Tension

If you've read my last 2 posts on suffering, you've probably figured out that I tend to chew on ideas for long periods of time and don't come to conclusions quickly. Sometimes it's a gift, like a greenhouse for wisdom and revelation. And other times it feels like my entire life is lived inside my head and I am deceiving myself by storing up a wealth of good intentions, but little more. For example, in learning about suffering and sacrifice, it's frustrating for me to have my eyes open to the beauty of the Kingdom, but then to be in a place where my life feels as if I am not living it. I'm sure reading all that Kierkegaard didn't help either (does my theology even exist or matter if I'm not living it?).

But even though it often feels as if my meditations are sectioned off like a TV dinner from the nitty-gritty nine-to-five, there are also times (like tonight) where I see that my thought life really does matter. Tonight in the prayer room much of the focus was on praying for a particular IHOPer who is scheduled for surgery tomorrow morning. Prayers for physical healing and restoration rose up all over the room. It was a truly beautiful thing... and most of the time I was wrestling with a tightness in my heart.

It seems with all my meditation on bearing up under suffering, sacrifice, accepting pain, etc., I've really gotten cloudy as far as my prayer life is concerned. What have I come to believe about God's intentions, anyway? When a brother or sister is suffering, I am no longer one hundred percent comfortable praying for their well-being. This bothers me.

I know that God desires to heal. Look at Jesus. Manifest compassion and release of the prisoners is everywhere. But my heart is also so ready to drink the cup of suffering, because I can now see the beautifying process it brings - like when, under pressure, an irritating dust particle becomes a pearl, or sand becomes a diamond. I know in my head that both approaches are good, biblical, and beneficial.

The main tension comes, like I said, when it gets past the meditating and down to the practical. When I'm supposed to pray for the sick or feed the poor, all of the sudden it feels as if God's intentions are foggy. Does he desire healing, wealth, and prosperity every time? No. Does he have a cold, stoic heart that makes us go through hell just to learn a lesson and build some character? Again, no.

I found out tonight that I don't really know how to handle suffering in others anymore - whether to rebuke it as a theif or to welcome it as a teacher. It's a disconcerting thing, and it has me bothered.