Pain, Disappointment, and Faith

Where do pain, disappointment, and faith intersect? This is a lesson that God began to teach me a few years ago (and it’s not finished yet).

God created humans in His beautiful image. He composed us of three parts: body, soul, and spirit. I want to focus on the importance of the soul. My definition of the soul is our mind, will, and emotions.

I’m convinced that many people are taught to disregard their soul, namely their emotions. This is foolish, because it is undermining an important part of how God created us as men and women.

I’m going to walk you through part of my story–an area of my life where pain of a circumstance collided with a promise that God gave me. But first, I want to look at the character of Jesus from the story of Lazarus.

Now when Mary came to where Jesus was and saw Him, she fell at His feet, saying to Him, “Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died.” When Jesus saw her weeping, and the Jews who had come with her also weeping, He was deeply moved in His spirit and greatly troubled. And He said, “Where have you laid Him?” They said to Him, “Lord, come and see.” Jesus wept.  So the Jews said, “See how He loved Him!”  (John 11:32-36)

Jesus embraced emotion. Melissa Helser states this beautifully, “Jesus felt emotion, but didn’t let it separate Himself from the Father.” Jesus, full of faith and aware of the outcome that Lazarus would be raised from the dead that same hour, was troubled in His soul and He wept.

Expressing grief does not equate to a lack of faith.

Being sad doesn’t negate that God is good.

Jesus perfectly expressed emotion, both occurring within Himself, and in sympathizing with others. Imagine how the story would go if Jesus was an emotion avoider…

“Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died.” When Jesus saw her weeping, and the Jews who had come with her also weeping, He repeated “stop it” in His mind to keep from crying and pretended to be unaffected by the situation. He stated, “it’s going to be OK, it’ll turn out in the end.” He then proceeded to change the subject to a happier one.

I’m glad that’s not how the story goes. Unfortunately, many people are afraid of situations like this and choose avoid the mess of emotions. But part of loving others is allowing them a safe place in our relationships to process emotion. True courage is facing pain.

This Bible passage was crucial for me in my own process of grieving. Six years ago, God spoke to me the clearest I had ever heard Him speak in my life. He told me that it was His desire to heal someone I loved deeply. I was amazed that God cared about all the details of my life. It was past my wildest dreams that He would restore this person to full health. I began weeping, and then the Holy Spirit poured a prayer of hope out of my mouth–proclaiming all of the incredible things that God had planned for this individual’s life. Things that were so far past what I could ask or imagine. I do not doubt what God spoke. It is still so clear.

As I was interacting with this individual a while back in their suffering state, I was troubled. It hurt me to see them this way. At first, I would not allow myself to feel upset because of the false presumption that expressing sorrow lessens my trust in God. Then, I stumbled upon the story of Lazarus and the Holy Spirit gave me permission to grieve. Yes, God is good. Yes, He will be glorified. But in this life we will experience pain, and God cares about how it impacts our souls. He is with us in the process.

You keep track of all my sorrows.
You have collected all my tears in your bottle.
You have recorded each one in your book.

(Psalm 56:8)

 

My sacrifice, O God, is a broken spirit; a broken and contrite heart you, God, will not despise.

(Psalm 51:17)