Tuesday, March 14, 2006
Though he slay me I will trust in him
What is it about suffering that seems to have such opposite effects on different members of the human race? Some people, when they receive the diagnosis that they have cancer, fall into deep depression and blame the world for being unfair? Others decide to make the most of the time they have left, and enjoy every moment of it. Similarly 9/11 provoked a lot of anger and despair in some quarters since it seemed so unfair, so unnecessary, so inhuman. On the other hand many affected by the tsunami a year ago have gone on living and rebuilding their homes and villages, taking this big catastrophe in stride. Are some people more resilient than others when tragedy strikes? Or does suffering only bring to the fore what is hidden in our hearts all along, namely our notions of justice and fairness and what we expect from life?
The classic reading about this matter is of course the book of Job, since it raises the age old question why suffering exists, and how you respond to it. Job of all people seemed a very decent person and so, according to the popular notion that you get what you deserve, really did not deserve much hardship at all. Yet the story describes how one tragedy after another seems to visit his estate, his family and eventually his own body. Naturally his wife suggests it was time to curse God, for if he existed he clearly had lost the plot, or maybe was more than a touch unfair. The discussion goes on, until Job utters the famous words “Even though he slay me, I will trust in him” (chapter 13, verse 15). What does he mean by that, and how can a person who has undergone so much suffering say something so preposterous?
It has often been said that Christianity is a crutch, by which weak people or those in distress find solace in the myth of a loving God. According to this view God and his inscrutable ways are always invoked when there seems to be no rational explanation for events or facts of human life. But the problem with this view is that it clearly comes from people who have never suffered, for during a catastrophe a theoretical explanation about a loving God is no crutch at all, in fact it is a monstrous notion. If God is love, how can he allow suffering like the death of a loved one? What Job expresses, on the other hand, is something very different: he has somehow seen beyond the apparent absurdity and injustice of suffering and grasped that God exists and is still trustworthy in spite of it all. That is not a crutch, but “hope beyond hope”. Here we do not deal with theoretical notions, but with existential realities.
So what is it that Job has seen which can cause him to not curse God, but rather to express his unwavering trust in him? Three aspects are worth mentioning, as they form the basic pillars of the Christian understanding of suffering. First of all he seems to have understood that life is more than what we see. If we only look at the forty, fifty or sixty years allotted to man and assess them according to how much suffering they contained, we are missing an essential part: human life cannot not just be evaluated by its earthly part, but needs to be seen as continuing into eternity; and what happens in that second part is even more important than what occurred here on earth. To use the words of Paul of Tarsus in his first letter to the Corinthians: “if in this life only we have hoped in Christ, we are of all men most to be pitied”. In other words life and suffering do not make sense unless we take into consideration that we are made for eternity, and whatever loss we encounter now is small compared to what we are promised in the afterlife.
Related to this truth is the second aspect, namely that suffering does change us, and even though painful it is not necessarily bad. Viktor Frankl, the Austrian psychiatrist who survived the horrors of the concentration camps, discovered that suffering and difficulties challenge us to decide how we are going to respond. Far from condoning pain or wishing it upon anybody, he saw the same truth that Job had discovered thousands of years earlier: in suffering man is tested and refined, and as he responds rightly to it he grows into a free human being and discovers meaning in life.
Thirdly Christians believe that in Jesus Christ God himself came and shared the human condition, including pain and suffering. By so doing he turned suffering into something we no longer need to run away from, but something we can embrace because we know that we can find God in it. This is not Christian masochism, but the mystery of the Incarnation. Therefore every believer can repeat Job’s words: “Though he slay me, I will trust in him”, because in the most severe pain he can discover the presence and love of God. Those who do are truly free, for suffering and death can no longer scare them. This is why Christian men and women have endured pain, shame and even death in the service of God and of their fellow men. They have understood the paradox that giving is more blessed than receiving, that suffering can bring blessing, and that death of self leads to eternal life.
The classic reading about this matter is of course the book of Job, since it raises the age old question why suffering exists, and how you respond to it. Job of all people seemed a very decent person and so, according to the popular notion that you get what you deserve, really did not deserve much hardship at all. Yet the story describes how one tragedy after another seems to visit his estate, his family and eventually his own body. Naturally his wife suggests it was time to curse God, for if he existed he clearly had lost the plot, or maybe was more than a touch unfair. The discussion goes on, until Job utters the famous words “Even though he slay me, I will trust in him” (chapter 13, verse 15). What does he mean by that, and how can a person who has undergone so much suffering say something so preposterous?
It has often been said that Christianity is a crutch, by which weak people or those in distress find solace in the myth of a loving God. According to this view God and his inscrutable ways are always invoked when there seems to be no rational explanation for events or facts of human life. But the problem with this view is that it clearly comes from people who have never suffered, for during a catastrophe a theoretical explanation about a loving God is no crutch at all, in fact it is a monstrous notion. If God is love, how can he allow suffering like the death of a loved one? What Job expresses, on the other hand, is something very different: he has somehow seen beyond the apparent absurdity and injustice of suffering and grasped that God exists and is still trustworthy in spite of it all. That is not a crutch, but “hope beyond hope”. Here we do not deal with theoretical notions, but with existential realities.
So what is it that Job has seen which can cause him to not curse God, but rather to express his unwavering trust in him? Three aspects are worth mentioning, as they form the basic pillars of the Christian understanding of suffering. First of all he seems to have understood that life is more than what we see. If we only look at the forty, fifty or sixty years allotted to man and assess them according to how much suffering they contained, we are missing an essential part: human life cannot not just be evaluated by its earthly part, but needs to be seen as continuing into eternity; and what happens in that second part is even more important than what occurred here on earth. To use the words of Paul of Tarsus in his first letter to the Corinthians: “if in this life only we have hoped in Christ, we are of all men most to be pitied”. In other words life and suffering do not make sense unless we take into consideration that we are made for eternity, and whatever loss we encounter now is small compared to what we are promised in the afterlife.
Related to this truth is the second aspect, namely that suffering does change us, and even though painful it is not necessarily bad. Viktor Frankl, the Austrian psychiatrist who survived the horrors of the concentration camps, discovered that suffering and difficulties challenge us to decide how we are going to respond. Far from condoning pain or wishing it upon anybody, he saw the same truth that Job had discovered thousands of years earlier: in suffering man is tested and refined, and as he responds rightly to it he grows into a free human being and discovers meaning in life.
Thirdly Christians believe that in Jesus Christ God himself came and shared the human condition, including pain and suffering. By so doing he turned suffering into something we no longer need to run away from, but something we can embrace because we know that we can find God in it. This is not Christian masochism, but the mystery of the Incarnation. Therefore every believer can repeat Job’s words: “Though he slay me, I will trust in him”, because in the most severe pain he can discover the presence and love of God. Those who do are truly free, for suffering and death can no longer scare them. This is why Christian men and women have endured pain, shame and even death in the service of God and of their fellow men. They have understood the paradox that giving is more blessed than receiving, that suffering can bring blessing, and that death of self leads to eternal life.
# posted by tino @ Tuesday, March 14, 2006 
