Awful grace

Our gathering word in unprogrammed worship on Sunday came from the ancient Greeks. Aeschylus wrote, “He who learns must suffer, and, even in our sleep, pain that cannot forget falls drop by drop upon the heart, and in our own despair, against our will, comes wisdom to us by the awful grace of God.”

In the silence, I wrote two questions in my notebook: 1) Is suffering an inevitable ingredient of the kind of learning that leads to wisdom? And, 2) Is wisdom the inevitable result of suffering?

I think the answer to both questions is “no.”

Life testifies that suffering can, indeed, result in wisdom. But delight and great joy also provide a path for learning. As a young person preparing for a career in teaching, I memorized a paraphrase of one of Solomon’s proverbs: “A wise teacher makes learning a joy.” That became my aim (if not always my reality) as a high school teacher.

As to the second question—Is wisdom the inevitable result of suffering?—I observe that while suffering can lead to wisdom, it sometimes ends up as bitterness.

Maybe it depends on the attitude of the sufferer.

Maybe it depends on the awful grace of God.

Lord, have mercy on me, a sinner. Let my sufferings today, large and small, lead to wisdom. Make me tender, not witty. Amen.

Suffering and discernment, or “Lord, what have you gotten us into now?”

After 16 days in the high altitude of La Paz, this morning I woke up feeling fine. Good, actually. Healthy and whole. But 16 days is a long time, especially when we are here for only three weeks with a lot to accomplish.

A time of adjustment to life at 12,500 feet is a normal part of serving here. We’ve done it for years. Now that we’re older (in the privileged grandparent bracket), it takes a little longer. So when we have a trip scheduled, we plan two to three days in La Paz of pure rest. And then it’s best to gradually ease into our work assignments and people commitments.

This time the schedule only allowed two days before we facilitated a two-day seminar for the leadership team of the Bolivian Friends history project. It was a key seminar as we are just in the beginning phase, still making plans and finding our way forward.

The seminar went well, with a high level of participation and commitment. The Bolivian leaders seem to be taking ownership, and that is a major accomplishment. We began each morning with a Bible study of Nehemiah, asking what this book has to tell us about involvement in a large project. The insights that came from the different small groups were profound and encouraged us all. Then we went on to reviewing and designing the purposes, perimeters and processes of this huge undertaking that we estimate will take five years, ending just before the centennial celebration of the INELA (Iglesia Nacional Evangelica “Los Amigos”). The two days ended with a time of prayer and brokenness that knit the team together.

Yes, the seminar went well, but it was intense, and we have paid the price. Hal’s cough lowered and eventually became altitude pneumonia. We both carried the pressure headaches, bouts of diarrhea, and body aches that typify this stage of adaptation to the altitude. But, while in the past this has lasted for several days and gradually tapered off, this time the ordeal stretched over two weeks. Two weeks we can’t afford.

I don’t mean to whine or complain, but this experience has us wondering. For one thing, people were praying for us specifically for a quick, smooth adaptation to the altitude. And a few of these people checked up on us by email for a progress report. I do not believe that their prayers went unanswered. But this only adds to my wonderment.

One of my friends and prayer partners, Mary, asked me these questions as she pondered our situation:  “I am concerned about the way La Paz is affecting both of you and will pray about God's will.  When do we choose what is hard on our bodies?  When is that part of the cost of discipleship?  When does God ask us to pray about others to carry the torch from here on out?”

Several times during the last weeks, I have thought that maybe our physical reactions were God’s way of telling us it’s time to stop running around, go home, retire, and enjoy life. But we sought the voice of Jesus before proposing this crazy project, and that included seeking discernment from those we trust. I’m reminded that just because something is hard, that doesn’t mean it’s not God’s will. In fact, the opposite is probably true. Hardship just may be part of the evidence we’re heading down the right path.

