Grief

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Suffering
My Catholic friends call it "slivers of the cross." I rather like that expression. Such slivers come in many forms. Perhaps physical suffering is our first thought.

Recently, the day following surgery, I had the "opportunity" to experience the worst physical pain I've ever had. Back at the hotel, within an hour of being discharged, I tried to sit down on the bed, intending to lie down. I got caught halfway between the two. The pain, from my knees to my ears, was so overwhelming I didn't know if I were having a stroke, a heart attack, or I'd ruptured something in my belly. Oh, and I couldn't catch my breath, either. That was a bit of panic. Later, I learned the reason. Surgery caused irritation of the phrenic nerve in the diaphragm, which regulates respiration. Even though I could scarcely breathe, I couldn't help but cry out. (Thankfully, I did make it to my feet, again, and figured out how to manage the pain.)

While we might wonder why we have to suffer, the Bible does give us clues. First to mind: "The rod and reproof bring wisdom," we read in Proverbs. And, in the opening to the book of Job, we read that, while the adversary is responsible, even he must ask the Almighty's permission to afflict us. Something about pain seals a lesson, learned perhaps no other way (as childhood spankings served to teach us).

The best example, in this world of all sorts of suffering, can certainly be found in relation to a combat zone. A patient coming through our ward in Vietnam, for some reason, decided I needed a protector: himself! (I'm pretty sure I was the only nurse at the 93rd Evac Hospital who had a flak jacket, not that I ever needed it.) He became a favorite among my circle of friends, the big brother I'd always wanted, my guardian angel with skin on.

With my wild imagination, I worried how I would bear it if he should be wounded and brought in to our hospital. Since door gunners had a significantly higher mortality rate, I begged him to be careful, because I feared I simply could not endure life without him in it. I even told him that if something should happen to him, I'm afraid I would just lie down beside him and give up the ghost, too.

Thankfully, both of us made it safely home, but that certainly wasn't the case for many others. I decided I'd welcome the suffering of acute or even chronic physical pain, any day, rather than the anguish of such a beyond-human-remedy loss.

In a recent radio commentary, Rush Limbaugh made the following statement: "…Can I tell you what torture is to me? Torture to me is not all this waterboarding stuff. You know what torture is? Torture is trying to go to sleep every night with pictures in your head that your wife, your husband, your son, your daughter jumped from a top floor at the World Trade Center to his or her death rather than burn alive. That's torture."

And, to me, his words illustrate the real suffering we can see every day on the news or from the internet, without even trying. My constant intercessory question cries out, "Lord, how can hearts bear this?"

Whenever we take part in the Lord's Supper, we hear the words, "His body broken for us." I've come to the conclusion (theologians wrestling with the mysteries of the Godhead aside) that far more than Jesus' body was involved. The very heart and soul of the Almighty broke, ripped apart like the Temple curtain covering the Holy of Holies, torn from top to bottom. Jesus' cry, "Eli, Eli, lama sabachthani?" also bears witness to the utter depths of His suffering on our behalf. And, I think, in His taking on Himself all the darkness of this world as the perfect Lamb, His words also echo the heart cry of all creation's experience: "My God, my God, why have You forsaken Me?"

For such suffering that is beyond human consolation, we thank the Lord that He has not left us without the Comforter, to be with us.

In all their affliction he was afflicted, and the angel of his presence saved them; in his love and in his pity he redeemed them; he lifted them up and carried them all the days of old. ---Isaiah 63:9

Be strong and of good courage, do not fear or be in dread of them: for it is the LORD your God who goes with you; he will not fail you or forsake you. ---Deuteronomy 31:6

---Edy T Johnson---

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