More from Voskamp. She has grown on me. I'm still a Lewis girl and no writing style can touch his. But the content in Voskamp's writing and the things she thinks about always quench my thirst.
In the blog post, she discusses her trip to Haiti. She comes back from that desolate place and people say things to her like, "You can't help but be grateful." And she ponders.
I love this line:
"As if God uses slums and shanties and the starving merely as this cosmic Sunday School visual aid to make a bunch of the spoiled kids grateful. As if gratitude is this virtue that can neatly scrub away any inconviencing responsibility, as if gratitude can quietly get us all off some uncomfortable hook."
Yes! I remember being in a Bible study group one year and a girl commented on how grateful she should be. She had nothing to complain about. She said she started thinking about some people in her life who are doing without a lot of things and she realized she should be very grateful. These are all wonderful sentiments. But I started wondering about the other people. Can they still be grateful in their deprivation? What is their hope? And what do I do with their deprivation? Just watch and stand in gratefulness? After all, we can look at lots of other people and breathe a sigh of relief. Our bellies are full while a man digs through a garbage can. One side of our bed is filled with a husband while another woman in her thirties grieves an early widowhood. Our kids go to the doctor occasionally when they're sick while another mom takes her kid to a doctor regularly because the tumor is still in his brain.
These things keep me awake at night sometimes.
If you want to compare yourself to someone and it somehow spurs you on in a healthy way toward more Christ-centered living, then I'm all for it. To wit, one day I marveled at a mom's saint-like patience with her child when I was at the Y. I took note and said to myself, "Observe this example. Pray for this kind of patience because, honey, you do NOT have it." But so many comparisons end up going in the wrong direction. Don't tell someone they have it easy just because they don't carry the load you bear. You haven't walked a mile in their shoes and they haven't walked in yours. And don't tell someone else their life makes you a heck of a lot more grateful for your own. You can say that to yourself, but don't say it to the one hurting. They probably already realize their life inflicts gratitude on your own.
My mind often swings from one end of the pendulum to the other. You see, I think these things are largely relative. If you want to know who had the hardest life in the whole world, look at Jesus. Did you go from a perfect, sinless existence to being nailed to a piece of wood, carrying the sins of the whole world? Neither did I. But for this comparison thing to work we have to take it the whole way. But if we do, we end up negating everyone sufferings altogether because none of us can truly know the sufferings of Christ as Christ knew them.
I'm so glad when he hears my prayers he doesn't say, "Well, child, you must not grieve. Are you kidding me with all of this? I bore the whole world. What is your trial compared to mine?"
Instead He says simply, "Come."
He's not just compassion. He's Truth. Sometimes my tears are sinful tears and he tells me so. They're tears of a hard heart or a proud heart. I used to think being proud meant you think a lot of yourself. But it means you think of yourself a lot. . .in a positive way or a negative way, it's no matter. God resists the proud. He often reminds me, even in my tears or my kicking and screaming that I have Life Eternal. This is Hope. This is Joy. The holiday will begin! No matter what I face here on earth, I'm already carrying a Hope that no grief can touch. Paul calls these things "our light and momentary troubles." I don't think he was being snarky. He's just comparing the earthly trials to the eternal glory which far outweighs them all. This is the good kind of comparison. This is the kind that fattens your soul.
Guess what I'm learning? Someone else always has it harder than I do. And someone else always has it easier. The end.
And let us not be weary in well doing: for in due season, we shall reap, if we faint not. Galatians 6:9
In this world you will have trouble. Take heart! I have overcome the world. John 16:33
I think some people are more comfortable with pain than joy. It can feel cozier. If something bad is always happening to you, then you feel less worried that something bad will happen to you. Or they may think no one will care about them if pity is not part of the picture. Maybe they think, "I'll only be loved if I'm pitied, therefore I must have a problem at all times. I must either be in poor health, or under great stress, or in dire straits of some kind. Otherwise, I'll be neglected." Incidentally, I read somewhere that it's not a sign of a healthy psyche if you desire to be pitied. I'm starting to think there's often a mixture of "I brought this on myself" and "This happened to me" in more things than I realized. Have you ever known someone who seems constantly in a pickle? Somehow there are just those people in life who tell you they got the flu, lost their dog, and had a fender bender all in the same day. And you aren't surprised. You think, "That is odd, yet almost underwhelming because you are one of those people who finds themselves often in a situation."
But others may think the only way to live life is to stay as far away as possible from pain. They wrap themselves tightly in the safety of comfort and make sure no one knows them too well. This keeps their emotions and their circumstances in tact.
I realize my thoughts here haven't been all that connected together. Lots of things bobbling around in my head. One of the best things I took away from the Voskamp post was this:
"Thanksgiving that doesn't become Thanksliving isn't Thanksgiving. It's Thanksdead. It's thanksnothing. . .What if gratitude always meant a question mark -- asking how will you let your gratitude to Christ mark the world for Christ?"
I look at two faces every day. Two small faces. Two not yet born again faces. Two faces learning to pray. Two faces learning to see. I'll soon be looking at third face. I start there when I think of the Great Commission. I start with those faces. If my gratitude doesn't spill over there, making it's mark for Christ there, to the least of these, then how can it possibly spill out anywhere else?
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