Signs of Spiritual Maturity Part 4: Responding to Suffering

Written By Duke Dillard

"Lord, hear my prayer;

let my cry for help come before you.

Do not hide your face from me in my day of trouble.

Listen closely to me;

answer me quickly when I call.

For my days vanish like smoke,

and my bones burn like a furnace.

My heart is suffering, withered like grass;

I even forget to eat my food.

Because of the sound of my groaning,

my flesh sticks to my bones."

-- Psalm 102:1-5

Suffering & Maturity

This week we continue our Maturity Series with Father Ron Rolheiser's fourth sign of maturity or Christlikeness:

"Let suffering soften your heart rather than harden your soul."

MATURITY

As we head into week 4, I want to give a little more background on the topic of maturity. Maturity is not the goal but a fruit of walking with Jesus and His people. I have been careful to emphasize this because maturity can quickly become an idol and/or a weapon by which to judge people. The point of this list of signs for an individual is to self-assess, not to decide how others fit. For leaders in a church or ministry, this list can be a helpful way to observe and adapt what you are doing. The New Testament speaks often of maturity making it clear that if life with Christ in community is not producing mature disciples, then something is wrong. The following verses each speak of an aspect of maturity, and I encourage you to read and study them:

  • Matthew 5:48

  • Luke 8:14-15

  • Romans 5:1-5

  • 1 Corinthians 2:6

  • 1 Corinthians 14:20

  • Ephesians 4:11-15

  • Philippians 3:12-15

  • Colossians 1:24-29

  • Hebrews 5:12-14

  • Hebrews 6:1-3

  • James 1:4

I'm not going to turn this post into a Bible study on those verses because, as I said last week, the main idea of this series is to speak of maturity in a Biblical sense using non-Biblical language. My hope is that this series in combination with your own Bible study and the work of the Spirit will encourage each of us to see Jesus more clearly and desire intimacy with him more for that is how we will become mature.

SUFFERING

One characteristic of mature people we see repeatedly in scripture is they have suffered (Romans 5, Colossians 1, and James 1 emphasize this idea). At the same time, suffering doesn't necessarily produce maturity. Suffering is part of the human condition, and it always impacts us. Rolheiser says that suffering makes us deep. The issue is that it makes us deep in different things. Some people suffer and become deep in anger and bitterness and self-pity. Others suffer and become deep in love and compassion and empathy. Recognizing this brings us to sign number four listed above and repeated here:

"Let suffering soften your heart rather than harden your soul."

KEEP IT REAL

It is easy to write the sentence above and while I am sitting here in the upstairs dining area of Whole Foods feeling encouraged and blessed, I have no trouble thinking good thoughts and giving a hearty amen with confidence that I will let suffering soften my heart and not harden my soul. Can't you feel the momentum? Bring it on! Let's do this thing!

Then suffering comes and everything falls apart. Pick your poison...a child dies or divorce and shame and isolation and loneliness or rejection and betrayal by a close friend or cancer or a car accident which leaves me in chronic pain or the death of a long hoped for dream or a false accusation and loss of a job or prison or being abused or raped or maybe we can choose smaller more mundane issues like ongoing financial debt or catching the flu or pneumonia or a child chronically disobeying or any number of issues that can arise each day. It is impossible to avoid suffering at some level. Thus, we must deal with the impact.

Here's a danger, we know how we are supposed to respond so we pretend. This may be the worst if not the unhealthiest thing we can do. Instead, we need to be where we are. We need to acknowledge what we are feeling, thinking, and experiencing. This is confession, i.e. truth telling. Whether I'm scared or ashamed or angry or numb or whatever I'm feeling, the best way forward is to recognize it, acknowledge and let God and loved ones hold me in it. This is a sign of health and maturity.

But what if I am not able to do that. My response is to shut down emotionally, put on a strong face, and plow through it. I'm fine! Or maybe I go into a shell and avoid people and make depression my best friend. Or maybe I turn to alcohol or drugs or opioids or sex or food or entertainment or risky ventures or fill-in-the-blank with your drug of choice to cope. We do this because we don't know another way to survive, and we believe the lies we have either heard or have told ourselves.

Regardless, Jesus is with us. Nothing can separate us from His love. He will never leave us, and regardless of what Jonah thought, we can't leave Him. Let this encourage you to push in and do the necessary inner work to bring about the healing you need. Repent where needed and believe the good news of Jesus. These are the steps that move us forward and grow us over many years to be softened and resilient instead of hardened.

HOLDING TENSIONS

The Biblical call to rejoice in suffering (James 1) and the example of Paul and Silas singing hymns in the Philippian jail (Acts 16) are wonderful encouragements, but we become the kinds of people who do that through a process which can include failure but doesn't happen by pretending. Of course, sometimes we act first in faith and our heart follows, but we know pretty quickly if that is what is happening. The joy of the Lord is our strength (Nehemiah 8) which means that we can step out in faith trusting that God will carry us. Living in this tension between being authentic and not pretending but also being willing to step out in faith trusting God will carry our hearts is part of the mystery and the call towards maturity.

