Onward, Upward, and Further In

Empathy is far more than a fleeting feeling of sadness over someone else's situation or experience. It is one of the very outworkings or manifestations of love, as we emulate Christ, who went so far as to take on flesh in order to experience our weakness. Empathy listens long. Empathy works hard to cultivate a God-honouring imagination, in order to get into another person's life and world, the influences and the shaping forces, the fears and joys, the deep devastations that have impacted the other person. It is beautiful.   There are some personalities who are naturally more empathetic. But the danger here is to lose the humility, to lose the commitment to work at listening, to grow lazy in cultivating that imagination, and instead assume that because they are 'naturally empathetic,' they don't need to work at empathy. They have arrived, and don't need to listen long or continue to grow in love.   I write this, because that's an apt description of myself...

On suffering: For those of us who endure deep, unspeakable suffering, one of the greatest temptations is to believe that God has cursed us. We see this in Job! Job's friends insisted that he needed to repent of his sins, because surely, it must have been his sin that was the reason for all his suffering - God must have cursed Job. This is a lie. From the father of lies, Satan. Some truths that help me to keep my sanity when I'm tormented by this kind of thinking: a) There's a curse on all mankind, on all the earth, because of Adam and Eve's sin. Much of what we suffer is simply due to the reality that we live in a fallen world. Sickness, mental health issues, death are all a result of sin coming into the world through Adam and Eve. b) God, in His abundant mercy, provided a way of salvation, through the seed of Eve (Jesus Christ), someone who would crush Satan's head, and his hold over all of creation.   c) God sent His own Son to be a curse for our sakes! Chr...