When Hope Makes The Pain Feel Worse

I was thinking about the post I wrote the other day about the homeless young lady, Britney. It took me back to the lowest moments in my life, and made me wonder about the millions of people around the world who might consider those moments their high points. Stumbling across a news article last night about the genocide occurring in Darfur over the last twenty years reminded me of that painful time. How could I have felt that low compared to entire villages being wiped out with reckless savagery?

There is no comparison, yet, there is a moment when your pain is so overwhelming, when you’ve been set back and disappointed so many times, that it becomes easier to wallow in despair than to be hopeful about anything. The anticipation of the inevitable letdown—when hope fails to materialize—is too much to bear. In fact, hope becomes painful. It offers a moment of clarity where your losses come into full view, and the habit of losing shouts, “Don’t even hope; the loss will be worse. Accept your fate and suffer.”

Viktor Frankl would have us find meaning in our suffering, and I would agree. Yet sometimes the search for meaning only brings more hope, and that hope makes us feel even worse. So, the only places we can escape are in the things that help us forget: the drugs, the anger, the sex, the alcohol—you name it.

I could go on about pain and despair. But I what I really want to talk about is how do we rise from that level of despair? And even more, how do we help someone else rise from that level of despair?

The answer is two sides of the same coin. You cannot do it alone. You need help, and you need to help others. It takes a commitment from someone else to walk with you, to help you overcome the paralysis of despair and find hope again. And when you’re able, you must do the same for someone else.

This is what community does at its best. It’s when a storm destroys your farm and everyone from church shows up to rebuild it. It’s when you lose your home and your friends and relatives give you a place to stay until you’re back on your feet. It’s when a spouse or child dies and one after another, people come to visit, bringing food and checking on you.

For so many, that expectation of hope is fading. For even more, it is hope they have never had. And without it, they quickly learn not to hope. The cavalry wasn’t coming because there was no cavalry.

I think this is just one of the many reasons Jesus spent so much time focusing on the poor. They need more than our money and charity—they need our time. We need to understand that they truly are a reflection of us, and if we don’t do what we can to lift them up from where they lie, who are we?

Equally so, the poor in spirit—a family member or friend struggling with addiction, financial difficulties, or just hard times in a million different ways. To make hope real for them, we must be willing to encourage and walk with them, to give them what they need even if it means sacrificing something of our own.

People like to ignore the hard words of scripture when, in fact, they are the clearest:

Luke 3:11 – “He answered and said to them, ‘He who has two tunics, let him give to him who has none; and he who has food, let him do likewise.’”

Luke 12:33-34 – “Sell what you have and give alms; provide yourselves money bags which do not grow old, a treasure in the heavens that does not fail, where no thief approaches nor moth destroys. For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.”

Luke 16:13 – “No servant can serve two masters; for either he will hate the one and love the other, or else he will be loyal to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon.”

Matthew 5:3 – “Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.”

Matthew 5:42 – “Give to him who asks you, and from him who wants to borrow from you do not turn away.”

Mark 10:21 – “Now brother will deliver up brother to death, and a father his child; and children will rise up against parents and cause them to be put to death.”

1 John 3:16-18 – “By this we know love, because He laid down His life for us. And we also ought to lay down our lives for the brethren. But whoever has this world’s goods, and sees his brother in need, and shuts up his heart from him, how does the love of God abide in him? My little children, let us not love in word or in tongue, but in deed and in truth.”

James 1:27 – “Pure and undefiled religion before God and the Father is this: to visit orphans and widows in their trouble, and to keep oneself unspotted from the world.”

Psalm 34:6 – “This poor man cried out, and the Lord heard him, and saved him out of all his troubles.”

There are many verses saying the same thing: it is not your treasure, it is God’s, and your job is to use it to help others. I promise you, this is clearer in scripture than any theological discussion on baptism, the Lord’s Supper, election, salvation, hell, or any of the other issues we argue about, which have spawned thousands of denominations over the years. But helping your brother and sister—especially those most in need—is pretty dang clear. And you must help until it hurts, even if it costs you something. What a world this would be if all churches and believers united in the cause of helping the poor and all our brothers and sisters in need.

And to those reading this who are currently residing where I have been—a place of despair where hope only makes the pain feel worse—my advice is this: throw yourself at Jesus with abandon, demand He help you, and then use that grace to throw yourself at others with abandon. Fly around until something sticks, and walk the path out of hell with at least one other person by your side. You will be disappointed and face setbacks. But it only takes one friendship or one commitment of true love and Christian faith to begin your journey to the light. Someone out there will walk the walk and treat you like the prodigal. Don’t give up.

Most of us don’t consider nearly enough how radical we are called to be as Christians. Be radical today—take off your Sub-Zero jacket and give it to that homeless person on the corner, give your car to that widow who just lost a child, pay off the debt of your friend who has been laid off, invite into your home that woman and her children who have been abused and have nowhere to go—radical, maybe; Christian, definitely; and in that space, will you find God, absolutely.