Breakers and Waves
When Suffering Keeps Coming
“Constant raindrops wear away stones, and the bravest minds feel the fret of repeated affliction.”
On March 8, 1971, Joe Frazier and Muhammed Ali went toe-to-toe at Madison Square Garden in New York City. The bout lasted fifteen grueling rounds and has been called “The Fight of the Century.” In the final round, Frazier caught Ali with a vicious right hook that sent him down to the canvas. While Ali was able to get back on his feet, the fight was all but over. A few minutes later, the judges declared Joe Frazier the unanimous winner, and, as they say, the rest is history.
What is not well known though, is that Frazier ultimately won the fight because of his strategy in the earlier rounds. Because he had a shorter reach, Frazier was able to get close enough to Ali to pummel him with body blows throughout the fight. If you are new to boxing, body blows are repeated punches to the torso that wear a boxer down over the course of a fight. They cripple the body, crush the fighter’s spirit, and oftentimes lead to that KO. When you watch the ESPN highlights of a fight though, it’s typical for them to focus on the killer, knockout punch. The shot that seals the win for the victor and sends the loser home or to the hospital.
Body blows may not be as sexy on the highlight real, but they are a brutal and deadly weapon for a fighter to have in the arsenal.
Mounting Trials
I say that to say this: for many of us, suffering often feels more like never-ending body blows than a Mike Tyson uppercut. Some days are so tragic that you just know life will never be same: a diagnosis, the death of a loved one, or unexplainable tragedy. These events freeze time and change our lives forever. Day to day though, it’s normally the slow rise of the tide that starts to break us down. The waves begin small, barely nipping our ankles, and it’s relatively easy to keep on moving. Because when things are going well—your marriage is good, your life has some real stability to it, and you’ve got money stashed in your savings account—when that’s the case, you can wade through a tough conversation with your boss or stomach being wiped out for a week by the flu. You’re a resolute individual after all. You may not be a Conor McGregor, but you are a fighter at heart.
But tack on some depression or anxiety to that harder than normal week, and you feel a bit different. Granted, this isn’t the wipe-you-out for three months depression you’ve experienced in the past. It’s more like a dull tooth ache that lingers for two weeks. It makes you let out a small gasp for air, get into the Psalms, and put your hand to the plow. The waves are knee-high now. Are you familiar with this feeling? It’s an all too familiar one for me. At this point, I’m more vocal with the Lord and asking for reprieve. I feel needier than normal, and I don’t always like that. Sometimes he grants me relief quickly at this stage. The melancholy lifts, I’m back in a good routine, and my version of the good life continues.
Identifying exactly how long these trials might last or high they mount is not the main point of this post though. What I want to establish, is that while suffering ultimately intends to take no prisoners and choke the life out of you, it often does it one shot at a time.
Broken Hearts
We need wisdom to navigate suffering that lingers, and King Solomon is one of the best places to turn for that. Solomon asks an important, rhetorical question in Proverbs 18. He has just made it clear that a man’s spirit can endure sickness (Prov. 18:14), from which we can infer that there is something deep inside of us that can persevere through certain types of illnesses. We all know that depending on the severity, physical illness can be debilitating. Solomon, (nor I), am trying to minimize that. But ultimately, the preacher uses this first statement to set up his reader with a tantalizing question. He asks, “Who can bear a crushed spirit?” (Prov. 18:14).
The obvious answer is no one can bear it. What Solomon is getting at is that there is an inner pain we experience that can even outweigh severe, physical pain. The physical trauma may very well be what sparks the emotional spiral, but if you put them both on the scale, the results aren’t even close. The crushed spirit wins out every time. C. S. Lewis captures this in his book The Problem of Pain: “Mental pain is less dramatic than physical pain, but it is more common and also more hard to bear. The frequent attempt to conceal mental pain increases the burden: it is easier to say, “My tooth is aching” than to say, “My heart is broken.”[1]
The Triune God has given us bodies, minds, hearts, and wills. When any of these four are knocked out of whack, the others suffer. The big deal with our spirit (which is synonymous for heart) is that it is our human operating system. Crush a person’s operating system and you crush the person. Total shut down will be inevitable. That’s one reason Solomon also tells us to keep talons around our hearts—the stakes are simply too high not to guard them viciously (Proverbs 4:23).
