Lament...

* This blog post is a write-up of a testimony I gave at a chapel service at University of Indianapolis. I had planned on being incredibly eloquent and composed - but God had other plans. I definitely did NOT keep my composure (at all :) but I think God works better through broken people than people who have it all together. I definitely don't have it all together:) So, here's my story...

If I were to write a book about this past semester, I would probably title it: An Encounter with Suffering – Grieving with Hope. All semester, week after week, sometimes daily, I have come face to face with some sort of suffering. Whether through listening to the residents in my dorm because I’m an RA, or through friends, I hear story after story… loss of a loved one, betrayal, spiritual bondage, thoughts of suicide, depression, eating disorders, broken friendships and relationships… you name it. And sometimes it's just as painful to suffer with someone, than to suffer yourself.

And, two and a half weeks ago, I encountered a suffering of my own. Ron Rohlfing - a very dear friend of mine, a strong pillar in our church, and an adopted grandfather figure – fell off his roof while cleaning the gutters by himself. He endured painful trauma to his brain, his ribs, his spleen and countless other injuries. This was merely two days after his son’s wedding. His son and new daughter left early from the honeymoon to visit him in the hospital. He soon slipped into a coma, and two weeks later, he quietly passed away at 7:45 on a beautiful sunny Sunday morning. 

My first reaction was shock. And then the pain came. I cried all the way through   the worship service at church. I knew I should be rejoicing that Ron’s death is not the end, but merely the beginning of his story – and that he is truly ALIVE. But all I wanted to do was grieve. I wanted to cry, and cry and cry some more. And I did. For days, I’d think about him during the smallest moments of the day, and then turn into a puddle.

It’s in times like these that I get all “philosophical”, think about eternity, and ask questions like “What is the meaning of Life” and “Does God exist”…

So, I was forced to deal with that proverbial elephant in the room: what do I do with suffering?

Suffering. There’s a lot of questions I have about it, like: What does it mean and why does it happen? Why is it a part of my story? The larger story, for that matter? Does it have a purpose? Samwise Gamgee, the wise little hobbit from the Lord of the Rings trilogy, puts it best. As he fights through the shadows of Mordor, he wonders aloud, “I wonder what sort of tale we’ve fallen into?”

And that’s precisely what we need to ask ourselves, because in order to understand the role of suffering, we must understand what kind of STORY we are in.

Let’s start with…

ACT 1: ETERNAL LOVE

Imagine yourself in a garden – a glorious garden – replete with animals, plants and wonders of every kind. And the most glorious thing of all? A beautiful man and woman – created with original GLORY – reflecting the image of the Godhead. As it says in Psalm 8: “You have made man only a little lower than Elohim – and crowned him with glory and honor”. These glorious beings walked in oneness with the Creator himself. THIS is oneness, unity, wholeness, completeness. In an act of great love, God created these two beings – not as robots, programmed to obey their master – but as humans with the freedom and capability to love. But this included the risk of choosing not to.

Which leads us to…

ACT 2: ENTRANCE OF EVIL

Evil now enters the story. We’ve all heard of him. We honestly don’t like to talk about him. Well, every story has a villain, and the arch-villain of our story is Lucifer. According to scripture, he was a commander in the armies of God, and a guardian of the glory of God. But pride entered his heart – he didn’t want to just play a role in the story, he wanted the story to be about him. He coveted the glory of the Lord for himself. And so, after an epic battle in the heavens, he was cast out. And he encountered Adam and Eve – tempting them to let pride enter their hearts… and they did.

And so begins…

ACT 3: THE BATTLE FOR THE HEART

Ever since God created beings that reflected the glory of the Lord himself – us, my friends – the master Villain has sought to kill, destroy and steal that glory away – what he believes is deservedly his. Act 3 is where we are now, friends. A battle for our hearts – God, calling his beloved to love him completely. The Enemy, seeking to steal, kill and destroy every last remnant of God’s glory on earth. We cannot ignore that there is a Villain.

And the ending (or should I say the beginning)…

ACT 4: THE KINGDOM RESTORED

In every story, we long for a “happily ever after” – we long for the original glory of the Garden to be restored. We long to once again walk in oneness with the Father – and want the story to be set right again. We hope for wholeness and peace – and a kingdom that is restored.

For those with no hope, the final end is death. There is no way out. The Enemy has stolen all previous dreams of happily ever after. He whispers, Your story is an accident… and then, there is nothing. This is as good as it gets. He even tells us that the paradise we are promised is nothing but a joke – a pie in the sky choir service replete with chubby angels and harps. Yuck.

But we have a better promise – of complete and total restoration. No pain, no tears, no sorrow. Unity with a Father who loves us completely. A world born again – as much as we love this earth, the new earth is a thousand times more.

I come back to suffering. In the midst of suffering, I often tell myself it’s wrong to grieve – that grieving isn’t normal, nor is it a picture of someone who’s faithful to God. All I needed during the suffering was permission – permission to grieve. If you believe in God and his promises, are you allowed to grieve?

And yes. Grieving is normal. Grieving is a natural reaction to suffering - it  is a groan that the world is not set right. That we long for the original Glory of the garden. That we long for the glory to be restored, for God’s kingdom to once again reign. For death to no longer be a curse. For brokenness to longer be – but rather, wholeness. For the curtain to rise on Act 4 and let the story to finally, really begin.

But what I’ve observed this past semester is the difference between those who grieve with hope, and those who grieve in hopelessness.  For the unbeliever, suffering is a conundrum – and loss is the end. Restoration and redemption is a fairy tale, and a final victory is… nonexistent.

But we – we have hope in a final victory. We know, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that our current sufferings are temporary. That they are the result of the Fall, and an Enemy who is out to kill and destroy. We have hope in restoration and redemption. Thus, we grieve with HOPE. We have whole books of the Bible crammed full of laments, grief and cries of desperation - yet, in the end, they end with the declaration: "Lord, you reign".

This is why we gather as the Body of Christ for worship – to praise, amidst the storms. We don’t come together to glaze over the truth, or to create this picture that Christianity is all about putting on a happy face and “everything’s ok”. Usually, everything is NOT ok. We all have our own stories of suffering – daily. We are all affected by sin, suffering and pain, and worshipping with the Body is where we can and should be honest. Pain is real – but God is a thousand times more real. The reality of REDEMPTION is the true reality. The beauty of our story is that we know the end - we know who wins. We've gotten a glimpse at those last pages of book. 

And yet we know those last pages are really just the beginning of the real story - the story that last for eternity.

And that’s why we sing.

I invite you to listen to this song called "Reason to Sing" by All Sons & Daughters. This song has been an anthem for me this semester – it’s a song of lament and grief, yet concluded with a declaration of truth. It declares why we sing... and who has the victory. It's about Grieving With Hope.

*References to the gospel as a "story" in 4 acts is inspired by a book called EPIC - by John Eldredge. Read it. It'll change your life.