Showers, Sympathy, and Suffering

I will admit it up front… The title of this post is entirely random. I had to call it something or it wouldn't let me post it, but MAYBE by the time you get to the end of this blog you will see where I was coming from. By the time you read this, I will most likely have written and rewritten it half a dozen times. Partially because this is my process, but mostly because I have so many things I want to say and no idea how I am going to tie them all together, if it is even possible. Please, please stick with me faithful friends.

I have a lot of my most intimate times with Jesus in the shower. I don't know if it is because that is one of the few places I find myself during the day that I am not totally distracted, or if it is because I'm in there in the morning when I am still waking up and ready to listen, but that's where Jesus and I like to spend a lot of quality time. Sometimes I stand there and am moved to tears because of the things Jesus is speaking to my heart, and I am totally okay with it because my face will be dripping wet when I get out anyways. Why am I sharing this awkward, private information with you? Not just to be so weird, but because I want to be able to convey to you the significance of a moment that I experienced a while back that Jesus has so gently been reminding me of lately.

One September morning, I was in the shower praying when I felt something click on the inside of me. My "Jesus have this day and make it yours" prayer turned into something a little deeper and more bold than usual. I remember praying this, "Father, my whole life is here in your hands. My prayer is that you would use me however you desire to get the most glory. If that looks like suffering loss so that my life can be a testimony of your restoration, may I have nothing left at the end of the day. If that means journeying with you through some dark moments so that people can see you as comfort, may I be willing to take your hand and go quickly for the sake of your Kingdom. If that means you allow me to face bumps, and roadblocks, and obstacles so that my life can be a testimony of your sweet presence in the midst of it all, strip away every comfort."

Let no one mistake me sharing this as some kind of flaunting of my spiritual strength. Literally two seconds after this prayer I panicked and said, "I'm just kidding. I take it all back." In that moment of Holy Spirit empowered boldness, I had meant what I said with everything in me. I had offered myself up as a willing, living sacrifice, and then I had a glimpse of what that might mean and I wimped out. The Lord knew and knows that this is my heart, though, and in some really tiny, bite-sized pieces, he has fulfilled this prayer I prayed in the shower in September.

Pause. We need to take a quick detour for a second and then I promise to tie everything together in the end, hopefully. Let me explain to you quickly the difference between empathy and sympathy.

Empathy is understanding what others have experienced because you have experienced it for yourself and can put yourself in their shoes.

Sympathy is acknowledging another's hardships and providing comfort and assurance.

When you are facing a diagnosis, you want to be surrounded with empathetic people. Sympathetic people will tell you all kinds of things to make you feel better, and you will probably be left feeling worse at the end of it all. Empathetic people will be there to walk you through it with the testimony that they have been there and are still alive to tell the story. When you lose someone you love dearly, you want to be surrounded with empathetic people. Sympathetic people will bake casseroles and offer hugs, but empathetic people carry the scars to prove that healing will come to your heart someday.

Here comes the connection, we are almost there. These past three weeks of my life have been really, really hard in more ways than most people could understand. I have felt more pain physically, mentally, and emotionally than I thought you could feel all at once without cracking. It has not been an enjoyable period of time for me in any way, shape, or form. At first, I did not handle any of the things I was experiencing well at all. I was slowly starting to unravel, growing more weary by the day, until Jesus started picking up the pieces behind me. I have felt hurtful things I have never felt before and watched fears I didn't even know I had come to life before my eyes, AND I WOULD GLADLY DO IT ALL OVER AGAIN. (I typed that in caps so both you and the enemy who has been waging war against me this whole time would get the point.) I have found true, life-giving joy in this suffering. Why? Because when Jesus leads someone in my direction who is experiencing severe physical pain, I can tell them that I have been there and that He is holding my hand as he desires to hold theirs. When someone shows up on my doorstep with heartache, I can welcome them in and tell them about my God who restores every broken piece of a shredded heart. When someone walks up to me in the grocery store even years from now who is dealing with both simultaneously, I can tell them about Jesus who is their hope for the redemption of it all. I don't want to be sympathetic. Sympathy does not make anything better. I want to be a faithful friend who is willing to walk the distance to see another restored.

My prayer for my own healing lately has changed a bit in light of this revelation. I was praying three weeks ago, "Jesus! Please hurry and take the pain away. I can't function!" But I have realized since then that I can function. I do not doubt for a moment that Jesus can and wants to heal me, but I am okay with him doing that whenever he should choose so that the maximum amount of people can see him do it. If my suffering can last a day, month, or year longer for the sake of someone else coming to know my Jesus, let me suffer with joy in my heart and all over my face.

Final thought: I was talking to one of my best friends yesterday about a major health crisis she is facing. Her suffering is in so many ways much greater than the one I have experienced. She told me that every time she gets ready to get up and share her story, she gets hit even harder with her illness and all the symptoms that come along with it. The enemy real, friends. He knows human nature-- that we will let ourselves become dulled to the point that we stop going the distance or standing up to speak because we expect more pain to follow. That is fear. My friend is not allowing that fear to steal her story, and neither will I, and neither should you. There is a world who needs overcomers, people who have been through the fire and come out on the other side, so that they may know the hope that is theirs in Christ Jesus. Would WE be so bold as to be those people.