When the world lost Rachel Held Evans tragically this time last year, the global lament within the progressive Christian and evangelical worlds was palpable. For a moment in time, RHE’s death connected us all. Grief transcends the petty arguments we may have. Death gets our attention.
But there is a different deeper connection that comes to the fore when any of us traverse the cusp of life that lay before grief to the life post-loss; the entry way to suffering.
This transition takes us from a very worldly, unenlightened state, to a truly revenant point of bearing, because of the suffering that has become us.
What we could’ve felt was meant to crush us, even as it commonly feels crushing, actually takes us to a point of such a brokenness that we find we MUST reach out and connect with support.
It’s at this point, perhaps as we look back from a place years into the future, that we come to see God’s plan all along: to connect us with others who have been on that journey, even as God connects us with them, in connecting us with others also who will join the journey at some future time. And, of course, God comes into relevance never more than through suffering, connection with the Divine just in time.
Do you see the wisdom of God in this? God knows we will suffer and travail in this life; there are myriad biblical signs and references that show us we should not be surprised by it. There is something beautiful and majestic, however, in seeing that God will turn our suffering into a redemptive purpose, while those who caused our suffering — if that’s how our suffering came to be — will be blessed in no such way.
The redemptive purpose is a solemn solidarity we share with those who equally have suffered. There is a deeper connection available with those who have been to their own rock bottom, and nobody quite understands what we are going through than someone who has been through it.
If not for our suffering, we would not know God so intimately. If not for the abuse we sustained, we would not have the empathy we possess now. If not for the trauma, we would not comprehend the interconnectedness between our mind, body and soul. If not for those we have lost, we would not know the devastation the other side of love which heralds the sovereignty of love. If not for the rejection we have faced, we would not know this deeper pleading that takes us all the way into the heartland of God.
Nobody welcomes the pain of loss, but anyone who has experienced loss has available to them the deeper, narrow way that Jesus talks about in Matthew 7:13-14.
Very truly, the red carpet to the Kingdom of God has been rolled out to us in our suffering.
Who would’ve imagined that suffering and loss are the gateways to the Kingdom of God?
Who would’ve thought that death would be the doorway to life? The cross and the resurrection right there.
We had to come to the end of ourselves to truly arrive at the beginning; so good that it happened in our lifetimes!
Just think of those you have fellowship with now, those deep and wonderful friends with whom you share so much in common with. And so much fellowship with the deeper God who knows you through and through, but that would not be possible had you not been in so much need.
None of this is to say that any of us enjoys the pain that comes to be ours after loss, but, when you think about it, the compensation available in God can more than make up for it.
Photo by Ray Hennessy on Unsplash
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