As I re-read the article in the print edition of the Journal, I experienced several things.
First, I remember how the project felt like a new kind of collaboration with Jesus. It was difficult for me to find time to write, let alone believe I had something worth saying. At least one mentor heard my idea and thought it was not relevant or scholarly enough, so I gave up on it for a few months. The burden I felt returned, so I kept thinking and praying about it. It was quite formative to lift it up to Jesus, hear his responses and to get to work on it in trust that he was with me and for me. Actually deciding to write with the Lord's help was a huge step for me, believing that I had something unique to say.
Second, my hyper-critical editor self came surging out, finding everything wrong with it that could be found. I'm not saying there isn't a time and place for editing, there is; but there is also a time to let it go as it is and trust it will accomplish something good. In the midst of such esteemed writers, I felt very, very small and incapable.
I brought this too to the Lord and felt his smile; he likes the imperfections because if the article has beauty and strength in it for others, then it is because of something other than polished perfection.
Third, related to the above, I felt a strange mixture of shame for being seen alongside the desperate longing to be noticed. This is nothing new to me, but becomes more intense when I engage in something public - writing or speaking, etc.
The Lord has been stabilizing my heart and granting me grace to let go of outcomes. I pray that others might find hope and help in my ramblings. I will post it in two parts due to length, but you can order print copies or subscribe here.
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Learning Lament between
the Paws: Walking with Aslan through Pain and Suffering
by Scott Holman, M.T.S
Introduction
"Son of Adam,"
said Aslan. "Are you ready to undo the wrong that you have done to my
sweet country of Narnia on the very day of its birth?"
"Well, I don't see
what I can do," said Digory. "You see, the Queen ran away and -
"
"I asked, are you
ready?" said the Lion.
"Yes," said
Digory. He had had for a second some wild idea of saying "I'll try to help
you if you'll promise to help my Mother," but he realized in time that the
Lion was not at all the sort of person one could try to make bargains with. But
when he had said "Yes," he thought of his Mother, and he thought of
the great hopes he had had, and how they were all dying away, and a lump came
in his throat and tears in his eyes, and he blurted out:
"But please, please
- won't you - can't you give me something that will cure Mother?" Up till
then he had been looking at the Lion's great feet and the huge claws on them;
now, in his despair, he looked up at its face. What he saw surprised him as
much as anything in his whole life. For the tawny face was bent down near his
own and (wonder of wonders) great shining tears stood in the Lion's eyes. They
were such big, bright tears compared with Digory's own that for a moment he
felt as if the Lion must really be sorrier about his Mother than he was
himself.
"My son, my
son," said Aslan. "I know. Grief is great. Only you and I in this
land know that yet. Let us be good to one another.”[1]
Young Digory Kirke is in a bind. He desperately
wants to find a way to save his mother who is dying from an illness and he thinks
Aslan can help; but he also has to own up to harmful choices he has made. He is
feeling torn apart by it all. As we eavesdrop on this scene from Narnia, we see
lament at work. Lament is a desperate expression of grief, sorrow and loss. It
is a useful tool to give voice to the pain one is experiencing, and it is a
very human means of asking for relief, help and wisdom. It is the
primary way persons have to incorporate difficult and traumatic experiences
into their stories. Through lament, Digory connected with Aslan the Great Lion,
and found something more precious than relief; he discovered shared intimacy.
In the intimacy of shared experience with Infinite Goodness, there is a beauty
that pierces deeper than pain.[2]
Placing Lament in Story
The
revelation of God in Scripture is told in the form of a story - one vast,
beautiful story centering on and culminating in the person and work of Jesus
Christ. Within the broad strokes of this
Story, we are presented with a variety of other literary genres that serve as
lenses and connecting points between us and God. Since this is the way God chose
to make himself known, we can assume that a great variety of genres are what is
required for us to become entirely human, whole and holy before God in Christ.
We need to be taught how to worship God, so we are given psalms, prophecies,
laws and poetry. We need to be schooled in joy, so we are given history, gospel
and song. Poetry, story and particularly lament are given to us to provide
space and language to bring our losses to God.
We were designed to have a richly interactive
relationship with a Trinitarian God, where every aspect of our day to day lives
gets taken up and immersed in the intimate life of the Triune God. Such a life
becomes eternal because it becomes united with God’s life. Though we
lost this with-God life in the fall, it is restored through union and
communion with Christ. Indeed, this immersion into eternal life occurs over a
lifetime of trusting in Jesus in all the ways that it is possible to trust a
person, which includes pouring out one’s soul to God through various means and
practices.
