Finding Wholeness in a Broken World Embracing Sorrow Psalm 137, Luke 19:41-44

Transcription

1 Finding Wholeness in a Broken World Embracing Sorrow Psalm 137, Luke 19:41-44 Today s message is the next to last in a series called Finding Wholeness in a Broken World. Our focus today is on the way we deal with the losses that inevitably come our way in life, and with our capacity to let sorrow and grief transform us in positive ways. In his book, A Grace Disguised: How the Soul Grows through Loss, Gerald Sittser tells the story of how his mother, wife and four year old daughter were all killed in an auto accident caused by a drunk driver. He writes, In one moment, my family as I had known and cherished it was obliterated. The depth of pain and the magnitude of the loss he suffered are beyond adequate description. But Gerald didn t allow this horrific experience to destroy him. He says, Catastrophic loss by definition precludes recovery. It will transform us or destroy us, but it will never leave us the same. What he found was that he had a choice about how he reacted to the pain. He could allow it to grind his soul down until there was nothing left; or he could embrace the pain and sorrow, and allow it a permanent part in his life, enlarging his understanding of other people s pain, and making him a more complex, compassionate and spiritually mature person. He likens the soul to a balloon, which can be stretched and become larger up to a point - without breaking. He says that our pain can stretch us and enlarge our souls, so that the size of your soul can actually increase through the experience of grief and sorrow. This may be difficult to hear if you are currently struggling with sorrow and loss in your own life. How could such pain do anything but damage you? But Gerald Sittser s experience isn t his alone. The Bible also recognizes the significance of suffering, and is filled with the stories of people struggling through the pain of loss. What the scriptures show us is that, while our losses always bring sorrow, we can also grow through our grief. 1

2 The question is, How do you let grief and sorrow stretch your soul in a growth producing way? The scriptures suggest three important elements to a healthy response to loss. The first may sound obvious, but it is actually one of the hardest things to do in our society. Allow yourself to feel your pain. Today s reading from Psalm 137 is an excellent example of how the Bible deals with suffering. It is a psalm of lament. The residents of Jerusalem have been conquered by Babylon, and been deported to that city. They had lost everything they held dear, even while neighboring nations jeared at them in contempt. The Jews had lost their city, their temple, their homes, and many of their family members. How did they respond to this loss? They sat down and wept. They remembered all they had lost and grieved over their destroyed city. They openly expressed their bitterness over what had happened, and yearned for vengeance on their oppressors. Happy shall they be who take your little ones and dash them against the rock! they say. This isn t an expression of proper theology, but rather an unfiltered expression of their pain. There are many other occasions in the Bible where people openly express their pain and process their grief. The Psalms are filled with such occasions, and the books of Job, Jeremiah and Lamentations have their fair share of grieving too. Even Jesus openly expressed his grief when his friend Lazarus died, and, in today s story, when he foresaw the violence his people were to suffer because of their refusal to accept his way of peace. Grief is an important part of biblical faith, and a healthy response to our losses requires us to let ourselves feel and express our pain. Of course, we all have pain, but we don t always feel free to experience and express it. It seems to me that we are much better at denying our pain. We try to be strong, and put a positive face on things. It isn t seen as dignified or acceptable to really grieve. Instead we are encouraged to get over it, move on with our lives, and not be morbid. When you get divorced, you are told not to worry, because there are plenty of fish in the sea. When you suffer a miscarriage, people try to comfort you saying you can have another baby. When a loved one dies, people 2

3 minimize your loss by telling you not to feel badly because your loved one is in heaven. There may be some truth in each of these responses, but none of them recognize or respect the depth of our pain. So rather than really express our sorrow, we deny it; or we medicate ourselves so we don t feel it; or we keep ourselves busy so there is no time for it. But the pain doesn t go away, it just goes into hiding, and pops up when we aren t expecting it typically in destructive ways. But the model Jesus and the Biblical authors give us is one of healthy grieving. The Bible shows us the importance of letting loss stop us in our tracks, and of being real about what we are feeling even if it isn t pretty, and if it causes us to say things we wouldn t ordinarily say. Grief is messy, and the Bible doesn t try to clean it up. Rather, it encourages us to own our feelings and express them so that we can ultimately grow through them. A second lesson from the Scriptures is that we need to learn to live faithfully during times of transition. When we suffer a loss, whether it be small or catastrophic, there is always an in-between time: Time between the way things used to be and the way they will become. Typically, the in-between time is filled uncertainty, chaos, disorientation and anxiety. This is what the exiled residents of Jerusalem experienced in Babylon. Their old way of life was shattered, and there was no going back at least for that generation. Something new had to take shape, but it was by no means certain what that something new would be. Ultimately, the time of exile was a very fertile time in the development of our faith major portions of the Bible were written or edited during that time, and the Jews learned that they could indeed sing God s song in a foreign land; and that God wasn t limited to Jerusalem or the Holy Land. But all this came slowly and with great difficulty. Another example of an in-between time is that experienced by the disciples between Jesus crucifixion and resurrection. The disciples were lost and scattered for a time, as their Lord had left them and they didn t know what would happen next. In-between times, times of transition, are never easy because they are so filled with uncertainty and anxiety. The challenge is learning to remain faithful to our calling in the midst of those feelings. 3

