion on behalf of others, and this often distracts me from any self-pity I may feel. In the midst of this self-pity, which was of course affecting my mood, I felt acute guilt. I somehow felt that I shouldn't feel this pain on my own behalf, as if it was somehow wrong. In the days since, I have been processing this guilt, trying to figure out how to accurately describe its origin. At first, I took delight in blaming my guilt on the way I was perceived by those around me, as if they somehow saw me as rock-solid and impervious to pain. Eventually, though, I came to the painful conclusion that I was only half-right. The unpleasant truth is that it was I who perceived myself as rock-solid and impervious to pain. I have found no other name for this unfortunate quirk than self-righteous guilt – and that makes it sinful, not merely unfortunate.

Somehow, up until today, I have remained blissfully unaware of my self-righteousness. I guess that is the nature of the beast. Somehow throughout my history, I have become erroneously convinced in my subconscious that I am better at handling my own problems than others are, and that is why I am able to help them. That is not the case at all. 


The question here is not whether I am better at handling my issues than others are at handling theirs. The answer to that question, though it may be interesting, is entirely irrelevant. The problem here is that I am actually asking that question. All self-righteousness starts with comparison to other people. In 2 Corinthians, Paul writes, “But when they measure themselves by one another and compare themselves with one another, they are without understanding.” (2 Cor 10:12b) 


The reality of the matter is that these quirks of my personality that allow me to empathize and help others are gifts. The source of my power is not internal. I do not help others out of an excess of my own ability. I do not have compassion upon others out of an excess of my own love. I do not carry others' burdens out of an excess of my own strength. Rather, these things are extensions of the Holy Spirit living in me. It is God who gives me the ability, love, and strength required to act in a way that will glorify His name. Unfortunately, my subconscious has been using these assets to boost my own ego. 


Fortunately, God's power is made perfect in my weakness (2 Cor 12:9). When I have a bad day and resort to extraordinarily-human self-pity, my self-righteousness takes a hit. When I take on more burdens than my shoulders can carry and depression sets in, my human frailty becomes unavoidably evident. And when I realize that for all of my days, God will be available to carry all of my burdens and all of my adopted burdens and all of the burdens of all of His children, I realize how perfect His power truly is. 


So yes. It is ok for my frail shoulders to feel some pain now and then. In fact, it's recommended. 

Empathetic or Pathetic?

I began today with worry. It has been my constant companion since my alarm went off. The sun was hiding behind sheets of rain at the time, so I went back to bed for an hour.

As I have mentioned before, I take empathy to a whole new level. When worry sets in, I turn empathetic into pathetic. I am prone to letting the cares of this world affect my mood. I'd like to be able to say that I have a constant underlying joy despite any circumstance, but that is only true up to the point where I start to worry.

As my load becomes too heavy for my frail shoulders to bear, my spirit becomes exhausted. I begin to feel, deep in my soul, that I am way older than my chronological age. I become weary and worn, and crave nothing more than eternal rest at the feet of my Savior. Even as I write this, I yearn for the day when the Lord takes me home and this world I am visiting lies forever behind me. On days like this – days like today – I find that my prayers make a subtle shift from aid in this life to reprieve from it. In my emotional exhaustion, I forget that the “joy set before me” is not merely waiting for me on the other side, but is available to me now, though in a slightly less tangible form.

This worry-laden forgetfulness does not any longer resemble noble empathy. It is merely pathetic. There is nothing noble in carrying unnecessary burdens. The desire to do so is noble, but the uneducated pride that actually attempts it is not. These are not my burdens to carry. They are not my problems to fix. By attempting to carry or fix these stolen woes, I help no one and hurt myself. I am even in danger of damaging my testimony, because the gospel is not complete without joy.

Knowing the human propensity for worry and the weight of the cares of this world, Jesus tells us this: “Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke on you and learn from me, because I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy to bear, and my load is not hard to carry.” (Mt 11:28-30, NET) This rest He speaks of is not only available after life on earth is over. Through the Holy Spirit, we can access His throne; through prayer and meditation, we can lay our burdens at His feet. He can help – we have only to ask.

This world is heavy. Our shoulders are weak. There are some burdens we must carry – but we don't have to bear them alone. There is never a need to allow the cares of this world to cast a shadow on the joy of being a child of the King. It will never be bad enough that He can't help you through. No load can possibly be that heavy.