Arise, cry
out in the night,
as the watches of the night begin;
pour out
your heart like water
in the presence of the Lord. (Lamentations 2:19a, NIV)
Trust in
him at all times, you people;
pour out your hearts to him,
for God is our refuge. (Psalm 62:8 NIV)
In the
course of this interactive life, many deaths are required to fully embrace the
Kingdom of God. As Paul and Barnabas reminded the believers of Asia Minor, “We
must go through many hardships to enter the kingdom of God” (Acts 14:22 NIV).
We are addicted to the running of our own kingdoms, so suffering often
accompanies us in our journey toward Christlikeness. It is one of the most
formative elements we encounter as we live life this side of Eden. Yet, it remains
one of the least understood elements. How does suffering and loss fit into a
curriculum for Christlikeness? How does lament help form us? In order for the
Spiritual Formation movement to maintain traction with ordinary people (the
kind of people Jesus hung around) then we must venture into how we can bring
our sufferings to God in such a way that, through them, we are made more like
Jesus.[3]
In our
day, we don’t know how to suffer well. We feel pressure to maintain some
semblance of strength, wisdom and control. We avoid pain at all costs or as
something to get through or “get over.” Not only do we avoid pain, but we
assign incredible value to happiness that is pain-free.[4] Unfortunately, Christians
seem to be just as ill-equipped as non-Christians in these matters. We typically
do not give space for experiencing and expressing sorrow and loss in our lives
or in the lives of others. Oftentimes our severest sufferings are due to the
fact that we are not free to suffer. The cruciform life of God in Christ does
not allow for such a position. Jesus on the Cross has forever redefined how we
see and experience suffering. We cannot avoid it, for in the Christ life,
suffering always precedes glory.
As we
walk with Christ we repeatedly experience circumstances beyond our control that
strip us of clarity, control and comfort. This world can feel like a cruel and
arbitrary place! We need help connecting with God in our pain. Further, we
require instruction in how to integrate our darkest experiences into our
overall life with God so that they do not own us. If we don’t engage in
practices like lament, the result may be orphaned parts of ourselves floating
around waiting to be triggered and overwhelm us. What we disown may come to own
us. Thus, whether or not we engage in lament practices will have a profound
bearing on our spiritual formation in Christ. The best place to begin is a
learning posture in the presence of a trusted, safe and wise Master.
Discipleship
and Loss
A
disciple is a learner, or apprentice, that is with someone else who knows how
to do something. As they are with the teacher or master, they become like them.
Thus, a disciple of Jesus is with Jesus learning to be like him. It involves
having a vision of how Jesus would live my life, if he were I. This obviously
involves all of life, the good and the bad, the joys and the sorrows. Without
the context of this learning relationship, and all the humility it affords,
attempts to engage in spiritual disciplines (including lament) will likely
result in one more project that I engage in to maintain clarity, control or
comfort.
Dallas
Willard used a “golden triangle of spiritual growth” diagram (Fig. 1) to try to
capture the essential components involved in our life with Jesus. At the top of
the triangle is the person and work of the Holy Spirit. On the right bottom
corner are our planned disciplines to “put on a new heart.” On the bottom left
corner is our daily trials, our everyday lives which contain all sorts of
beauties and dangers, joys and sorrows. Disciplines like lament (bottom right)
can help ground our everyday experiences (bottom left), especially the darker
more painful ones, into the life and work of God (top).
Fig. 1[5]
Lament
as Spiritual Discipline
Lament
can be a disciplined form of prayer that connects our dark and painful
plotlines to the ongoing work of Jesus through the Spirit. As disciples of
Jesus, we look to Jesus to teach us what lament is and how it is to be
expressed. We are with Jesus learning how to suffer, to see how he did it so
that we can become the kinds of person who also suffer in faith.[6]
We can learn to express our sorrows as he did as he struggled with the will of
God.
Obstacles
to Overcome
Unfortunately, the people who most need this
discipline – the most broken and hurting among us – often seem the least able
to access it. The severely wounded and traumatized person often faces
significant obstacles giving voice to their pain. We have removed lament from
our liturgies and homes with the result of either great guilt (something wrong
with me) or great denial (just keep pretending everything is ok).
