17th Sunday after Pentecost
2 Corinthians 1:3-7
Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Mother of mercies and the God of all consolation, who consoles us in all our affliction, so that we may be able to console those who are in any affliction with the consolation with which we ourselves are consoled by God. For just as the sufferings of Christ are abundant for us, so also our consolation is abundant through Christ. If we are being afflicted, it is for your consolation and salvation; if we are being consoled, it is for your consolation, which you experience when you patiently endure the same sufferings that we are also suffering.
Our hope for you is unshaken; for we know that as you share in our sufferings, so also you share in our consolation.
Dangerous Ideas
This reading is a strange one. Like our text a few weeks ago in which the author repeats Jesus telling the disciples that they need to be like children in order to go to heaven, here we have the repetition of the word consolation: consolation, consoled, consolation, consoled, in these 5 short verses, it shows up 10 times! And, I think we can all agree that the writing is a little convoluted, at least for our modern English sensibilities. So, before we can go any further, we need to make sure we actually understand, or at least try to understand, what Paul is trying to say here. So, 1. God consoles us in all of our afflictions. Easy enough. 2. God consoles us, so that we can console others. Okay. 3. We console others, with the consolation that God gives us. Getting a little trickier, but I think we’re all still following, right?
You know that thing that happens when you keep saying the same word over and over again until it starts to lose all its meaning? Like it’s just sounds with no connection to a definition or idea? It’s called semantic satiation, and I feel like that’s what’s happening right now with this consolation word, but we’re going to keep going. 4. Christ’s suffering looms large in our minds, but the consolation we receive from Christ is just as significant. 5. Now remember, we’re just trying to figure out what Paul is saying here; I’m not saying that I agree with him. We just want to understand what he’s saying. 5. If we, Paul and Timothy, suffer, it is so that you, the church of Corinth, may be consoled and saved. I’m not really sure how that works, but I think that’s what Paul is saying. 6. If we, Paul and Timothy, are consoled, it is so that you, the church in Corinth, will be consoled, as you suffer what we suffer. 7. We know that you share in our suffering as well as in our consolation.
Don’t let anyone tell you that they are not interpreting the Bible and they only take it literally. There is no way to read 2 Corinthians 1:3-7 without some kind of interpretation. So, what do we do with it?
The thing that stands out for me in this piece of scripture is how Paul treats suffering, almost as if it’s a good thing. For me this gets into some pretty dangerous territory. There’s a problem in religious circles where people have a tendency to attribute suffering to God. I think it’s theologically flawed and has hurt a lot of people, continues to hurt a lot of people. And, this isn’t just an assumption that I’m making, I have seen this with my own eyes. Telling someone that God is testing them, or trying to teach them something, or trying to make them stronger through suffering isn’t really that helpful. It doesn’t help their relationship with God, and it doesn’t make them feel good about what’s going on in their lives.
And, when you take a step back and really think about, the idea that suffering is good and that it comes from an all-powerful, all-loving God doesn’t really make a lot of sense. But, it is a pervasive idea, and it’s even become a part of our culture. We think all kinds of interesting things about suffering. We talk about enduring hardship with a stiff upper lip. We talk about suffering in silence and how suffering builds character. The Chinese have this idea of “swallowing your bitterness,” meaning that you can’t let anyone around know that you’re suffering, because it might make them uncomfortable.
All of these colloquialisms are about living with suffering and not complaining about it. As if the test of how worthwhile and respectable a person is could be measured by how much suffering they’re able to endure before deciding they don’t want to suffer anymore. We look down on people for being soft, for complaining too much, for not being happy with what they have.
My brother invited me to go with him to church, one Sunday. It was a non-denominational congregation, and it was my first time there. The music was great, there were quite a few people, and my brother was really excited to show me what their worship service was like. I didn’t go into that situation worried about what I would see or hear while I was there. The pastor came up and introduced his son, who would be giving the message that day. And again, it didn’t occur to me to be concerned. But then, he started speaking. The heart of his message that day was that suffering comes from people’s dissatisfaction with their lives. He said that people would just be happy if they could accept their lives as they were, if they could just accept what they had instead of wanting more. If they could just accept where God had put them. On the surface, it almost seemed obvious, logical, but I was immediately uncomfortable. I don’t know if he was just being careless with his words, something a preacher can never afford to do, or if he really believed what he was saying, and just hadn’t thought through the consequences of it. What he was saying was dangerous, and I was scared that there were so many people listening to him.
Because that message, that you should just be happy with what you have, it sounds reasonable, at first. But, if you stop to think about what that message is, you realize that idea, that you should just be happy with the way things are, has always been the dominant culture’s message to the oppressed. That message is about holding on to power. It’s about maintaining the status quo.
Because if people were just content to live their lives and accept things the way they are, to accept their suffering, then we would still slavery in this country. We would still have segregation. Women wouldn’t have the right to vote. Women wouldn’t be able to be pastors, and queer people wouldn’t be able to serve in the military or get married. Instead of looking for ways to help our unsheltered neighbors, we would be printing out pamphlets telling them that if they just accepted their situation in life, then they would be happy, and they would suffer no more. If we ignored the suffering of millions of people around the world, if we ignored the impact of climate change to the most vulnerable, then we will be overrun with floods, and drought, and hurricanes, and wildfires, and this planet will no longer be able to support life as we know it. This is a dangerous idea.
As pervasive as this idea of “good suffering” is, I think on some level, probably because God is always with us gently steering us back on course, we know that it’s wrong. When we look back at the what our species has done since we first appeared on the planet, the arc of human history has always been towards more equality, more fairness, more peace. It’s not by chance. It’s not an accident that things are better now, and they better now, despite what the news and social media might want you to think. It’s proof that God is at work, moving through us and among us to make the world a better place.
It was not easy getting here, and we still have a long way to go. There have been a lot of bumps on this road, some of them more terrible than we can imagine. And, even though there are still so very many problems in the world, we have never been safer, there has never been this much peace and stability in the world, and we have never had this much access to food and water. War and starvation used to be the norm. Even still, we are aware of people in our own community who suffer from food insecurity, and have to worry about where they’re going to spend the night when the temperatures start to fall.
It is our job to work with God to bring more justice and more equality into the world. To bring more peace, and to live in the peace and consolation that God brings to us. So even though we worry, even though we’re faced with so much suffering, we need to remember that God is with us. That God loves us, and that God absolutely does not want us to suffer. God wants us to live in peace, and to share that peace with everyone around us. Amen.
~ Rev. Charles Wei