PERSONAL HISTORY

It took me about five seconds to think of several personal anecdotes of suffering poorly. Here's a good one...Our third child was born in Aktau, Kazakhstan. Laurie was the first Western woman to give birth there. The birth was quick but the baby, our son Hayden, was struggling to breathe. The facilities in Aktau were poor so we were air evacuated to Vienna in an 8-seat jet sent by the insurance company. Hayden recovered and is a healthy adult today, praise the Lord. However, while we were in Vienna Laurie was at the hospital with Hayden, and I was with our other two children in a Catholic youth house. I was miserable. At one point I went to a laundromat to do our laundry and needed change. There was a convenience store across the street, and I entered and asked the clerk for coin change so I could use the machines. The clerk refused, ignoring my pleas. I was livid and full of self-pity and walked out of the shop, turned around standing on the sidewalk, and loudly rained down curses on that shop. I put the imprecatory psalms to shame as I commanded God to bankrupt them and ruin their lives. No loving my enemies or turning to the other cheek from me. Fortunately, I was alone. No doubt I was my authentic self in that moment. I was also immature and quite angry at God for not fulfilling my desires, of which change for the laundry was the least. In reality, God met all of our needs abundantly. Reflecting later on that time, I could see God's kindness and generosity towards us. That season brought about significant growth in both Laurie and I and sent me on a journey deeper into the glory of the Gospel and God's love. Today, I would respond quite differently to that situation. Yet there are still many instances in which I don't suffer well. God is still quite busy working on me! I assume this is true of all His children.

The point is not to respond perfectly in every situation, but as I say every week, it is about who we are becoming. Our actions and responses reveal where we are and looking at them over time reveals the direction. Usually, the line is quite jagged and though we want it to be up and to the left, often we find that it is up and down and all around. This is what it means to be human. God knows this about us and continues to walk with us in love and gentleness.

RESILIENCE

One aspect of the way we come through suffering is resilience. In a May 2002 article in Harvard Business Review, Diane Coutu shared that her research on resilient people. She wrote, “Resilient people possess three characteristics — a staunch acceptance of reality; a deep belief, often buttressed by strongly held values, that life is meaningful; and an uncanny ability to improvise. You can bounce back from hardship with just one or two of these qualities, but you will only be truly resilient with all three."

Interestingly, all three of these fit mature disciples of Jesus. Abiding in Christ means we are free to accept reality as is. We do not need to sugar coat or sanitize or act like things are better or worse than they are. We are people of truth and Truth. By definition, life with Jesus is meaningful, and the Bible makes it clear that God works all things for good to make us like Jesus, even and especially suffering and hardship. And lastly, as people who have the Holy Spirit nobody should be better at improvising than us. This means as we walk with Jesus, and He does his work in us, we will grow into resilient people who go through suffering in such a way that it (eventually) softens us.

But maybe you know people who are long-time Christians, but they have not been softened by suffering. Instead, they are bitter and angry, maybe petty and full of self-pity. Sadly, this happens although I don't think it is commonplace. If you know someone like this, pray for them and love them. Let your response to him or her be the revealer of what God needs to do in you, of your level of maturity. And let them be a reminder to you to open yourself to Jesus and the work He wants to do in you so that the suffering you experience softens you.

RESOURCES

For a deeper dive into this, I recommend a couple of excellent books:

"Out of suffering have emerged the strongest souls; the most massive characters are seared with scars."

-- Khalil Gibran

After reading this post a reader (who asked to remain anonymous) sent me the following thoughts. I thought it was worth sharing and so have included it here.

You wrote:

Rolheiser says that suffering makes us deep. The issue is that it makes us deep in different things. Some people suffer and become deep in anger and bitterness and self-pity. Others suffer and become deep in love and compassion and empathy.

When I read that, I thought of something I began to learn and need to continually put into practice. I'm sure you've heard it said that if you're going to truly love, you'll experience pain. What do we do with that pain?

 

Some people think all pain is a signal to pull back. However, in this instance, that results in muted emotions. We don't experience the full heights nor depths of what we are capable and designed to. We become emotional mutants, with dulled emotions. 

The other option is to embrace the pain with the love. What this does is that it expands our hearts to be able to experience even more love...and deeper pain. Our heart is ripped apart, but when it heals it's larger, if more tender. This can become a cycle of expanding our experiential capabilities, expanding our hearts to be able to love more deeply and hurt more intensely. 

Which way did God choose? Well, looking at the history of how God loved His creation and specifically His people, it seems that He chose and continues to choose to open His heart to love and being hurt. He began the process in eternity past by becoming the Lamb slain from before the foundation of the world. He continued through man's existence and continues today. He goes further, though. He also bears our griefs, our thoughts and emotions. Imagine how big a heart He must have...and how much it must hurt!

So, if we are to follow Jesus, how do we handle relational pain? Do we numb it with distractions, drugs, or other things, or do we follow Him into ever-deeper love and pain by embracing it as He does?

What's in your hand? Is it a broken heart? Will we follow our Lord in suffering, allowing our hearts to be enlarged like our Lord's? Or will we pull back in self-protection? I want to become like my Lord. How about you?

Duke Dillard
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Signs of Spiritual Maturity Part 5: Forgiveness
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Signs of Spiritual Maturity Part 3: Transforming Responses