Transcript
Here's an important principle of suffering. You never just suffer the thing that you suffer. You always suffer the way that you suffer the thing that you suffer. Now, what does that mean? It means you never come to your suffering empty because you're never empty. We're all interpreters. Everyone of us is a philosopher. Everyone of us is a theologian. Everyone of us is an archeologist and we'll dig through the mound of our existence to try to make sense out of our lives. That's all of us.
The Interpretive Grid You Bring to Suffering
And so, you're always bringing some kind of interpretive grid, some kind of thought structure to your suffering. And the things that you say to you about you, about God, about life during your moment of suffering will either make that suffering a livable experience -- although painful -- or will deepen the angst and the suffering. I think often what we suffer in suffering is not just the thing, but the messed-up way we think about suffering that makes that suffering even darker and more painful.
I say this a lot. I think almost every time I speak, I say this, but it's important to remember that no one is more influential in your life than you are because no one talks to you more than you do. Most of us have learned it's best not to move our lips because people think we're a bit crazy, but you're in a constant conversation with yourself and the things you say to you about you about God, about life are fundamentally important. They're the formative of the state of your emotions. They're formative of your actions.
Psalm 27 is a Psalm of trouble. It's written in some of the darkest of experiences, either when David was fleeing from Saul, who was out to kill him because Saul was jealous, or when he was feeling fleeing his son, Absalom, who was out to take his throne. Gross injustice or gross family betrayal. And Psalm 27 is written in that moment, but what's interesting about Psalm 27 is that it doesn't begin with trouble. It begins with theology. David's saying, "The Lord is my light. The Lord is my salvation. The Lord is my stronghold."
David is trying to say good things to himself so those good things would be the interpretive grid through which he interprets the hardest things we could imagine facing. I would just ask you the question: when the unexpected, the unwanted, the difficult, the hard, when suffering has entered your door, what do you say to you?
