I definitely do not love that others suffer, but when I hear of someone's pain much greater than my own, it gives me perspective. It is easy to say my pain and suffering is nothing of what Jesus suffered for me, but much more difficult to conceptualize, than when you hear that someone you know of has been diagnosed with a brain tumor or of a little girl suffering in stage 3 cancer receiving chemo weekly.
Yeah, my sufferings are like grains of sand compared to their boulders.
But isn't it amazing that when our sufferings are boulders, clinging to Christ seems more palpable?
Recently I had a boulder. I was the boulder. I was blocking my own view of God in a way that is difficult to explain. I was not "haughty", but rather I think I slowly slipped into this laziness that tumbled into depression and then I could not see hope. I was destined for misery, convinced that the Christian life was one of suffering and pain and disappointments. Afterall, beihind the curtains of so many "heroes" and "heroines" of the faith was a fight against depression, misery, poverty, ailments, "thorns in the flesh".
I knew the Word. I knew that there was "joy" in the Lord. I had experienced it before, when I was a young and naive Christian. The silver lining was a joke for the simple and I wanted "ignorance" back.
The Lord would say to me, "Trust Me," in which my response was always, "I want to, but I don't know how."
Thankfully, after some time, God helped my perspective shift...I could see Him. My boulder was just a rock that could easily be climbed through intimacy with my Creator.
Now, my rock looks like a pebble in the light of people and families suffering with much greater trials. Praise be to Him who does not give us more than we can handle and to the warriors facing such difficult circumstances with the strength of HOPE in our Lord and Savior, Christ Jesus
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