On the other hand, the voice of common sense is part of the way God speaks. We are getting older. Is it right to subject our bodies to this torture? Are we fools? Is it time to pray for our replacements? Perhaps. But here comes that ubiquitous “other hand”  again. Because of our experience and particular knowledge of this work, and because of the relationships we’ve built over the years here among Bolivian Friends, it seems like everything is coming together to open this door. It seems that now is the time, and we are the people. Everything seems to be saying that. Everything, that is, except our bodies.

And our bodies demand to be taken seriously.

How do we discern what this particular suffering is saying to us about God’s will? One thing I know is that we need to keep listening. And we need to continue to invite the discerning voices of people who know Jesus well and who know us well.

To be continued………

Still Grandpa

We were eating dinner with Hal’s parents not long ago. Both in their 90s, they now live with different members of the family, as the grown kids take turns caring for them. We were at Hal’s brother’s place that evening. Bill took a bite of his home-canned peaches, looked up at me and recited, “Fruit, fruit, fruit! The more you eat, the more you toot!” He then grinned and commented, “It’s been a long time since I remembered that poem.”

A long time indeed. In all my years of knowing him, I have never heard him recite anything like that. Bible verses and old hymns, yes. But he kept a strict watch on his, and his family members,’ words, not tolerating anything flippant, crude or even vaguely nasty.

It gave me a delightful glimpse into him as a normal little boy, mouthing off, probably giggling at his audacity. Unless caught, of course, by his parents.

It also gave me a more sobering glimpse into what Alzheimer’s disease is doing to his personality. While this is a relatively minor incident (absolutely no one at the table was mortified), it is but one example of the multitude of behavioral changes we are all observing, not to mention the memory loss and general confusion. Younger members of the family are asking, “Who is this strange old person?”

Alzheimer’s is a degenerative brain disease that affects memory, cognitive and reasoning ability, language and behavior. There is as yet no cure. According to a feature article that came out in Time magazine in 2010, “More than 5 million Americans currently suffer from Alzheimer's disease, a number that will grow to 13.4 million by 2050.”

In other words, what’s happening in our family is not unusual.

And yet it is entirely unique and strange and frightening because this time it’s us—our father and grandpa—that it’s happening to.

I recently read a novel that is helping me find some perspective on dealing with Alzheimer’s. Actually, Still Alice, is more than a novel because its author, Lisa Genova, is a neuroscientist with a Ph.D. from Harvard University, and the National Alzheimer’s Association has endorsed the book as accurately portraying the disease.

Genova tells the story of Alice Howland, a renowned Harvard psychology professor, who comes down with early onset Alzheimer’s while in her fifties and at the height of her professional career. The novel is from Alice’s point of view, beginning with the ordinary frustration of misplacing her glasses, building through a series of small incidents to a growing awareness that something is wrong, climaxing in the frightening diagnosis, and continuing with the chronicle of slow decline. Not only Alice’s reactions, but those of her family are portrayed in this moving story as husband and grown kids come to realize that with all the changes and even the lack of recognition, she’s still a valuable person. She’s still wife and mother. She’s still Alice. 

The story suddenly seems all too real. It helps me understand some of what may be going on with my father-in-law.

When our grown kids write to ask how their grandpa is, I feel the responsibility to tell the truth. So I detail some of the changes and challenges, try to prepare them as best I can. After all, he may not recognize them the next time they see him.

But I also remind them that he’s still grandpa.

When children suffer

Many of us in the northwest have been praying for 5-year-old Kate and her battle with leukemia. She’s been struggling for much of her short life, and at one point it seemed she was breaking through. But a few months ago, the news that the disease was reasserting itself shocked and saddened us, and so the battle continues.

On Saturday Kate successfully received a bone marrow transplant using cord blood, and now our prayers are for her body to receive the transplant, as we continue to pray for her family and for the light of Christ to fill her and heal her. The road ahead is not clear, but our commitment is.

