When the Lord has given you the bread of suffering
and the water of distress,
he who is your teacher will hide no longer,
and you will see your teacher with your own eyes.
Your ears will hear these words behind you,
“This is the way, keep to it,”
whether you turn to right or left. Isaiah 30: 20-21
All the world’s great religions teach two things is difficult for the earthly mind to accept: suffering is a condition of life and suffering can teach us. Some might say that suffering shapes us. Ask any victim of a violent crime, anyone who has been betrayed, any person alone, and you will be told that the whole world is different for them. And not just the immediate life, but their vision of reality is changed.
We are not talking about a few bad days, of course. We are not talking about a long series of severe annoyances, though many of us seem to equate such as suffering. When we hit the point where everything we eat and drink, everything we take into our bodies and minds is painful, then we are truly in darkness. But we ourselves are not of the darkness. Perhaps it is like Plato’s Cave, except there seems no wise person to show us out.
I love these verses as much for what is not promised as for what is promised. God, through the prophet, does not tell us that in these terrible times we will just be transported away from the cave, and all that is wrong will be made right. But this is where the Holy Spirit, the teacher promised to us by Jesus, can speak to us. And if we open ourselves and listen, we may not be instantly relieved of the hurt and the horror, but we can hear the voice of God guiding us, not by flights, but by deliberate, meaningful steps.
Holy Spirit, help me to open to your direction, to the comforting hand of God leading me through pain. Give me eyes to see others in suffering and give me wisdom to be the agent of your love for them. Amen in Christ.