Mother Nature

When I was in high school, a friend of mine thought it would be wise to share candidly what he thought was wrong with each of his friends. His opinion as a professional high schooler was obviously well-received. When my turn came, he told me: “Nora, you don't have to be everyone's mother.” At the time, I was mortally wounded. Me, acting like a mom? In high school, that is an insult of the most offensive nature.

Since then, I have discovered that this young mind had stumbled onto something that runs very deep in my personality: my mothering nature.

In high school, I was the go-to listening ear among my friends. I could tell when they needed me, so I would listen to their woes and then offer the little bit of insight I had. Everyone told me I should consider becoming a counselor, and my answer was always that I planned to graduate from counseling at the end of high school.

As an adult, my friendships took on qualities far more complex and less dramatic than those developed in high school. In response, my mothering nature matured. As I began to listen to the adult-sized woes of people I loved, my tender heart broke – and it broke frequently. I would offer what advice I could and listen when advice was superfluous. But all the while, not too far below my calmly compassionate surface, there was – and is – a bubbling turmoil of empathy.

At this point, I must make it clear that I am not writing this to laud my own achievements in the compassion department. I am aware of this aspect of my quirky personality, and while it may be on some lists of virtues, it causes me far more pain than is reasonable. My intention is not to form an inflated view of myself in which I appear to be the next Mother Teresa. As I have stated previously, the point of this blog is to explore methods to remove this weighty world from my flimsy shoulders.

I have been described as empathetic to a fault. I have somehow found a way to channel this instinctual nurturing emotion into something excruciating and unhealthy: anxiety. My emotional state progresses rather quickly from calm to turmoil. When I discover that someone I love is experiencing some kind of difficulty – ranging from a minor headache to a ruptured family – I am filled with sympathy and my heart aches in empathy. I then rapidly search through my mental file folders for possible cures or anesthetics. When one is found, I immediately suggest it to the injured party. Sometimes, my suggestion is gratefully accepted and the headache goes away within thirty or forty minutes. Other times, I can find no solution, and the unsolved problem plagues me indefinitely. Still other times, something far worse happens: my advice goes unheeded.

While my mothering nature was given to me by my Creator, the quirks related to it come straight from my very own mother. One of these quirks is that I do not respond well when my advice is not accepted. I have little patience for people who will complain about a problem and then take no steps to resolve it. So I do what mothers do best – I nag. This nagging is not well-received by a mother's own children, so it is definitely not well-received by people wholly unrelated to me, and I have almost lost friends this way.

When I finally realized that this diabolical need to nurture was causing some problems, I was at a loss for solutions. At my very core, I am a mom, even though I don't have any children of my own. This is how God made me. I am a nurturer; I cannot stop caring this deeply, and have no wish to try. I have since realized that it is not the caring that gets me into trouble, but how I act on it. There are so many different mistakes I make because I care so deeply that there is no way to fit them in this already absurdly-long post. (The next few posts will discuss each of these mistakes at length.)

For now, I will close with this consolation: “Is there anyone among you who, if his son asks for bread, will give him a stone? Or if he asks for a fish, will give him a snake? If you then, although you are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father in heaven give good gifts to those who ask him!” (Mt 7:9-11, NET) No matter how deeply you love, God's love is deeper. No matter how confident you are in your ability to solve this problem, God is far more able. And no matter how anxious you are, God is in control.

Realistic Contentment

Those of us who have spent more than a decade on earth among people are fully aware that life closely resembles a roller coaster: ups and downs, fasts and slows, and a fair share of nauseating turns. That's simply life. The only factor we control is how we respond to these changes.

Frequently, and in response to practically any circumstance that appears even remotely hopeful, my instinctual reaction is happy delusion (dubbed thus only in retrospect, of course). I allow myself to believe that the best really can be true, even if it defies all logic. Obviously, this delusion is accompanied by extreme happiness. Later – moments or months – I realize I had jumped the gun and sacrificed good sense for possible good fortune. The realization is painful, and my emotions do a virtual 180, dropping me into bitter pessimism – my previous lesson has taught me to expect only the worst.