“Obviously, what we must never
do is get over it as soon as possible or make as little of it as we can. ‘Get
over it’ and ‘make little of it’ are unbiblical and inhuman. Denial and
distraction are the standard over-the-counter prescriptions of our culture for
dealing with loss; in combination, they’ve virtually destroyed the spiritual
health of our culture. The societal effect is widespread addiction and
depression.”[7]
If our
access (conceptual and experiential) to Jesus has been hijacked by
psychological baggage, we will likely need extra help to trust him enough to
pour out our souls to him in the way above described. Metaphors, poetry, songs
and stories are some of the richest means for us to access these realities “by
the back door,” in subversive ways designed to bypass defenses without
triggering them. Sin and psychological damage can, and frequently do, prevent
us from accessing the healing presence of God in Jesus.[8]
Many of
the friends I walk with are angry with God at times, though they are afraid to
admit it. Most often they have experienced some trauma or loss and have not felt
free to process it; they have no idea what to do with it. This is compounded by
religious leaders not handling their pain well. I occasionally encourage such
friends to let go of what they think they’re “supposed to do” or what “God
expects from them.” If the timing is right and they’re open to it, I might
suggest they take some time each day to “tell God what they really think.” I
put it that way to try and communicate that God is already with them, right
where they are. The starting place for all of us, always, is engaging with God
from right where we are. In my world, this is what lament looks like – telling
God what we really think – about him, about our stories, and about what we’ve
lived and experienced. Such a lament takes a surge of faith to get past the
initial hurdle of discomfort of speaking like this to a holy God, and often
it’s our presence with others that gives them (and us) the courage to do such
work. Since Jesus has taken all our curses upon himself, there is literally
nothing obstructing us from doing this lament work except our own fears,
expectations and prejudices. In lament I can give myself and others freedom,
space and language to pour out the toxic brew that has been hidden away in my
heart, sometimes for decades. A broken peace often follows such work, enveloped
by a transcendent tenderness that is Trinitarian grace.
In
addition to the obstacle of psychological baggage that we bring, we have an
understanding of grace that also works against a practice of lament that is
interactive and discipleship focused. We have an understanding of grace in our
day that makes us passive consumers of religious goods and services. We can
sustain this consumeristic life as long as it works; once it stops working and
we experience the disorienting pain that comes with it, we have a choice:
become open to other categories, other ideas, other practices or hide the mess
and try harder. It is often a brush with traumatic, acute pain and suffering
that ushers us into a world of responsive interactivity with God that our
rational categories have no room for. I would call this Spiritual Formation.
Whatever we call it, it is vitally necessary for becoming human and maintaining
a viable Christian witness in a world where beautiful and terrible things
happen.
How can we clear away the rubble and dust off
this ancient literary genre called lament? What good is it when your body is
screaming in pain, or when you would almost do anything to end your suffering?
Even more difficult, how do we own and express our losses through lament when
they are tied with wrong conceptions of God and Christ? When a person suffers
religious abuse in the name of God, that person will be less than willing to
talk to God about it unless an alternative metaphor can be introduced that helps
them see God differently.
The character of Aslan in the Narnian
Chronicles can function as a wonderful alternate metaphor. From my own
experience, I discovered the land of Narnia late in life when I desperately
needed help interpreting my story and my world, which had fallen apart. I did
not intend on finding the character of Aslan so compelling, but he seemed to
bypass most of my own defenses and was able to communicate Christ to me in
fresh new ways.[9]
[1] C.S.
Lewis, The Chronicles of Narnia: The Magician’s Nephew (New York, NY:
HarperCollins, 1983), 167-168.
[2] This
is shown in Digory’s own tale. After completing a mission given him by Aslan,
it is written, “‘WELL done,’ said Aslan in a voice that made the earth shake. .
. . But he was in no danger of feeling conceited for he didn't think about it
at all now that he was face to face with Aslan. This time he found he could
look straight into the Lion's eyes. He had forgotten his troubles and felt
absolutely content” (Ibid., 197).
[3] This
is why twelve step programs like Alcoholics Anonymous will always be a
wonderful model for Christian spiritual formation. At it’s best, it takes into
account the regular lives of ordinary people and their brokenness and connects them
with the resources of God.
[4] The
recent Pixar movie “Inside Out” characterized Joy that was detached from sorrow
at first; as the main character (Riley) developed emotionally, sorrow was
incorporated into joy to create a fuller experience of maturity.
[5] Dallas
[6] cf.
Hebrews 12:1-2; 1 Peter 4:1, 12-19.
[7] Eugene
Peterson, Leap Over a Wall: Earthy Spirituality for Everyday Christians
(New York, NY: HarperCollins, 1997), 120.
[8] I am
assuming that the baggage obstructing our access to Jesus is due merely to sin
alone, but also psychological damage in the form of wounds.
[9] C.S.
Lewis once replied to a letter from a concerned mother whose son seemed to love
Aslan more than Jesus. Lewis replied, “Laurence can't really love Aslan
more than Jesus, even if he feels that's what he is doing. For the things he
loves Aslan for doing or saying are simply the things Jesus really did and
said. So that when Laurence thinks he is loving Aslan, he is really loving
Jesus: and perhaps loving Him more than he ever did before.” C.S. Lewis’
Letters to Children, Lyle Dorsett and Marjorie Lamp Mead, eds. (New York,
NY: Touchstone, 1995), 52-53.
Go to Part 2 here.
Go to Part 2 here.
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