quote: spauline
thank you so much for your kind words. I am very sorry to hear of your back. Gosh, do I know what that is like. when I was younger, I worked at a warehouse and hurt my back, and my mental illness has caused at times for me to be disabled mentally because I hallucinate back trouble that does not exist. I pray that Jesus would be with you in your suffering and help heal your back so that you can better serve Him.
I can surely empathize with having to endure mental illness, Scott. I am severely ill, both psychologically and mentally, and have been, since childhood - some 50 years ago.
Mercifully, my intellect was left untouched by illness.
Thank you for your kind words, about my back healing.
quote: spauline
Perhaps, then, I should refrain from using such harsh words. I just get frustrated at people who have the nerve to think that when other people suffer, it is because āthey donāt have enough faith.ā Obviously, as you indicate, not all evangelicals subscribe to the notion of āif you are faithful to Jesus, you will prosper materialistically, and if you are not, you will suffer.ā Obviously not.
This 'you donāt have enough faith" business, I think of as the
āJobās Friendsā Stance.
Poor Job. There he is, sitting on a pile of refuse, scraping at
his boils, while his āfriendsā are telling him that he must have
sinned! - to be in this shape. [As I recall, God basically said to
these so-called 'friends" - āIāll deal with you, later.ā]
Jobās blessed attitude was:
āThe Lord giveth, and the Lord taketh away. Blessed be the
Name of the Lord.ā
You know what I think? I think that God āentrustedā me with
mental illness. He trusts me to love Him - even in the midst
of psychological confusion and great emotional pain.
When all goes well, in life, thereās not much difficulty in
loving God. But when He took away so much from me,
due to this illness, still I trust, by His grace - and* only*
by His grace.
Every time I catch myself saying āthemā - I pull myself up short
and say āDo not do that. This soul is of infinite value to Him.ā
And I do understand what Francis Thompson, the poet, wrote,
when he asked God:
Ah! mustā
Designer infinite!ā
Ah! must Thou char the wood ere Thou canst limn with it?
When suffering chars oneās life, one becomes like a piece of
burnt wood - charcoal, which charcoal can then draw [limn] or write words.
The question, for one who has been charred, by suffering, then becomes:
What does God wish me to draw or to say?
Thompson was asking God was there not another way to go
about this? [Thompson became a laudanum addict, when he was[/COLOR]
given this substance for an illness, in his youth.]
Alone, with no place to live, he took to selling matches and
newspapers, to keep going. The Catholic publishers,
the Meynells, took Francis in - when Mr. Meynell received from
Francis some poems that Francis had written.
These poems were written on grimy peices of paper,
for Francis was living on the streets of London.
God gives - to those whom He allows to become charred,
through profound suffering - the opportunity to come to know compassion and,
in many instances, empathy - not solely sympathy.
What took me a very long time to learn, Scott, was that I was
not āendorsingā the thought of another, when I could have
compassion toward them - by Godās grace. It took me many many years,
to understand this simple thing. I am not āagreeingā with anotherās positions -
when I pray for them.
May God walk with you, each day and each moment,
in your pilgrimage back to Him. For life really is a pilgrimage,
I think. And the way of the cross is walked daily, as we see
the suffering in the lives of others. Each life is a āstation of the cross,ā in some way, I think.
Kindest regards,
reen
]
Excellent answer, Reen!..
ā¦then all the pennies could pay to replace all the shattered glass in this non bullet free glasshouseā¦