Life's Soundtrack - Ep. 01: Love Is Here by Tenth Avenue North
I've been thinking about pain a lot recently.
It's the art of making comfortable, and not the art of curing, that is the obsession of our time. This explains the abundance of painkillers. People don't want to be reminded of the peoplekiller (time) so they kill the reminder (pain). Time is in short supply for all of us regardless of age, but we'd rather kill the pain than have the pain kill the illusion of control. This is the real pain in pain: not that we are physiologically hurting, but that we are made aware of our soul-sickness and the consequences that sickness will reap after our impending death.
Like humanity in general, I have a problem with pain. But it's not the sort of problem you would think. I don't just hate pain, with the hatred increasing exponentially as the degree of pain increases. Lewis expresses my problem quite well in The Problem of Pain when he remarks that "everyone feels benevolent if nothing happens to be annoying him at the moment." We can make that more specific: Inky feels benevolent if nothing happens to be annoying her at the moment.
Keyword: annoying.
In my problem with pain, obnoxious pains are the worst. I have found that extreme sufferings - pain to the point of barely being able to lift one's head from one's pillow - awaken in me a sort of stoic martyrship. To a certain extent, I enjoy gritting my teeth and exhibiting a deathly pallor and wearing a (figurative) halo of gold while others tiptoe around me with hushed voices and praise my longsufferingness. But fill my sinuses and nose with mucus, or stick a dull pain in my gut, or even place the slightest soreness in my throat, and it's off with their heads to anyone who dares put one foot wrong in my presence. Break my leg in four places and you shan't hear a peep. Make my head ache and throb even in the slightest of ways, and I shall scream and rage inwardly and throw down my work and protest that I shall never get anything done, and my life is ruined - vanity of vanities, all ends in naught.
In my problem with pain, obnoxious pains are the worst. I have found that extreme sufferings - pain to the point of barely being able to lift one's head from one's pillow - awaken in me a sort of stoic martyrship. To a certain extent, I enjoy gritting my teeth and exhibiting a deathly pallor and wearing a (figurative) halo of gold while others tiptoe around me with hushed voices and praise my longsufferingness. But fill my sinuses and nose with mucus, or stick a dull pain in my gut, or even place the slightest soreness in my throat, and it's off with their heads to anyone who dares put one foot wrong in my presence. Break my leg in four places and you shan't hear a peep. Make my head ache and throb even in the slightest of ways, and I shall scream and rage inwardly and throw down my work and protest that I shall never get anything done, and my life is ruined - vanity of vanities, all ends in naught.
Regarding pain, it is as if I have pledged: Lord, thy bitterest pills I shall swallow gladly with the utmost and saintliest placidity; however, I reserve the right to pitch a royal fit should you choose to afflict me with head colds and indigestion.
Why? Why does the little stuff get to me? Well... what do I mean by little stuff, and what do I mean by it getting to me?
Let's take the latter first, returning to the idea of obsession with feeling healthy and its accompanying motives. When pain gets to me, it elicits an angry, ungodly response - e.g., lashing out at a person or circumstance in my life. I am angry at God because he gives me pain. I hate God because I love my own comfort more (serving the latter Master and hating the former). I hate God because I have bought into this obsession, because I would rather think of myself as the infinite one.
Let's take the latter first, returning to the idea of obsession with feeling healthy and its accompanying motives. When pain gets to me, it elicits an angry, ungodly response - e.g., lashing out at a person or circumstance in my life. I am angry at God because he gives me pain. I hate God because I love my own comfort more (serving the latter Master and hating the former). I hate God because I have bought into this obsession, because I would rather think of myself as the infinite one.
This leads to the former part of the statement, the little stuff. I mentioned how it is (relatively) easy to resist the temptation to wail and moan when the afflictions are extreme, especially if they are short-lived and not frequent occurrences. Extreme pain practically screams: "Curse God and die!" It's the dim, dull, obnoxious pains that are of very little consequence to anyone but ourselves that cause me (us?) so much trouble. Where big pain screams, little pain whispers. Where big pain is obvious, little pain throws in subtleties. Thus, "little stuff" is a misnomer. If little stuff were seen as it really is, the reason why it gets to me is obvious: it really isn't all that little.
I once used the analogy of a man who is offered the option to jump over a cliff only to realize he has already done so. The analogy was intended to describe a person who faces a blatant temptation and, standing on the edge of committing something terrible, realizes his heart had been turned against God in anger long before. So it is with an angry response to pain. My brother irritates me; I respond in anger, and then I am guilty the rest of the day. Perhaps I only snapped a "no" or "go away," but the memory is bitter with guilt not only because I just committed something wrong, but because I am now aware of a long-standing disposition of hatred towards God. This hatred is not limited to one action of anger. It is preceded by a host of uncorrected and long-cherished sins of the heart against my thrice-holy Redeemer.
