Consoled by God (Gratitude V)

The reason that suffering leads us to communion with God is because God, too, suffers. We can connect because God is already in the conversation and the experience. Jesus reveals this. The central revelation of God is Jesus, and at the center of that revelation is God suffering—for us, for love, for a path of communion with us that destroys darkness and death.[1]

This is because God the Father, like Jesus, is not only the All-Powerful, but also the All-Vulnerable.[2] We are taught to see him as the All-Powerful, and He is. And we stand in awe of him. But in our awe we may easily miss God the All-Vulnerable, who suffers with a suffering creation and suffers, in fact, to be near us.[3]“Because of the joy awaiting him, he endured the cross, disregarding its shame.”[4] This is what God has always done, long before Jesus walked the dusty path of the Via Dolorosa. This is exactly what our souls need to discover if we are to continue patiently and courageously in faith. This is what we need to see if we are not only to stand in awe of God, but also to deeply love Him. 

My prayer during the last few weeks (and now months) has become Psalm 131:

Lord, my heart is not proud;
my eyes are not haughty.
 I don’t concern myself with matters too great
 or too awesome for me to grasp.
 Instead, I have calmed and quieted myself,
 like a weaned child who no longer cries for its mother’s milk.
 Yes, like a weaned child is my soul within me.
O Israel [O Brandon, O Reader], put your hope in the Lord—
now and always.

This Psalm, like Psalm 95, is grounded in worship. “Put your hope in the Lord” is an act of worship, trust, and thanksgiving. It’s not my natural bent to give thanks when life has ceased to make sense to me. But the posture of the Psalmist demonstrates trust right in the midst of a world he can’t fully understand. 

I tend to resist and hate and judge my weakness and my inability to make sense of life. I loathe the weaknesses I see in myself, and how I can’t seem to get them straightened out. But we must come to a place where we embrace and even give thanks for our weakness and limitations. Only then do we begin to understand that it is God who maintains our relationship with Him and that He is the one reaching out to us, always, right in the midst of our unsortedness. It’s not our ability to figure everything out that keeps us grounded in God, it’s our willingness to admit we can’t figure everything out and our trusting that, still, God is reaching for us. Only when you see this reality will God make sense to your soul, even if that understanding cannot be fully held by your mind. 

Gratitude anchors us in this seeing, because in gratitude we are actually expressing trust. Indeed, we are called to give thanks not just for the things we love (although we are called to give thanks for those) but also for the things that strip our souls. Therein is maturity and all spiritual sight. 

For all of these readings in one place, order my book 'Learning to Live and Love Like Jesus.'

[1] Cf. John 14:9: “Anyone who has seen me has seen the Father!”

[2] See “The Forgiveness Ladder” in ‘Chapter 15, The Generous Life: Forgiveness.’

[3] See Romans 8, especially 20-25. Paul says that God submitted creation to suffering, in hope of redemption. God Himself is in a state of hope, of longing, which is its own type of suffering, and God is vulnerable to face this suffering along with His creation. Cf. Isaiah 63:9.

[4] Hebrews 12:2.