This is a vital point when your suffering ramps up. If you are not careful, multiplying trials will break your heart quickly, because you simply won’t have time to catch your breath. One wave after the next will leave you gasping for air and disoriented. That’s the image we are given in Psalm 42, and it’s why I’ve titled this post Breakers and Waves:
Deep calls to deep
at the roar of your waterfalls;
all your breakers and your waves
have gone over me (Psalm 42:7).
This is not a pleasant swim—it’s a violent riptide. Before you’ve even had time to process one pain, the next arrives. And if your heart is crushed, your will is already out the window and your mind might be next. Our strength to persevere is directly tied to the current condition of our inner self. That’s one reason the afflicted Psalmist not only asks the Lord to hear his cry, but also to strengthen his heart (Psalm 17:14).
When the Stars Disappear
The harsh reality is that when the current of suffering intensifies to a certain degree, it finally pulls us all-the-way-under. Immersion in affliction will at times lead to a waning heart, or, as the Psalmist coins it, “a failing heart” (Psalm 73:26). In these moments, all we have to stand on is the undiluted truth of God’s Word, because whatever sense of feeling we had left has now gone totally numb.
More than ever, when we are surrounded by total darkness, we need truth with spine; we need to hear a better word; we need light. When the stars disappear, we still have to find our way home. Light is a dominant metaphor in the Bible, and it is one we would do well to trace when the pain in our lives just keeps coming. Here is a brief sketch of how light is described in the Scriptures:
The Word of God is repeatedly referred to as light:
· Your word is a lamp to my feet and a light to my path (Psalm 119:105).
· For the commandment is a lamp and the teaching a light (Prov. 6:23).
· Send out your light and your truth; let them lead me; let them bring me to your holy hill and to your dwelling! (Psalm 43:3).
God himself is the source of light and the one who brightens our path:
· God is light (1 John 1:5).
· For with you is the fountain of life; in your light do we see light (Psalm 36:9).
· For it is you who light my lamp; the Lord my God lightens my darkness (Psalm 18:28).
· The poor man and the oppressor meet together; the Lord gives light to the eyes of both (Prov. 29:13).
Jesus Christ, The Word made flesh, is light:
· Again Jesus spoke to them, saying, “I am the light of the world. Whoever follows me will not walk in darkness, but will have the light of life” (John 8:12).
· The true light, which gives light to everyone, was coming into the world (John 1:9).
· I have come into the world as light, so that whoever believes in me may not remain in darkness (John 12:48).
The Holy Spirit brings light:
· I do not cease to give thanks for you, remembering you in my prayers, that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory, may give you the Spirit of wisdom . . . having the eyes of your hearts enlightened (Eph. 3:16–18).
Finally, in the New Jerusalem, the Lamb will be our light:
· And the city has no need of sun or moon to shine on it, for the glory of God gives it light, and its lamp is the Lamb (Rev. 21:23).
The effect light can have on our broken, numb hearts cannot be overemphasized. Solomon says, “The light of the eyes rejoices the heart, and good news refreshes the bones” (Prov. 15:30).
When you are pummeled by the waves of suffering, when some of the lights in your life begin to fade—whether your health or relationships or job security or just the general pleasures of this world—when that happens (not if), the Word of God will light up your darkness. You will come to find out that the Jesus dwells in the darkness, he dwells in the waves, he dwells in you. That doesn’t mean the pain won’t feel or be unbearable at times. But it does mean it’s possible to find our way through.
*Next week, I’ll add Part Two to this post
1. C. S. Lewis, The Problem of Pain (New York, NY: Harper One, 2001), 161.
