How can I be thankful in the face of great pain? Is it appropriate? Right now, I hold a baby that I wasn’t sure I was ever going to get. She is perfect, healthy, sweet, and so small. I am thankful. I am so glad that she is here, and she is mine. But I am also heartbroken.
While my prayers were answered and I hold this precious child, many others’ prayers were not answered in this way. Others are haunted by the soon arrival of Mother’s and Father’s Day. Many feel taunted by greeting cards and tiny shoes in stores or invitations to baby showers that they do not want to attend.
Oftentimes we are encouraged to look at the positive and be grateful for what we don’t have to bear. Women in particular, especially Christian women, are practiced at immediately moving to gratitude during times of deep pain.
‘Got to be positive.’
‘Can’t be sad and be a Christian.’
‘If I’m not grateful for what I have, it’s disrespectful to those who have less.’
Or the big one, ‘After all that Christ has done for me, how can I be unhappy.’
But I am still sad. I still experience hurt. I still struggle.
Proverbs 17:22 states, ‘A cheerful heart is good medicine.’ yet in John 11:35 ‘Jesus wept,’ in response to hearing of a friend’s death. So, which is it? Are we to be positive, cheerful, and thankful or are we ‘allowed’ to cry and be sad? Perhaps the answer, as to many things, is not either or, but and. Not should we be thankful or cry, but thankful and cry too.
Ecclesiastes 3:4 states that there is a time for everything including ‘a time to laugh and a time to mourn.’ Gladness can be natural and appropriate when we have much. But what happens when we simply stay here, in the thankfulness?
Romans 12:15 exhorts us to ‘rejoice with those who rejoice’ but also to mourn. This text comes in a passage labelled as ‘Love,’ starting with the statement that ‘love must be sincere’. How else can love be sincere but that it shares in the heartache as well as the joys? Sincere love will help us to be Christlike and see the needs of others.
Brene Brown talks about ‘sitting in the [metaphorical] darkness’ with her kids when they are going through something tough, rather than trying to turn on the light and ‘fix.’ God sent His Son to do just that when He sent Him to Earth, to live among us.
Do we as Christians sit with others in their suffering or only be positive or fix? Aren’t we called to help with the needs of others? Yes certainly. But avoiding the tough emotions may lead us to miss the hearts too.
Philippians 4:4 implores us to ‘Rejoice in the Lord always.’ This sounds like a directive to always be positive to me. But a few verses later, perhaps it is not so clear-cut. ‘In everything, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving’(Philippians 4:6). It doesn’t actually say that we should be joyful and thankful for all things. Rather that, along with thanksgiving we should share everything that touches our hearts with our God who cares.
What a thing to be thankful for.
A God who wants to hear all that we have to say, all that we are feeling, all that is crushing us or all that we wish or hope for. A God who is fully aware of the painful world and doesn’t require us to pretend that everything is fine. A God who can deal with the complexity of emotions He programmed into us as He created us in His image. A God who not only delights in my newborn baby but is equally present with those suffering great loss.
Right now, my baby is safely tucked into her bed after a couple of hours of settling and close feeds. I am thankful. I am thankful that she is finally asleep. I am thankful that I get to be her mother. And I am so incredibly thankful that the God I know, sees each of us, in whatever patch of darkness we are walking through.
WRITER: Chelsea Ralph, attends Lilydale SDA Church.