Trusting God in the Midst of Suffering: How You Can Help

 

Is it nothing to you, all you who pass by on the road? Look and see? Is there any pain like mine? The LORD has afflicted me, he has inflicted it on me when he burned with anger. Lamentations 1:12

 Oftentimes, when someone faces a season of challenge and tribulation, they are asked by others if there is some sin in their life for which they might be being punished. I think there are two reasons for this. First, the one asking would like to see that there is something different between them and the person experiencing trial, something that keeps them safe and prevents trouble from coming their way. This gives them the comfort that as long as they are obeying God, they won’t have to deal with whatever they see their neighbor going through. Second, they may genuinely want to help and think that by removing sin from your life through confession you may be restored from your problems. It’s a classic example of “Us and Them,” of trying to separate yourself from trouble by seeing yourself as different. While I do believe that we are called as a family of believers to support each other by addressing sin we see, blaming someone's suffering on some unknown "possible sin" is not supportive.

 I think that God wants us to approach this experience differently. Instead of trying to find something to separate us and keep us safe from our neighbor’s troubles, God calls us to come alongside them and share in their grief. Not correct it, not fix it, not judge them or blame them, but sit with them in it. This is demonstrated in several places in the Bible:

       ·       In Job 2:13, three of Job’s friends come and sit with him in silence for seven days and seven nights. Now, it kind of went downhill from there as far as their support went, but when their friend had experienced deep, horrible loss, they just came and sat with him.

       ·       In the book of Ruth, when Naomi lost her husband and both of her sons, her daughter-in-law, Ruth, rather than leaving her and finding her own happiness, said, “Where you go, I will go, and where you stay, I will stay” (Ruth 1:16).

       ·       Ecclesiastes 4:9–10 teaches us that we are designed for each other, to hold each other up and help with the other falls.

       ·       And finally, Galatians 6:2 tells us, “Carry each other’s burdens, and in this way you will fulfill the law of Christ.”

 It is said, and I have shared before, that, “Misery loves company.” Sometimes, when we are suffering, we just need someone to acknowledge it. We need to feel seen. We need someone to come alongside us and say, “Wow! That sucks!” In our verse today, it seems like the author is seeking this. He writes, “Is it nothing to you, all you who pass by on the road? Look and see? Is there any pain like mine?” He wants someone to acknowledge all that he is going through. He doesn’t want to experience it alone.

 Have you ever felt that way? I sure have! As humans, our default is to try to “fix things” or find some way to blame the person experiencing trouble so that we feel safe from it. We want to distance and separate ourselves from trouble, but that doesn’t make it any less real, and it certainly doesn’t help the person going through it.

 I’m going to be really candid here. I think that people praying for my healing is very much like this. They see what I’m experiencing, and it scares them. They think, “What if that happened to me? I could never handle that!” They want to think that God will “fix” me, and then they don’t have to be afraid of what I’m going through because if God fixed me, He will fix them too. In the many years that I have faced serious health concerns; I have never heard from God that He intends to heal me physically in this world. In fact, I believe I have heard the opposite, that this illness is for His glory and much good will be brought from it. That doesn’t mean that I do not desperately need your prayers! Every day, every hour is a challenge, and I need God’s help to get through them. I long for His comfort and for relief from my symptoms. He carries me carefully, gently, constantly and without His help I would never make it. I need those prayers, prayers that God will take care of me and use my situations for His glory, not prayers that I would magically be “fixed.”

Here’s the Thing: Illness, especially chronic illness, can be a very lonely road. This is made all the more lonely when people only pop in to try to fix you and make themselves feel better. If you really want to come alongside someone biblically, don’t try to make them better, help them feel seen. Acknowledge their pain and struggle. Pray for God’s comfort and peace for them. Pray that God would be glorified through their situation and that all their troubles would be worth it in the end.