All of this highlights the ongoing discussion about the mystery of human suffering, and especially the suffering of children. The Psalms of Lament and the book of Job are some of the passages we turn to. Other recent reading has also been helpful. Last week I re-read Stanley Hauerwas’ God, Medicine, and Suffering (1990) in which he specifically addresses the suffering of children. Hauerwas is uneasy (to put it mildly) with theodicy (the discipline that tries to explain evil) as a legitimate theological enterprise and exposes the shallowness of some of the arguments given for why good people suffer: “I believe that the most decisive challenge which the experience of childhood illness presents is our inability to name the silences such illness creates….I cannot promise readers consolation, but only as honest an account as I can give of why we cannot afford to give ourselves explanations for evil when what is required is a community capable of absorbing our grief” (xi). (Hauerwas’ own recent memoir, Hannah’s Child: A Theologian’s Memoir 2010, shows how his own suffering has honed his views).

Another book I read earlier this year, Peter Greig’s God on Mute: Engaging the Silence of Unanswered Prayer (2007), also encourages us to rest in the mystery of God, even as we search for answers. The background of the book and informing all its arguments is a brain tumor that continues to torment the author’s wife. Greig, himself a leader in a national movement for intercession, asks the same hard questions that Hauerwas addresses, and in spite of continuing questions, encourages us to faithfully keep praying.

For me the best resources on the subject, other than the Bible, are Gregory Boyd’s treatments of theodicy and suffering: God at War (1997) and Satan and the Problem of Evil (2001), among others. Boyd’s academic, yet pastoral approach gives depth to the subject. His strong chapter on intercession encourages me to keep praying, in spite of unanswered questions, and to keep affirming my faith in a sovereign, loving God.

But one of the most encouraging things I’ve read recently is a blog posting by a young Quaker whom I’ve known since her birth. Part of the same Quaker meeting that I still call home, Emily was born with all sorts of physical problems and, at the age of two, underwent a risky liver transplant. A recent university graduate, Emily is currently working as an intern at the Friends Twin Rocks camp on the Oregon coast and exploring the possibilities of graduate school.

She writes, “Glory be! To God for His incredible love for us! It’s May 20th again, and again I am humbled and awestruck by the power God displayed, and continues to display, as each year this borrowed liver holds out. Each year I hear another amazing story from one of my parents that I had never heard before, and each story is further evidence that God intervened every step of the way through my illness and the transplant.” Go to her blog, "A Ray of Sunshine," to read the story she refers to here.

Emily concludes by saying, “I am humbled at the heroic and miraculous efforts God made on my behalf. I may sound like a broken record when I say I sincerely hope I can live up to the person God had planned for me to be even back then….Every day really is a gift!”

I remember the way the congregation gathered around Emily and her parents in prayer. I remember occasional feelings of hopelessness. I am glad for the stories of answered prayer; I draw courage from them. And I am learning from the stories of unanswered prayer.

I bring all this to a focal point in my commitment to Kate and her family. I commit myself (again and again):

--to the courage to face hard questions;

--to faith in the goodness, power, and sovereignty of God; to respect before the mystery;

--to the task of prayer;

--to the body of Christ, realizing that my prayers join those of many others, and together we call down God’s mercy and power, the manifestation of God’s kingdom in this child;

--to support for the family in whatever practical ways might be appropriate, including silent accompaniment (realizing that my closest link is to Kate’s grandmother who happens to be my long-time friend).

Lord Jesus, have mercy on us all. Have mercy on your beloved child, Kate. Let your healing love and light surround and penetrate. Thank you for the wonders of medicine; let the transplant “take,” the medications be effective. Strengthen and encourage Kate’s family. Be glorified in all of this. Keep teaching us how to pray so that we might cooperate with you in your purposes. Amen.

High position

“The brother in humble circumstances ought to take pride in his high position” (James 1:9).


Unemployed,
in danger of foreclosure,
dependant on hand-me-downs
and the government’s forced charity—
only a sliver of hope
keeps despair at bay.
The Sunday morning
pastoral prayer includes
me, along with the flood
in Pakistan, Mrs. Murphy’s
cancer and the missionaries
in Rwanda. Have mercy, Lord.
This high position I hold
is windy and cold.