13 The Comfort of God’s People
13
As I write this chapter I’m in the throes of an irony—or maybe not. Just as I began to stabilize physically and to learn to live with the physical deficits I’ve been left with, I have been hit with a virulent attack of shingles. Because of my dysfunctional immune system, the virus will be with me longer and the deep nerve pain will be more powerful than in more typical cases. I have been warned that the debilitating back pain I’m dealing with could be permanent. The physical travail of the last few days has been so severe that I have been unable to sleep or write or sit, nor am I comfortable lying down; I feel some relief only when standing. Pain medication gives some relief, but pain is still always with me.
On one hand, it’s ironic that as I’m coming to the end of this book on suffering, I’m now dealing with yet another layer of it. It’s tempting to be absorbed in all the why questions we tend to ask. It’s tempting to wallow in self-pity. It’s so tempting to be envious of friends who seem to have it so easy. It’s tempting to give way to “how long” and “what next” fears. It’s tempting to wonder if God really does hear my cries for help. Once again I’m confronted with the reality that suffering is not just physically, situationally, and relationally hard; it’s also a moment-by-moment spiritual war. It’s vital that I be aware of the dangers of this battle. But I’m reminded also that I’m not meant to fight this battle alone.
Suffering powerfully highlights what has always been true—we were not created for independent living. Suffering exposes our weakness, our blindness, and our lack of control. Suffering preaches that our lives are a community project. Suffering reminds us that God’s grace doesn’t work to propel our independence but to deepen our vertical and horizontal dependence. The strong, independent, self-made person is a delusion. Everyone needs help and assistance. Everyone has learned at the feet of someone else. Everyone is strengthened by others. To fight community, to quest for self-sufficiency, is not only a denial of your spiritual need; it’s a denial of your humanity. Suffering is a messenger telling us that to be human is to be dependent.
So perhaps I’m not in the middle of an irony but of a very wise plan. As I sit to write a chapter about the comfort of the community of faith, God works to put me in grave need of the very thing that I’m writing about. Clearly God has called me to experience what I had no plan or desire to experience in order to produce in me what I could never create on my own. The Bible has a name for this: grace. I’ve not been forgotten, I’m not being messed with, and this is profoundly more than another round of bad luck. What I’m experiencing is the very uncomfortable grace that I have written and spoken so much about. This physical travail, in the hands of my Savior, is a tool used to drive me away from self-sufficiency and into a deeper dependency on God and his people.
I’ve cried out to and been held up by a circle of faithful brothers and sisters. I can’t imagine how different this hardship would be if I’d had to walk through it alone. One of God’s sweetest gifts to us between the “already” of our conversion and the “not yet” of our homegoing is the gift of the body of Christ. God makes his invisible grace visible by sending people of grace to give grace to people who need grace. His people are meant to be the look on his face, the touch of his hand, the sound of his voice, the evidence of his love, the picture of his presence, and the visible demonstration of his faithfulness. God hasn’t left us to ourselves but has blessed us with an abundant community of help. The question is whether your suffering will drive you inward to go it alone or call you outward in humble, honest, and willing dependency.
There’s a wonderful example of humble dependency in 2 Corinthians 1:
We do not want you to be unaware, brothers, of the affliction we experienced in Asia. For we were so utterly burdened beyond our strength that we despaired of life itself. Indeed, we felt that we had received the sentence of death. But that was to make us rely not on ourselves but on God who raises the dead. He delivered us from such a deadly peril, and he will deliver us. On him we have set our hope that he will deliver us again. You also must help us by prayer, so that many will give thanks on our behalf for the blessing granted us through the prayers of many. (vv. 8–11)
Each time I read these verses I’m impressed with the shocking honesty of the apostle Paul. He was a powerfully influential man of faith, one you wouldn’t expect to be going through the struggle of heart that these verses portray. These words blow the lid off any image we might have of Paul as an independently spiritual man who lived way above the spiritual battles that are common to us all. This icon of gospel clarity, this messenger of gospel hope, this missionary to the hopeless, desperately needs for himself all that he holds out to others. So in the context of one troublesome event, he humbly unzips his heart and reveals the unsettling conflict that lives there.
