If you’re like me, you’ve probably found yourself guilty of minimizing difficult situations that others go through when the other person seems to be much better off than you are. For example, I once spoke with somebody that talked about losing ‘several’ of their homes in a California fire. If I’m honest with myself (and you, the reader) I didn’t feel as much sympathy for that person as I probably should have.
I think it’s part of the [imperfect] human spirit to feel a sick measure of pleasure when seeing somebody ‘better off’ suffer. It’s one of the reasons that tabloids print money writing about the divorce stories of ‘perfect’ celebrities. In a lot of ways, this sort of healing-at-the-expense-of-others-better-off is a terribly destructive way to live, and I’ll be the first one to admist that I’ve been guilty of this trait at various points in my life.
Hell, there are a lot of things that I’m not proud of. This blog isn’t the time to open up that vault, however.
I don’t think people are entirely wrong when they fail to believe that somebody better off than them is suffering. Why? Because that person first starts with the position that the other is somehow…better off; better, richer, better looking, happier, more successful or even nicer.
To some degree, I think this mindset can extend to the way that we connect and relate with God. For example, God is this magnificent, all-powerful, omninpotent, perfect and pure being that we humans can never wrap our finite minds around – any more than an ant will be able to build – much less, drive – a Ferarri.
The size and capabilities of the ant don’t make it an inferior being to the Ferrari – given that the Ferarri doesn’t have a beating heart or brain.
On the other hand, the complexity and speed of the Ferrari don’t mean it’s more significant than the ant in the grand scope of things. In fact, one could argue that it’s far less significant in that it does nothing to better the health of our plane[t] while the ant, at least, helps the natural order of things in the ecology.
Ants and Ferrari’s aside, I’ve found myself on the difficult end of a situation that recently occurred. What I now call “the nightmare before Christmas’ was an event that shocked, traumatized and broke my spirit in more ways that I can count.
Up until this point of my life, I’ve never gone through a situation that has traumatized me. Christmas Day changed that, and I now count myself among the growing population of people that experience ‘flashbacks’, nightmares and a buckshot blast of minature panic attacks throughout the day that have rendered me a shattered man since the morning of the 25th.
In Saving Private Ryan, there was a scene where a group of soldiers found themselves blocked by barbed wire, while being mowed down by heavy machine gun fire. Trapped and without a way out, suddenly a man from the back of their troop ran in front of them and threw himself on top of the barbed wire, shouting:
“OVER ME!”
The men were saved, because they stepped on the back of the man who offered his body as the shield between the razor wire. Every man that ran over him pushed the sharp metal edges deeper into his flesh, ultimately costing him his life.
To some degree, I understand now what happenes when you jump over a razor wire fence, or throw yourself on top of a grenade in order to protect the one[s] you love the most.
This evening while I was cleaning, I prayed about the circumstance that had occured – feeling as if I were still picking out the shrapnel from my guts in the aftermath of what occurred.
That’s when I found myself guilty of the condition I first wrote about; thinking that ‘better’ beings don’t feel the same pain that I do.
“God, what could you ever know about betrayal? Being traumatized? Having your back stabbed?” I thought.
“Bro. I got sold for 30 pieces of silver by one of my closest friends.” Jesus replied.
Rarely do I experience nearly-audible messages from God. However, I did tonight and It hit me like a load of bricks.
Suddenly, I started to understand a deeper level of why Jesus came to Earth. It wasn’t just to heal the sick, flip tables in the temple or to throw shade at the religious elect at the time; it was to feel pain. Our pain.
See, if God were just this almighty being in the sky that spoke universes into existence for the fun of it, perhaps I might have been right in doubting His ability to feel or relate to what I’m going through at the moment. However, when He came to us in the form of Jesus, He signed up to firsthand experience every measure of pain, suffering, betrayal, hunger, thirst and heartbreak that any human could ever experience in this lifetime.
When I look at all of the hurts, failures, pain and suffering I’ve experienced in my life – as well as all of the events I will encounter as I grow older, there’s a part of me that fears there’s a barbed wire fence in front of me that I can’t pass.
And out of nowhere, I see Him push me out of the way and throw Himself on top of that barbed wire….
“OVER ME, AARON!”
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