When Victory Doesn't Come

“I have heard many things like these; you are miserable comforters, all of you! Will your long-winded speeches never end?  What ails you that you keep on arguing?  I also could speak like you, if you were in my place; I could make fine speeches against you and shake my head at you.  But my mouth would encourage you; comfort from my lips would bring you relief."       ~Job 16:2-5

"How did I get here . . . again!?" "I've been through this before - why is it still so hard!?" "Why can't I seem to learn whatever lesson I'm supposed to learn from this so I won't have to go through this any more!?" "Why doesn't God answer my prayer and take this away?" 

Have you ever found yourself in the midst of a trying circumstance wrestling with any (or all) of these questions?

Yeah.  Me too.

When I'm in pain or feeling frustrated, first I want empathy - compassionate acknowledgement from another human being that what I'm going through is hard; and then I want a way out - a tried and true solution that I can control; some ethereal truth I can apply to conquer my circumstance so that I, in all of my insight and wisdom, can rise above my troubles in victory, and be done with them!  (Don't we all!?)  

But that kind of victory doesn't always come as easily as I'd like (and sometimes not at all), leaving me to wonder if there may be times when these questions and this search for a solution may be too narrowly focused.  Perhaps, contrary to what our dauntless, self-reliant minds like to believe, not all struggles we (or others) face are simply problems to be solved.  And while there are undoubtedly many circumstances in which "lessons learned" can definitely make life easier, perhaps achieving an easier life isn't always wisdom's highest aim.

In one of his letters to the church in Corinth, Paul (arguably one of the most insightful and faith-filled men in the Bible) makes reference to a struggle he was having with what he described as a "thorn in the flesh."  While he doesn't make it clear exactly what his source of frustration was, he does make it clear that the struggle was ongoing, and that, wise, devout, and faith-filled as he was, even fervent prayer wasn't making it go away:  "Three times I pleaded with the Lord to take it away from me."   (2 Corinthians 12:8)

And evidently, God's answer didn't seem to be, "When you've finally learned your lesson, this will stop happening."  Nope. According to Paul, God told him, "My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness."  (2 Corinthians 12:9)  So pretty much, God said, "While I do promise to be with you, and offer you grace to bear up under this difficulty, you're just going to have to learn to live with this one."  (my paraphrase)

Yikes!  That's not the answer I'd want to hear!  

Based on Paul's multiple requests, I'm pretty sure it wasn't what he wanted to hear, either, and as if to add insult to injury, his conclusion as to the purpose of the ongoing struggle he was facing doesn't sound very complimentary:  "Therefore, in order to keep me from becoming conceited, I was given a thorn in my flesh . . ." (2 Corinthians 12:7)

Ouch!

Gratefully - for him and for us - Paul was able to get past his initial disappointment to recognize that sometimes God's purpose in allowing us to struggle is bigger than simply teaching us a lesson so that we can climb ever higher on the scale of wisdom and success in avoiding negative life consequences. Paul's calling encompassed being an effective teacher and comforter of others in the midst of their own struggles, and as he looked to God for wisdom, Paul was enabled to see that the arrogance that inevitably comes with forgetting what it's like to struggle would get in the way of his ability to live out his purpose (and can make a person a real jerk).  

Like it or not, you and I both know it's true.

I mean, we've ALL had experiences when we've gone to someone for empathy and comfort in the midst of a struggle and have been met with pat answers and "common sense" maxims offered from a "one up" position, supposedly earned by experience.  And it's pretty undeniable that, even in cases where there may be a grain (or more) of truth in the admonition, a less-than-sympathetic delivery (or worse, a smug superior one) renders the message ineffectual, because it's really hard to receive truth from someone who seems out of touch with the difficulty of what we're going through (especially from those who can't seem to own that they struggle at all).

And I don't know about you, but being an arrogant and ineffectual "miserable comforter" is not who I want to be, either.

So, with this in mind, when met with a personal struggle that doesn't seem to be going away no matter how much "wisdom" or "prayer" I throw at it, I pray that God will give me the presence of mind and insight He gave to Paul, so that I may be enabled to humbly join him in saying, "Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ’s power may rest on me.  That is why, for Christ’s sake, I delight in weaknesses, in insults, in hardships, in persecutions, in difficulties. For when I am weak, then I am strong."  (2 Corinthians 12:9-10)

And when others come to me for support in the midst of a frustration or struggle they're going through, I pray that God will give me grace to listen with compassion and to encourage with humility, remembering full well that I'm not above struggling with stuff, either.

(And if I don't - please feel free to remind me!  I need that, sometimes.)