Notice that Paul doesn’t tell us the exact situation; this is not a detailed report of his difficulty. Paul’s focus is the impact that this situation had on him and those with him. He is candidly confessing a deep spiritual struggle. He is confessing to where his thoughts went and what his heart experienced. This is more of a humble appeal for help than a careful communication of what he’s suffering. We tend to enjoy telling people in detail about the thing we’re suffering, while we tend to be more guarded about how we’re suffering. Celebrating the gift of the body of Christ in the middle of suffering isn’t about reporting suffering but about confessing the struggle in the midst of it. It isn’t just about communicating what you’re going through but also being honest about how you’re going through it.
Let’s examine what Paul says. First, he admits to weakness, saying, “We were so utterly burdened beyond our strength.” He doesn’t hide behind spiritual platitudes. He doesn’t act as if he’s something that he’s not. He has no fear of publicly communicating his frailty. But what he says next is key. It’s the thing that many sufferers seem afraid of doing, and because they are, they don’t receive the kind of comforting care that God has provided through his people. Paul confesses to the despair of heart he experienced as he was faced with his weakness and inability. These words, “We despaired of life itself. Indeed, we felt . . . the sentence of death,” capture the spiritual battle in Paul’s heart that was underneath the physical travail. Remember, this is the apostle Paul. No figure looms larger in the New Testament except Jesus, yet here he is, thinking, “This is it. I simply don’t have what it takes to make it through this mess.”
Like every sufferer, Paul’s suffering exposes the depth of his weakness and the reality of his dependency. The question is, what will we do when suffering confronts us with the fact that independent, self-sufficient strength is a lie? Will we hoard our discouragement? Will we hide our weakness? Will we act as if we’re okay when we’re not okay? Will shame keep us from confessing what we know is true? Will we allow discouragement of heart to morph into despondency and maybe even paralyzing depression? Or will we reach out for the help that God has lovingly provided?
There’s something else powerful about Paul’s humble confession of weakness and heart desperation that’s important to highlight. His despair isn’t a prison; it’s a doorway. Confessing that you don’t independently have what’s needed to walk through the travail on your plate is a gateway to receiving the care that only God can give you through the heart and hands of his people. Hopelessness is the doorway to hope. The confession of hopelessness frees you from attempting to do what you don’t have the power to do on your own. The admission of hopelessness frees you from acting as if you’re something that you’re not. The confession of hopelessness robs shame of its paralyzing power. The confession of hopelessness frees you from isolation. The admission of hopelessness positions your heart to receive the gracious comfort that the God of all comfort has promised every one of his children.
Paul next reflects on the purpose of God in exposing the depth of our weakness. In the last two weeks of unrelenting pain and inability to eat or sleep, I have once again been comforted with the fact that it doesn’t take much to shut me down and to make even the smallest of daily tasks virtually impossible. I’m faced with the fact that even on my strongest days, I am not independently strong. When I’m strong, it’s easy to forget that my strength depends on God’s constant provision and protection, without which I wouldn’t be strong. Consider again the words of Paul: “But that was to make us rely not on ourselves but on God who raises the dead. . . . You also must help us by prayer.” He’s saying that his travail, in the hands of the Savior, becomes an instrument of grace.
