Psalm 40:1-5
I waited patiently for the Lord; he inclined to me and heard my cry. 2 He drew me up from the desolate pit, out of the miry bog, and set my feet upon a rock, making my steps secure. 3 He put a new song in my mouth, a song of praise to our God. Many will see and fear, and put their trust in the Lord. 4 Happy are those who make the Lord their trust, who do not turn to the proud, to those who go astray after false gods. 5 You have multiplied, O Lord my God, your wondrous deeds and your thoughts towards us; none can compare with you. Were I to proclaim and tell of them, they would be more than can be counted.
2 Corinthians 12:2-10
2 I know a person in Christ who fourteen years ago was caught up to the third heaven—whether in the body or out of the body I do not know; God knows. 3 And I know that such a person—whether in the body or out of the body I do not know; God knows— 4 was caught up into Paradise and heard things that are not to be told, that no mortal is permitted to repeat. 5 On behalf of such a one I will boast, but on my own behalf I will not boast, except of my weaknesses. 6 But if I wish to boast, I will not be a fool, for I will be speaking the truth. But I refrain from it, so that no one may think better of me than what is seen in me or heard from me, 7 even considering the exceptional character of the revelations. Therefore, to keep me from being too elated, a thorn was given to me in the flesh, a messenger of Satan to torment me, to keep me from being too elated. 8 Three times I appealed to the Lord about this, that it would leave me, 9 but he said to me, ‘My grace is sufficient for you, for power is made perfect in weakness.’ So, I will boast all the more gladly of my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ may dwell in me. 10 Therefore I am content with weaknesses, insults, hardships, persecutions, and calamities for the sake of Christ; for whenever I am weak, then I am strong.
There is an unwritten rule among seasoned pastors that it is futile and foolish to preach a very pointed message to one or a few particular people. Not only is it a sign of need for control from the preacher's perspective, but 99% of the time, if they preach to that one person…it's the one day they don't show up. That said, I am intentionally preaching a pointed message to a number of people today. Specifically, because there are too many of you who have been enduring long-suffering. All we have to do is glance at the joys and concerns in our weekly bulletin to see how many names remain on our joys and concerns for too long. And those are just the people that we name, let alone those in our lives that we fail to name, don't want to mention, can't mention, including ourselves. I don't know if you've noticed yet but at the top of the prayers concerns…(take a look…open it up right now)--as we addressed last week, most of us are happy to pray for others, but we don't know where to start when praying for ourselves. (On the prayer concerns the first listing is (“insert your name here”)
I've been rereading Gerald May's bestseller, The Dark Night of the Soul to help strengthen my own prayer life, and to find words for relief for those who are suffering (which many of you understand all too well). The old adage of ‘misery loving company’ can only take us so far. And although this church does a wonderful job of caring for one another, empathy and sympathy can also go only so far, because everybody's experience and journey in and through suffering is different. We also all know that there's nothing worse than sharing part of our heartbreak or heartache with someone and their response is, “Oh, I know how you feel” or “oh, that happened to me, too.” And as I've said from the pulpit and from the hospital bed many times, the only person who can ever say that to us, is Jesus, when he was dying on the cross. “I know you're suffering and I know what it feels like.”
Paul was no stranger to suffering and neither was David, who wrote Psalm 40, writing, “God drew me up from the desolate pit and out of the mirey bog.” And I looked up the Hebrew; listen to the Hebrew literal translation: “He is stretching out to me. He is hearing me and He is bringing me from a cistern of tumult, from the mud in the mire. He is raising my feet onto the crag, establishing progression for me.” WOW This is the gift when we go back to the original text, because 20% literally is lost in translation.
Walter Bruggeman, who is a well-known Hebrew and Old Testament scholar summarizes Psalm 40 a little more succinctly. He says: “God heard”. “God saved”. “God transformed”. Don't we need to know that when we or someone we love is suffering endlessly? I find it helpful for myself and for all others.