4 We all go through times of transition. Every change brings a loss, even positive changes. When you graduate from school and enter the workforce, when you get married, when you have children, when your children move out, when you retire, when someone dies, when you move all these things involve an ending to one way of life, and the beginning of a new phase of life. The transition is never easy, and the path is never clear. You go through an in-between time. But even in that time of transition, we need to be attentive to what God is doing, and focus on our relationship with God. The Jews didn t give up on God just because they were in exile even as they wrestled with how to remain faithful in that new circumstance. The disciples didn t give up on God while Jesus was in the tomb even though they surely were filled with questions and doubts. Likewise, we need to hang in there during our inbetween times, recognizing that God is at work even when we can t imagine how. The in-between time is a time for faithful waiting, and that waiting stretches us and creates within us the spiritual quality of endurance. Finally, the scriptures teach us to trust God to create new life. This is the fundamental lesson the Bible teaches us. God creates life. God creates new life, even when all seems lost. The exiled Jews returned to the promised land and rebuilt Jerusalem. Jesus didn t remain in the grave, but rose to eternal life. We ourselves, even though we die, yet shall we live because of Jesus Christ. It is this hope, this faith, that can ultimately help us to grow through our sorrow and grief, and empower us to make it through the in-between times when the future seems so uncertain. Trusting God to create new life doesn t minimize the pain of our losses. But it can transform the pain. Pain without hope leads to utter despair. But pain, even the greatest pain, endured with hope, is something you can survive. Even if it feels like you are dying inside, when you trust God to bring new life out of your pain, you can find the strength to go on. And when God eventually does bring this new life, your faith, which has already grown through being stretched, grows even more as it is confirmed. 4

5 One of the most difficult experiences in my life was the loss I experienced when I left my church in Indiana to work on a new church development project in upstate New York. Even though I felt strongly led by God to take that path, it was really painful! The losses were many, and touched every area of my life. I still feel that pain. Worse yet, my experience in New York turned out to be one of those inbetween experiences where I had no idea what God was doing. I spent nearly two years in limbo, grieving my losses and suffering serious disorientation as to God s will for my life. But then, God called me out of the wilderness, and brought me here. There are no words to describe how grateful I am for what God has done in my life. But as much pain as I went through during the last few years, I can t say that I d change it. (Well, I wish I didn t have to give up my kitchen in Indiana and my cat Newt, who I had to leave in New York.) I am certain that the pain I ve experienced has changed me for the better by stretching me, making room in me for the suffering of others, and by reinforcing my faith. At the beginning of this sermon I mentioned that our souls can actually grow by embracing sorrow; that they can stretch and expand like an inflating balloon. Although I wouldn t have come up with that metaphor on my own, it seems right. When we embrace sorrow and live through it, when we pass through the painful in-between times, and wait on God to create new life, our souls do expand. They expand because our sorrow makes room in us for a broader range of experiences; it creates a depth we wouldn t otherwise have; and most importantly, it give us the ability to empathize with the suffering of others. There are many losses we will experience in life, but each death or loss has with it the potential to create something new. Specifically, God can use our sorrow to bring about the birth of compassion within us. You can t comfort someone who is suffering if you have never suffered yourself. Jesus says blessed are those who mourn, for they shall be comforted. When you suffer through grief, you become open to God s comfort. In turn, the apostle Paul says we comfort others with the comfort we ourselves have received from God. When we embrace the sorrow that comes our way, we can indeed be blessed, as God uses that experience to create in us a wellspring of compassion, that is in turn a blessing to others. 5