I don't seem to manage a happy medium. Bitter pessimism is not at all realistic. Logic requires that I admit that things won't turn out horribly every time simply because they have in the past. Unfortunately, neither can I prevent myself from diving head-long into delusion when the facts obviously revolt against hope. Realistic contentment evades me.

The most plausible explanation for this is that my emotional framework is defined almost exclusively by my current circumstances. I lack the foresight to prevent delusion and the grace to accept temporary defeat.

One important item to note before too long is that I would consider myself a realist verging on pessimism. That is why I have no qualms calling myself delusional for believing happiness is inevitable. I may not have lived a very long life, but I have seen enough to know that rose-colored glasses don't provide an accurate view of the world. Somehow, however, I still manage to allow myself those strange moments of spontaneous optimism when it appears as if things are going my way. There will be no explaining away that quirk of my personality.

This realism of mine can become very dangerous, especially if I let it control my mood. Whether it's a fizzling friendship, someone I love experiencing irreversible crisis, or unrest in the Middle East, trouble will find its way into my consciousness. Denying that fact is delusional; dwelling on that fact is dangerous.

I have not yet found a way to change my personality. I am a realist – whether by nature or nurture – and no amount of time or therapy will change that. I have a history of letting this trait deter me from contentment, and that cannot continue. Instead, reality needs to become the foundation for this contentment.

The bottom line here is this: if I were truly aware of my reality, bitter pessimism would never find a foothold. Likewise, if I dig beyond the surface of my circumstances, my happiness would be based on fact, not illogical delusions.

My reality does not consist merely of friendships or life events. A day is not comprised only of success at work and adequate caffeination. My reality is founded on the sacrifice of Jesus. I am a sinner. I deserve to die. And yet I am allowed to live – and not a bland, pointless life, but a life full of fellowship with my Creator and Redeemer. God, who created everything that determines my reality, loves me deeply. That is my reality.

Based on these facts, this realist can in fact experience joy in life's frequent disappointments. I don't have to let reality get me down. The true Foundation of my joy is unshakable. While I can't claim to be able to prevent either the happy delusion or the rapid transformation into bitter pessimism, I know I don't have to choose between them. There is a third choice for me: realistic contentment.

The world is heavy, and my shoulders are frail, but despite it all I am content.  

Controlling the Control Freak

I'm a fixer – a control freak. If I see a problem, my mind automatically initiates strategic planning sessions, and all power is channeled into eliminating the problem. Sometimes a solution presents itself immediately, and normal function resumes. Other times, weeks go by before an exhausted problem acquires a solution. On rare occasions, the encountered problem has no solution. This causes me extreme anxiety: so much, in fact, that I had serious trouble forcing myself to write the previous sentence. I toyed with writing, “The problem has no visible solution,” or “The solution remains hidden,” or “I remain somehow blind to the solution.” The source of this internal struggle is this: something at the very core of my being refuses to admit that there's a problem that cannot be fixed. The issue is not personal pride (at least not entirely). I am willing to admit that there are problems I cannot fix. In fact, my problem-solving process involves consulting friends whose opinions I highly value. On these rare and troubling occasions, they tell me there is no solution. Each of these un-solvable problems takes up permanent residence on my shoulders.

On top of my own quandaries I place the ridiculous amount of pain and suffering I see all around me. I am naturally empathetic – to a fault. (Confession: this is why I do not regularly watch the news. Like many of you, I apprise myself of major events via social media.) If I hear that someone I know is experiencing hardship, my heart constricts and my stomach somersaults. When a dear friend's life is filled with pain, betrayal, or disaster, I carry their burden as if it were my own. The unfortunate reality of this life is that this habit of mine acquires quite the load for me to carry.

All of these strange personal quirks mean that at every moment I am carrying far heavier burdens than my frail human shoulders can handle. Until recently, I thought this was a normal part of life, and that the anxiety, exhaustion, stress, and worry were all entirely acceptable. Then one day, a good friend pointed out to me that worry is a sin. Since then I have waged continual war with my inner control freak. I don't anticipate ever having complete control over these impulses; however, I have discovered some useful battle tactics.

Through this blog, I will share my struggle to accept that I cannot fix everything and that I do not, in fact, need to carry the weight of the world on my shoulders. I will close with one item of the highest importance: my method hinges on the life, death, and resurrection of my Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. It is through His love for me that I am able to surrender daily those burdens that threaten to crush my soul.