The picture here is that every child of God has a warehouse of comfort, rescue, strength, wisdom, direction, and protection. But because of the pride and self-sufficiency that sin produces in us, we don’t open the door of that warehouse; we live self-reliant lives, trusting that we can make it through on our own. So as an act of redeeming love, God leads us into situations that cause us to be confronted with our weakness so that we’ll open the door to the lavish resources of help that are in his warehouse of grace. This week I have reached out to Eric, Bill, Alan, Malcolm, Steve, Rechab, DC, Shelby, Ben, Matt, Jeff, and Cheryl. These people have made the invisible help of the heavenly Father visible. They really have been the look on God’s face, the sound of God’s voice, and the touch of God’s hand. They have spoken lovingly into the depths of my discouragement. They have lovingly confronted my fear. They have reminded me once again that I’m not alone. In ways that are hard to describe, they have given me strength to face the next day.
My physical situation hasn’t changed; the pain and weakness are still there and might be there for a long time. But because of their willingness to incarnate God’s grace, I have changed. I’m not giving in to weakness, wallowing in self-pity, and wasting my time worrying about the future over which I have no control. I’m right now doing what God has called me to do. I’m doing my best to put gospel words down on the page so that through my weakness and the comfort I’ve received from God’s people, others too will be helped.
I have to stop and talk about my dear wife, Luella. No one in my life has more powerfully incarnated God’s presence and provision. She always greets my fear, discouragement, questions, and complaints with amazingly patient grace, and she never fails to preach the gospel to me in my moments of amnesia and also to live the gospel before me. She stands as a rich blessing of mercy that I could never have earned or deserved. She’s never too busy; she’s never irritated when I’m weak; she never pushes me to get my act together; she’s always ready to complicate her life to give me the help I need. She’s made it easy for me to confess things that are hard to confess and to be willing to receive what can be hard to receive. She is God’s constant reminder that I have not been nor ever will be alone.
Second Corinthians 1, 1 Corinthians 12, and Colossians 3:12–17 tell us that God has never required any of his children to make it on their own. They remind us that we shouldn’t be ashamed of our frailty. They assure us that God isn’t disgusted by our lack of independent strength. Rather, they preach the gospel of God’s sympathetic understanding, his faithful care, and his provision of the help we need in the presence and help of his people. There’s comfort in the people of God. It won’t be perfect. Nothing is perfect this side of eternity. But the messy resources of help from the people of God are a glorious comfort and provision to all God’s suffering children.
There is one more thing that my friend TobyMac so wonderfully captured with these words: “What does it look like to admit your need and open the door to God’s warehouse of provision?” Consider these steps.
1. Don’t Suffer in Heroic Isolation
There’s nothing noble about bearing down and suffering alone. In fact, it’s a recipe for disaster. Everyone has been designed by God for community. Healthy, godly living is deeply relational. Worshipfully submissive community with God and humble dependency on God’s people are vital to living well in the middle of the unplanned, the unwanted, and the unexpected. The brothers and sisters around you have been placed in your life as instruments of grace, and as I’ve said before, they won’t be perfect instruments, they won’t always say and do the right things, but in the messiness of these relationships God delivers to us what only he can give.
In my own suffering I’ve had to fight with the temptation of self-imposed isolation. There are times when I don’t want to rehearse again what I’m going through. There are times when it seems too much to be around people. There are times when I’ve been hurt by the response of another and don’t want to deal with that hurt again. At the same time, I’m convinced that it’s important that I fight the isolation temptation. I know I need the presence and voices of others in my life who can say and do things for me that I could never do for myself, and I know that the relationship I have with these people is God’s gift of comfort, rescue, protection, and wisdom. Are you suffering in isolation?
2. Determine to Be Honest
The first step in seeking and celebrating the gift of the comfort of God’s people and experiencing how they can make the invisible grace of God visible in your life is to honestly communicate how you’re handling what you’re going through. Notice that I was careful in characterizing what you should communicate. Honest communication is not detailing the hardship you’re going through and letting all the people around you know how tough you have it. Complaining tends to drive people away and to attract you to other complainers, which is far from healthy and helpful. Rather, every sufferer needs to be humbly honest about the spiritual battle underneath the physical travail so that brothers and sisters around you can fight that spiritual battle with you. If you’re beaten down with an endless catalog of “what ifs,” talk about it. If you’re struggling with doubt about God, talk about it. If you’re defeated by envying the lives of people who seem to have it better than you, talk about it. If you’re discouraged by how long you’ve suffered, talk about it. If you feel that no one hears your prayers, talk about it. If you think that no one really understands your suffering, talk about it.
