The third in a three-part series of reflections on gifts and lessons that come from seasons of darkness…
The love of God is different from mine. The darkness taught me this.
One of my chief priorities in life is sparing people pain—especially those I love. I’ve been known to pursue this end through a variety of means, some honorable, some less so. I pray for my beloveds to be spared from trials and temptations. Where it’s possible, I throw myself between them and threats—even at times when it’s perfectly clear that the threats are self-induced. I approach truth-telling with extravagant delicacy. (I was never so flattered as when someone told me I was the person from whom she most preferred to hear bad news.) And yes, sometimes I’ve been known to avoid such painful conversations entirely. Because, well, possessing this particular information, however true, would probably just hurt them.
Until fairly recently, it had not truly occurred to me that God might prioritize differently.
Like many people, in seasons of suffering, I’ve been known to ask, “How could a loving God allow this to happen to me (or others)?” The consolation that I’ve learned to find comes from meditation on evil: God did not will or cause this suffering. According to Jesus, evil is an actor on the field, on a mission to steal, kill, and destroy all that’s good. But God is in the business of reclaiming what evil steals and repurposing evil’s wreckage into some new work of mercy.
It’s a hope-giving thought. I believe that it is true. But I also now begin to suspect there is still more to the story of suffering. The suspicion first arose when I found myself in a season of deep darkness of which evil seemed to have no part. To the contrary, no matter where I looked or reached, I sensed only the presence of God. It was God who seemed to be drawing me straight into the heart of darkness.
For months I puzzled over it—why on earth would God bring me here, to this place of desolation? Yet even in the depths of pain, I could not shake the perplexing sensation of loving presence and intent. In a space of soul-wrenching, honest prayer, I caught the first whisper of an answer: Love wanted more for me than I wanted for myself. Love wanted my healing. My wisdom. My freedom. My maturity. My fullness. And the movement toward all these things, at this particular moment, required a kind of dying. Love had drawn me down this pain-filled road because it was down this road that my fullest good lay. And Love was willing to suffer with me rather than spare me—for the sake of the joy set in front of me.
In suffering, I have doubted the love of God. I have never thought to doubt my definition of love.
The love of God is different than mine. It takes no shortcuts. It brooks no lies or illusions. It will not sacrifice long-term goods for short-term gains. It settles for nothing less than each human being fully grown, fully free, fully awake. Sometimes this thought dazzles me. Sometimes it terrifies me. Sometimes it causes me to fall down in wonder and worship. Sometimes it makes me want to run and hide. Truth be told, I’m not always entirely sure I want to be loved so fiercely. And that is the best word I can think of to describe it—the love of God is fierce. It is fierce its determination for my completeness, fierce in its commitment to my true good.
Some darkness is the result of the presence of evil. Here Love endures with us, delivers, redeems. But some darkness is the result of the presence of God. Here Love heals, purges, frees. Here Loves spares us nothing in order to give us everything.
In my moments of greatest weakness, I sometimes wish to be loved more cheaply. But on the other side of darkness, I find I cannot wish that Love had left me less whole. Deeper than my fear of pain, I desire to be what only the darkness can make me—fully mature, completely alive.
Will you forgive me, friends, if I pray the same for you? I pray not that God would spare you all darkness, but that Love would hold you gently while the darkness does its work. I pray that suffering would not break you but increase you. I pray that all your dyings would be in the service of true life.
