Sorrowing...

 …Sorrowful, yet always rejoicing; poor, yet making many rich; having nothing, and yet possessing everything. (II Corinthians 6:10)

Sorry, I can’t resist the urge to include the visual pun because today, we’re talking about paradoxes and Sunday’s walk in the park resulted in several pictures of “pairs.” For the one who walks with God, there is the real possibility of hurting or fearing while simultaneously finding comfort, relaxing, and having joy. We can know that God will take care of us. We can even rejoice that a loved one is now with God. At the same time, we may feel the pain and fear of want or grief over being separated from that loved one.

In fact, that may be precisely what is happening in the beloved Psalm 23. David doesn’t say, “The Lord is my Shepherd, I do not want.” He says, “The Lord is my Shepherd, I shall not want.” There’s another translation that says, “The Lord is my Shepherd, I lack nothing,” but is this a statement of fact, or something of which David was trying to remind himself because at the time, his circumstances felt insecure?

Another example of this is Job, and my theme verse for the year. Job didn’t pretend there was nothing wrong. He felt the pain of losing everything including all of his family except his wife. Have you noticed that “friends” showed up to comfort him, not brothers or cousins? And yet, he said, “But He knows the way that I take; when He has tested me, I will come forth as gold.” Job didn’t pretend that everything was fine. He struggled. Many might say that he failed. But he still said that he would come forth as gold.

There have been times when I struggled, and people “encouraged” me to have faith. That increased my struggle because the problem wasn’t that I didn’t have faith, it was that the faith didn’t make the pain or fear disappear. Some would say that it’s wrong to acknowledge the side that is not “of faith” but that would suggest that the words of Paul that we take to be inspired by God are wrong, because he noted that we are both sorrowful and rejoicing, etc. It would also suggest that Jesus was wrong to ask that the cup be taken from Him or to ever admit that He was sorrowful. “Jesus wept” would then mean “Jesus sinned.”

We don’t seem to have a way to acknowledge both sides of the paradox, either suffering ourselves while rejoicing, or allowing another to suffer and rejoice. Sometimes, the best we can do is say that we are suffering, but we will rejoice. When we are tried, we will come forth as gold. And when we find the person who is struggling, we need to realize that we haven’t failed in our task if they don’t immediately “buck up” and celebrate because we tell them they should. For some, this may be obvious and second-nature, but for others, it will be a breath of fresh air.