So I not only obsessed with feeling good, but I have been buying into this anti-God obsession for a very long time. No wonder there is a deep fountain of bitterness in my heart that wells up and out against God every time something small and painful bounds into my life. My problem with pain turns out to be (as most sins do) a problem with God. As Orual discovers in 'Til We Have Faces, having a problem with God does not mean God has a problem. When I hate God, it is not because He is deserving of my hatred, but because I do not believe He is able at once to love me and to give me pain. When I hate God it is not because He deserves my hatred, but because I would rather be healthy than cling to Him as my Healer. When I hate God it is not because He deserves my hatred, but because I find my identity and security in how I feel rather than what He has promised to feel toward me: love, for all eternity, without alteration or retraction. God is not the problem. Like Orual, I am the problem.
If I am the problem, then I am certainly not the cure, nor can my efforts toward one have any effect. I have before resolved in my heart, time and again, to be quiet - to refrain from murmuring - to focus all my effort on keeping my mouth shut when I know the pain is at just the right level to induce anger. This, I can say with absolute assurance, does nothing. I cannot make myself stop being bitter. The sickness goes much deeper than raging, discontent appearances, and so must the cure be infinitely deeper than a placid and content outward disposition.
For this hatred of an infinite God and the obsession with lying to myself about my finitude - for these wells of bitterness and unbelief that come from the continual harboring of sin at its subtlest, most deadly form, there is only one cure - "only" one, but what a cure! Pain, which once whispered to my soul words of sedition and rebellion, now is the means to plant of a flag of truth within the fortress of my rebel soul (paraphrase of Lewis). The cure is the one who at once plants the flag and is the flag.
He is the one who reconciles us finite beings to an infinite God, so that we may not fear time but live in the hopeful expectation of eternity with Him.
He met sin and pain and death in battle and emerged victorious.
He crushed sin on the cross, and continually crushes it in my life through his intercessory work at the right hand of the Father on my behalf.
He is the Word, the Truth, and as the sharpest of any two-edged swords at once reveals and decimates the subtlest of lies.
The cure is Christ.
"...but God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us."
On that very roundabout note (ha ha), my song for this week is Love Is Here by Tenth Avenue North (and before anyone rolls their eyes, I honestly intended to put this song first before I went to the concert). According to the band, Romans 5:8 (above, bold/italic) provided the inspiration for this - especially the present tense of the verb show.
The title of the song was a bit off-putting for me at first, so I feel a bit of defense is in order. See, I've heard Christians complain - mostly heard myself complain - that too much of Christian music focuses on the love of God and ignores other aspects of truth to much harm. In one sense, I agree. The love of God is but one aspect of God's character, and to assume that it is the only aspect is a very serious error - and repeating vapid declarations of how great we feel with no solid understanding of who God is and what he has done is at once irritating and useless. A song with the title Love Is Here in a time when songs that are abounding in love without any understanding of Who defines love just didn't seem that promising.
At the same time, I disagree with that. Take the following statement (something I've both heard and said myself): "Instead of going on and on about the love of God and how happy we are, more ought to be said about sin - about fighting for holiness - less of this feel-good stuff and more of the Truth." While I have nothing to say against songs with messages about the fight for holiness and Truth, I believe this is a false dichotomy.
The cure is Christ.
"...but God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us."
On that very roundabout note (ha ha), my song for this week is Love Is Here by Tenth Avenue North (and before anyone rolls their eyes, I honestly intended to put this song first before I went to the concert). According to the band, Romans 5:8 (above, bold/italic) provided the inspiration for this - especially the present tense of the verb show.
The title of the song was a bit off-putting for me at first, so I feel a bit of defense is in order. See, I've heard Christians complain - mostly heard myself complain - that too much of Christian music focuses on the love of God and ignores other aspects of truth to much harm. In one sense, I agree. The love of God is but one aspect of God's character, and to assume that it is the only aspect is a very serious error - and repeating vapid declarations of how great we feel with no solid understanding of who God is and what he has done is at once irritating and useless. A song with the title Love Is Here in a time when songs that are abounding in love without any understanding of Who defines love just didn't seem that promising.
At the same time, I disagree with that. Take the following statement (something I've both heard and said myself): "Instead of going on and on about the love of God and how happy we are, more ought to be said about sin - about fighting for holiness - less of this feel-good stuff and more of the Truth." While I have nothing to say against songs with messages about the fight for holiness and Truth, I believe this is a false dichotomy.
See, there is no difference between fighting to know God loves us and fighting to (desire to) be as He is. Time and again the children of Israel are told to Remember! what God has done for them - not because they'll fail their history module and won't earn degrees and be employable, but because without remembering how God acts towards them in love they are doomed to hate everything He does and rebel against His every plan.