I’m not counseling you to buttonhole everyone you meet, but take advantage of the people in your life whom you are sure know and love you and know and love God. They are tools of right-here, right-now grace. Invite them to be warriors with you in the spiritual battle. And don’t worry about what people think of you. Remember, you don’t get your identity, peace, security, and rest of heart from them but from your Lord. No one in your life is capable of being your messiah; people are tools in the hands of your Messiah, Jesus. It would be impossible to fully communicate the depth of the comfort, strength, and counsel I have gotten at crucial moments of spiritual battle from the dear ones God has placed in my life. Are you humbly and honestly communicating to others about how you’re handling your hardship?
3. Let People Interrupt Your Private Conversation
There’s someone you talk to all the time about everything in your life. The opinions, interpretations, responses, beliefs, biases, perspectives, and viewpoints of this person are incredibly important and influential. You can’t escape these conversations, and you can’t avoid their influence. Most of the time, you’re unaware that you’re talking to this person, and most of the time you fail to realize how these conversations influence the way you think about yourself, God, others, and life. You’ve probably already guessed what I’m about to say—that person is you.
You have incredible influence over you, because no one talks to you more than you do. The problem is that there are times when it’s very hard to say to ourselves what we need to hear. The travail of suffering is clearly one of those times. It’s hard then to give yourself the hope, comfort, confrontation, direction, wisdom, and God-awareness that every sufferer desperately needs. So you need voices in your life besides your own. You need to invite wise and loving people to eavesdrop and interrupt your private conversation, providing in their words things you wouldn’t be able to say to yourself. And don’t take offense when they fail to agree with your assessments; you need these alternative voices. They’re not in your life to hurt your feelings but to give you what you won’t be able to give yourself, and that in itself is a sweet grace from the hand of God. Who have you invited to interrupt your private conversations?
4. Admit Your Weakness
Doing well in the middle of hardship is not about acting as if you’re strong. God’s reputation isn’t honored by our publicly faking what isn’t privately true. The grave danger to sufferers is not admission of weakness but delusions of strength. You see, if you tell yourself and others that you are strong, then you won’t seek and they won’t offer the enabling and strengthening grace that every sufferer needs. And remember, the most important form of weakness that we all face isn’t the physical weakness that accompanies so much of our suffering but the weakness of heart in the midst of it.
I’d like to be able to say that the weakness I’ve had to deal with in my suffering has been only physical, but that’s just not true. God has used my travail to expose weaknesses of heart that I had no idea were there. He hasn’t done that to shame me but to create in me a desire for his transforming grace. I’ve learned that nothing good ever happens when I deny weakness, and that all kinds of good happens when I confess it.
Determine to be honest about your weakness, and in so doing, invite others to be God’s tools of his empowering and transforming grace. When you suffer, you view weakness either as an enemy or as an opportunity to experience the new potential that is yours as God’s child. Is your habit to admit or deny weakness?
5. Confess Your Blindness
This side of eternity, since sin still lives inside us and blinds us, there are pockets of spiritual blindness in all of us. We all like to think that our view of ourselves is accurate, but in light of what the Bible says about the power of sin to deceive, we have to give up on the thought that no one knows us better than we know ourselves. As you walk through your travail, there may be inaccuracies of belief, subtle but wrong desires, wrong attitudes, susceptibilities to temptation, wrong views of others, struggles with God, and evidences of hopelessness that you don’t see. So in love, God has placed his children in your life to function as instruments of seeing. They offer to you insight that you wouldn’t have by yourself. Because they can see what you don’t, they can speak into issues in your life, and by so doing be not only instruments of seeing but also God’s agents of rescue and transformation.
