AP

TTHE MINISTRY OF PRESENCE

As we think about life in terms of problems or troubles that come upon us, we can easily miss something critical. Imagine someone comes to you from church and tells you about a problem that he or she has.

‘I’m struggling with depression.’ ‘I have chronic sickness.’ ‘I have a boss who hates me.’ ‘I’m in a difficult marriage.’ ‘My sister just died.’

What is your primary concern?

Maybe it’s just because I’m a problem-solving male, but my initial reaction is usually ‘Let me help you get out of your problem.’ This is a fairly universal human impulse, I think. Trouble and suffering are painful and we want our friends to not be in pain.

You see this desire in Paul, regarding his own thorn in the flesh: ‘I pleaded with the Lord three times that it might depart from me’ (2 Cor 12:8). It is there in Job’s friends who try desperately to diagnose his suffering and find its root cause so that he could be free.

Now the alleviation of suffering is not a bad thing and often there are problems that are easily fixed through godly advice. But we must keep in mind that some suffering is an affliction from God that is designed to last. That was the case with Paul. His thorn in the flesh wasn’t going anywhere.

What that means is that we can’t immediately assume that people experiencing some difficulty are doing the wrong thing. We can’t assume that there is some stock-standard answer to get them out of the pit. I gave a talk on anxiety but it was not designed to be a checklist that you can complete so that when you reach the end of the list you are cured. The biblical advice regarding how to respond to anxiety is true yet it may not result in a life free of anxiety!

Here is the point, if Paul could experience suffering that he responded correctly to, that was sent by God and designed to be long-term, then we should expect that we will find ourselves or our friends in that sort of situation too.

How would you have helped Paul if Paul came to you and told you about his thorn in the flesh? Have you prayed, Paul? Yes. Have you understood that God is in control and is good? Yes. Are you seeking to obey Christ, Paul? Yes. And you are still suffering? Yes. Well….

At that point you might want to consider that there isn’t anything to fix in Paul’s life. Paul is just suffering and it might be good for you to sit in the dust with your friend. Being there is a big deal and a big help.

It is often worth starting off with the assumption that not all sufferings have a solution. Asking questions is a great way to practically display this assumption. When we jump straight into advice we are assuming that we understand the problem and that we know the solution. Asking questions and entering into our friend’s experience can help us not assume that we know everything.

You don’t have to understand suffering completely. You don’t even have to know what the sufferer should do about it. As a fellow Christian, getting alongside your brother or sister in Christ and being with them in their sorrow is a way to bear one another’s burdens.

Think about this: Christ has sent the Holy Spirit to us which is why God can say ‘I will never leave you nor forsake you.’ If Christians have the Holy Spirit with them always, why do they still suffer? Is the Holy Spirit powerless to help?

You might say ‘the Holy Spirit is there to teach us obedience and works through our suffering to get rid of our sin.’ Sure. But what about Job? What about Paul? What about Jesus? Did these men go through their specific sufferings without the Holy Spirit?

No! Surely one of the roles of the Holy Spirit is to be there. To be with us in our darkest moments. The Holy Spirit is a fixer – certainly. But he is also a comforter who draws near to us in our times of trouble.

May we have grace to both encourage and strengthen the distressed through biblical counsel as well as grace to be present friends, willing to sit in silence with our friends as they are pricked by the thorn that God has driven into their flesh.

– Tom Eglinton