Beloved, Don’t Be Surprised.
Psalm 90, Revisited
Mighty One, are you still hiding?
Come back! Stop playing games.
Have mercy on your children, who seek you.
We have searched high and low, and are tired of waiting.
Wake us up each day with your honeyed sun
and lark calls of joy. Teach us your ways,
but teach us first to sing again. We have forgotten
The melody, and our words fall flat.
Promise us that the coming dawn
will outlast this great and pressing darkness.
If not in our lifetime, then let our children see
your glory on earth, as it is in heaven.
Give us each day the assurance of your smile
when you behold us, your created ones—broken as we are.
Don’t let all of this be for nothing.
Don’t let all of this be for nothing.
I looked down at the papers in my hands in anger and disbelief. This wasn’t supposed to happen to me. I had done everything “right,” had prayed and stayed faithful, had surrendered this to God one thousand and one times, and yet there I was—two and a half years after my wedding day, signing divorce papers and checking the box that read “irreconcilable differences” as the “reason for dissolution”—as if those two words could ever describe the pain I had endured as I clung to that marriage and what I believed was God’s plan for my life.
Had God tricked me? Did I hear Him wrong? Maybe. Or maybe not.
Although I could not admit it at the time, part of the anguish I was experiencing was the grief of releasing my subconscious belief that if I just obeyed God’s direction in my life, I wouldn’t have to suffer. My belief equation looked something like this:
Follow God’s Leading + Stay Faithful to Him for the Long Haul = Relatively Pain-Free Life.
I was wrong.
***
We are surprised by suffering.
This is a hard truth that I’ve been wrestling with lately, especially this past year. Why are we surprised? Because we have believed the lie that if we just buy enough, look the right way, have enough resources, and are decent enough people, then the angel of death will pass over our house and spare us from deep, soul-wrenching, despair-inducing suffering. Sure, we might have the occasional bummer or mishap but anything can be fixed with enough money and time and work, right?
The reason this lie is so deadly is because when life-altering suffering does come, we spend so much time protesting it that we miss the quiet invitation of God to know him more deeply in and through suffering. We hate the idea of suffering so much that we resist any appearance of it and spend our days pursuing comfort and safety, often in the name of Christianity.
As followers of Christ, we of all people are told not to live our lives in such a way that we avoid suffering at all costs. Instead, we are invited to pick up our crosses and live like Christ. We follow a God who willingly surrendered his body to torturous death on a cross. 1 Peter 4 tells us to expect suffering as a part of life on earth:
“Beloved, do not be surprised at the fiery trial when it comes upon you to test you, as though something strange were happening to you. But rejoice insofar as you share Christ's sufferings, that you may also rejoice and be glad when his glory is revealed.”
God is grieved by our suffering, but he is not surprised by it. Why? Because he lived it. He knows what it is like to be human—scared, hurting, and lonely.
Why do we suffer? I do not know. But somehow, sharing in Christ’s sufferings on earth is part of our future joy when His glory is revealed and all that is wrong is made right. Our glory is bound up with Jesus. This is a mystery to me. I do not know why God allows pain and suffering to flourish, no matter how righteous or unrighteous we are.
I do know from personal experience and the wisdom of others that when we learn to anticipate and even embrace suffering as a part of the intricate, messy, masterful tapestry of our lives, we create more room for our souls to breathe. We exchange the false security of “having the answers” for real and lasting peace. Eventually, we may learn that what we see as the rubble of ruined plans for our lives, God sees as freshly tilled soil—fertile ground in which to plant seeds of redemption.
Divorce is not what I had planned for my life. In fact, it was the number one thing I was committed to avoiding at all costs. But thank God that I am not in charge of my life. Years later, as I begin to enjoy the fruit of the garden he planted in my pain, I realize it’s not about having the answers or “getting it right” to avoid pain. It’s about following him, even through the darkest of valleys. This is hard, lifelong work—much easier believed than actually lived out in the gritty messiness of our day-to-day lives. Still, He gives more grace.
These are the questions I wrestle with when pain continues to mark my life—especially in this seemingly unending season of uncertainty and loss:
Do I need God more than I need answers?
Do I love God more than I love comfort?
More often than I’d like to admit, the answer is No.
But oh, how I want to. How I long to sit at Jesus’ feet as Mary did, content with His presence above all else.
I have a long way to go.
But maybe for now, the wanting is enough.
***
“Learn the discipline of being surprised not by suffering but by joy. As we grow old . . . there is suffering ahead of us, immense suffering, a suffering that will continue to tempt us to think that we have chosen the wrong road. . . . But don’t be surprised by pain. Be surprised by joy, be surprised by the little flower that shows its beauty in the midst of a barren desert, and be surprised by the immense healing power that keeps bursting forth like springs of fresh water from the depth of our pain.” -Henri Nouwen
*Parts of this post were inspired by Mark Sayers’ excellent sermon, “The Way of the Cross.” I encourage you to listen to it.