Your need for these instruments of seeing shouldn’t make you ashamed, as if there’s something wrong with you. We all need these people, and we’ll continue to need them until sin is no more and its power to deceive has been finally defeated. As you suffer, either you will be defensive when someone points out something you don’t see, or you’ll be thankful that God has placed people in your life, and you’ll welcome them.
It’s humbling but true of every sufferer that accuracy of personal insight is the result of community, because sin makes personal insight difficult. Since we all have areas where we fail to see what we need to see, we need to welcome those whom God has sent into our lives to correct and focus our vision. How open are you when those near you help you see things in yourself that you don’t see?
6. Seek Wise Counsel
It’s dangerous to make important life decisions in the midst of the tumultuous emotions and despondency of suffering. Often in the middle of hardship, it’s hard to see clearly, to think accurately, and to desire what’s best. The shock, grief, and dismay of suffering tend to rattle the heart and confuse the mind. If you’re in the midst of wavering emotions and finding it difficult to have clarity of thought, it’s dangerous to make in isolation the many decisions you’ll have to make.
When you are suffering, you need to humbly invite wise and godly counselors into your life. I’m not talking here about professional help, although that’s good if necessary. I’m talking about identifying the wise and godly people already in your life who know you and your situation well, who can provide the clarity of advice, guidance, and direction that is very hard to provide for yourself. Don’t be threatened by this; it’s something we all need, and wise sufferers welcome it and enjoy the harvest of good fruit that results. Have you invited wise and godly counselors into your life to help you decide what would be hard to decide on your own?
7. Remember That Your Suffering Doesn’t Belong to You
Take time again to read 2 Corinthians 1:3–9. The message of this passage is clear: our sufferings belong to the Lord. He will take hard and difficult things in your life and use them to produce good things in the lives of others. This is one of the unexpected miracles of his grace. When it seems that my life is anything but good, God picks it up and produces what’s very good in the life of another. Every sufferer needs to know that the comfort of community is a two-way street. Not only do you need the comfort of God’s people, but your suffering positions you to be a uniquely sympathetic and insightful tool of the same in the lives of others.
Because of what you’ve gone through, you know what’s helpful and what’s not. You know when to speak and when to listen. You know where comfort is needed and when it’s time to confront. You know how to lovingly break through anger and defensiveness. You know what it’s like to feel hopeless. Your suffering has given you a toolbox of gospel skills that make you ready and equipped to answer God’s call to be an agent of his comfort in the lives of fellow sufferers. God calls you not to hoard your suffering but to offer it up to him to be used as needed in the lives of others. And there’s blessing in taking your eyes off yourself and placing them on others, because it really is more blessed to give than to receive. Have you hoarded your suffering, or seen it as a means for bringing to others the good things that you have received?
Yes, it’s true that the God of all comfort sends his ambassadors of comfort into your life. They’re sent to make God’s invisible presence, protection, strength, wisdom, love, and grace visible. So welcome his ambassadors. Be open to their insight and counsel. Confess your needs so that God’s helpers can minister to those needs. Live like you really do believe that your walk through hardship is a community project, and be ready for the good things God will do.
Review and Reflect
1. What temptations do you tend to face during your times of suffering?
2. In what ways do you communicate about your suffering? After reading this chapter, what new ways would you like to use?
3. Paul Tripp writes, “God makes his invisible grace visible by sending people of grace to give grace to people who need grace”. Who has God sent into your life for this very purpose? Take time to praise him for these people.
4. How is despair a doorway rather than a prison?
5. Paul lists several ways to open ourselves more to God during our suffering. In which of these do you need to be more willing? Prayerfully ask God to show you.
Heart Reset
1 Corinthians 1:18–31
2 Corinthians 1:8–11
Colossians 3:12–17