We Culture
The urge to feel sorry for one's self is a powerful one. At this moment, all four of my kids are sick. Last night my wife was totally out of commission and I've been suffering with terrible sinus headache pain every morning for the past several days.
But on the other hand, I recently returned home from South Africa. While there, I witnessed sickness and poverty and tragedy to a degree completely foreign to my Midwestern, American mind. I visited AIDS and TB patients in their homes made of literal garbage - cobbled together shacks of cardboard, sheet metal, scrap wood and things other people had thrown away. I prayed for people so poor they didn't have water.
It's hard to cry in your beer over your own problems in light of that.
The degree of "their" need (whoever they are) does not make mine any easier to bear though. It certainly is a healthy dose of reality and perspective, but I don't think it's God plan to make us feel better by showing us how much worse it could be. Wasn't it the Pharisee who said, "I thank God I'm not like other men?" No, that's not what God is into or up to. But there is fellowship to be found in his suffering.
The "theme," once again threaded with no effort from me, to this issue seems to be Others. Each article is either a look into the lives of others, a call to notice others or an encouragement that God's mission is in the world, among other people.
It occurs to me that when I suffer, I'm sharing in the big Body. It works the same with joy and rejoicing of course, but there is something about suffering that really makes our union poignant. On the long flight home from Africa I kept thinking, "I can't imagine what it must be like to God and see your children suffering like this." My own little suffering reminds me of "them," and through that remembrance it is no longer me and them - it's us. There is a We Culture born in pain. Again, when one part of the body receives honor, we all receive it together, but something different is formed in the fire of affliction.
Elite military units bond through the torture of long painful selection and training. Marriages get stronger as they navigate rough waters together. We use the term "growing pains" to describe the stress and heartache of moving from childhood to maturity. I encourage you to join into what God is saying through this month's issue. Partake of this We Culture by sharing your insight and commentary with those who have written.
I'm all the more aware of the way the stories of the heroes of Hebrews 11 segues into 12:1; "...Therefore let us run the race with endurance."
You can contact Scott by email at scottjbane@gmail.com |
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