The fight to believe God loves us is the fight against sin, and therefore reminders of God's love are equipment for battle (provided they provide a true picture of said love, something TAN's songs do exceptionally well). Those who hear songs about the love of God and respond with only fuzziness (or even think that the only potential response is fuzziness) are missing something huge. To know that God loves us for who Christ is and not who we are is the battle. As a battle, it is the source of the blood in our mouths and the sweat pouring down our faces and the ache and strain in our muscles. There is nothing feel-good or fuzzy about it.
In The Knowledge of the Holy (ch. 8, "The Infinitude of God"), A.W. Tozer describes the love of God in terms of his infinity:
"The Christian witness through the centuries has been that "God so loved the world . . .”; it remains for us to see that love in the light of God’s infinitude. His love is measureless. It is more: it is boundless. It has no bounds because it is not a thing but a facet of the essential nature of God. His love is something He is, and because He is infinite that love can enfold the whole created world in itself and have room for ten thousand times ten thousand worlds beside."
If I could but cling to the truth that Christ's infinite love can enfold ten thousands upon ten thousands upon ten thousands of worlds, and thus surely is able to at once enfold and soak into every aspect of my life, into the pain and the comfort and all areas in between - would I not have killed the tendency to kick against God's plan? Would I not have killed my obsession with obsessing with things that are not God and clearly were not intended by God to be my Master?
As I began with the futility of earthly medicine, let me end with the all-sufficiency of our heavenly Healer. Christ stands in stark contrast to the obsession with making comfortable. He is not a painkiller designed to numb us into a false state of comfort 'till death destroys us. His cure is not free from pain, but once complete it will free us from all the pains of sin and death.
This cure is to be found in knowing that love is here - love measureless and boundless and infinite, and not love in some nebulous, dim sense. The love that has come is Love as defined by the nature of God and demonstrated by Christ in His death and life.
Such a Love is here, it is now - and here and now it is ours in Christ.
Such a Love is here, it is now - and here and now it is ours in Christ.
So we have come to know and to believe the love that God has for us. God is love, and whoever abides in love abides in God, and God abides in him. -1 John 4:16
I've totally missed your posts like this, Anna. Especially as I work to prepare a speech about a painful chapter in my life . . . just as the very time when that painful chapter rolls around again. It ain't just physical pain, sometimes it's emotional too.
And I love how you talked about the Holiness of God. I just read Sproul's book on that. Wow. It was quite . . renewing, in a sense, and helped me start thinking about *all* of the aspects of God, especially as I work through the Old Testament in Bible Lit class. =)
That was a significant post :)
I can't really comment except to share what I feel.
It is very easy and tempting to curse the cold, the ache, or anything like that. In doing so we curse God who allowed it. Yet I think that it's pride that really is the culprit here since we feel that we deserve to be healthy all our lives, we're good people and we should enjoy life and not have to worry about feeling under the weather.
That's the completely wrong outlook. I've started taking advantage of the times when I am sick to thank God that I'm healthy for 99% of the time or that it's not as bad as it could be. Why am I not incapacitated and unable to earn a living for for months at a time? Why are all of my illnesses only of the type that I can still go to Church and work? Due to the Fall and my own sinfulness I certainly deserve it! I think of it as a reminder that perhaps I was depending on my own strength and taking His blessings for granted.
Then again, currently I don't live with a family so I don't have anyone to try my patience.
Perhaps this is a very simplistic way of looking at things. As far as I know I don't share in the same struggle so I feel rather distant. However, I hope it does help and that we both learn to rely on Christ's strength through our own weaknesses. I certainly have plenty of those!
Thank you for challenging me again, Inky. I always feel guilty after I read because I don't see the truth this clearly--I don't believe it, and I don't want to believe it. Thankfully, Christ is the one who opens the eyes of the blind and the ears of the deaf.
Anna--Thank you SO MUCH for reflecting on this. Lately it's been on my mind.
Let me start by saying that I think it would be equally miserable to be famous for your pain and suffering. Perhaps not you, but I would feel more peevish than usual if I had my leg broken in four places. You know.
Pain is Satan's way of saying that sin is an undefeated enemy. Through pain the enslavement of sin takes on a monstrous appearance. I am tempted to believe that the misery of sin is controlling me. I'm living the curse--I'm fragile, hurting, dying. There's but a small step from there, to a full-out spite of God.
Yesterday I was talking with some friends about why old people sometimes become extremely cranky or bitter. "They didn't start out that way," my friend said--and as I looked at the three of us it occurred to me that the pain of life changes us. People who used to be happy become cynical and bitter. People who were great at reaching out become needy and self-focused. Pain needles at us, nags, says we should give up hope. We give in to our old task-master.
You describe the remedy so well: to remember the fierce, fighting love of God. Christ became a curse for me. He bore my sin, and He bore the pain that came along before it, after it, around it... His salvation is healing. That's what the word means. And after Satan is locked in Hades with the consuming anger of God around him, I still remain in the hands of Christ.