Again, back in Chapter 11 of 2 Corinthians, the self-named “super apostles” are attacking Paul, because he hasn't ‘shown any special abilities’. They say he hasn't accomplished any great deeds . He doesn't seem to be a recipient of any special spiritual experience and accomplished no miracles. When people accuse us of not being great or special and flawed, the first thing we do, is try to defend and explain ourselves. (i.e., Okay, so I burned the meatloaf, but I, also, made a blanket for the winter to keep us warm). We're always defending ourselves!! But instead, Paul decides not to defend himself and name the things he has achieved, which would show his value and make himself feel better. Instead, he becomes a different kind of braggadocio, boasting instead of his weaknesses, his suffering, his vulnerability.
Since I think we've just starting “Shark Week”, most of us probably remember that classic scene in Jaws where the three of them are sitting on the boat and they're not really getting along all that well, but the more the rum starts to flow, the more they share their stories about being attacked by a shark, comparing their scars one by one. “Well, you want to see this?” “Oh, I got a better one.” “Look at this one.” “Oh, I got a better one” “Look at this one.” Comparing their suffering. We’re all happy to share our recovery stories but we don't really like to talk about our vulnerability, when we are enduring our suffering (unless, of course, we're speaking about vulnerable to a Trojan horse virus in our computers). Most of us like to keep our vulnerability to ourselves or maybe a loved one or our trusted confidant. But the bridge that Paul builds for us here is about naming suffering and God's activity and it's really helpful.
Beverly Gaventa, who is one of my favorite teachers at Princeton is a Pauline expert and she sums up Paul's writing here in chapter 12 by saying, “Whatever thorn or malady Paul is enduring is actually insignificant, because the question is whether Paul can prevail over it himself or persuade God to do it on his behalf”. I find this a helpful reframe for my (and all of our) individual suffering and he had these three occasions when he prayed for relief and his request was denied. Doesn't that sound familiar? We pray… We ask... We beg repeatedly to help God rescue, save, heal, sort, fix, change. Sometimes our prayers are answered right away. Sometimes they seem to be falling on deaf ears. Regardless upon looking back at hardship and difficulty and illness and crisis, we often can see some insight, some learning, some gift of grace that comes only in retrospect.
Gerald May, in his book revisits his long battle with cancer writing, “A dark night might refer to loss or desolation where gratitude can be felt for simply surviving. At other times, there is a strong sense that the experience, however unpleasant, can be a vehicle for grace as well as self-knowledge. Hopefully a closer sense of God and a deepening of faith and trust.” He continues, “Like many people, I feel this way about my cancer. I wouldn't have chosen it, but I experienced so much grace and learned so much about myself and God. I don't want to go through it again, but there were gifts along the way.”
I was talking with an old friend that I got reconnected with again this week whose husband passed away. I asked how she was doing. “How long has it been?” (I thought it was two years since her husband passed). “It's four.” She said, “But you know what? He's teaching me as much in his death as he did in life.” We know that we can learn so much when we look backward on life. At the same time, we have to live life looking forward, so we have a choice about how we deal with life's disappointments, failures and suffering and loss.
Again, Gaventa writes that “…Paul does not need a miraculous resolution of his difficulty”, (even though we'd rather have that when we pray). “It's because the Lord said, “My grace is sufficient for you. My power is perfect, especially in weakness. It's not a glorification of weakness, but in such weakness the power of Christ now can dwell in us…”, because we're not resistant to it. We are open, and in that openness, our weakness gets transformed into strength. Strength is exactly what we need to help endure deep disappointment, struggle, suffering or watching those we love endure that.
Marjorie Thompson talks about the approaches to prayer in her book, Soul Feast. We walked through her book about 10 years ago. Her words tie into last week's sermon. She writes “…if we begin to pray with gratitude, praise and offer our whole selves to God, that we can ask boldly and as much faith as we have, faith cannot be forced, but only prayed for. And then we can say. ‘I believe. Help me in my unbelief.’ We wait with trust for a response, not… as she says “…with anxious repetition but trusting perseverance”. Not anxious repetition (as if God is deaf), but trusting perseverance. I know this is easier said than done, but if a tiny little mustard seed can grow into one of the largest bushes in the Middle East with very little water, imagine what God's grace can do for you, for those you love and even for those who no one loves.
May it be so. Amen.