Dear Amy,

Why is life so hard?

Consider: the young person, to whom life seems so bleak they turn to self harm to try to anchor to reality; the older person who lives alone, who may go days without speaking with another, having long forgotten what it’s like to give and receive a hug; the faithful believer waiting on the Lord for the fulfilment of a promise, praising him in the heart-breaking years of waiting, or the one crying out for healing and enduring debilitating pain in the waiting and the praising; the grief in the death of a child. Why is life quite so very hard?

Some of this may be a consequence of trying to live apart from the Lord, or simply failing to love one another, but some is not. What of that, then?

Paul writes about this in Romans 8:18-27, in a passage sandwiched between two rather better known and loved celebrations of victory. If you possibly can, read it in The Message. Here’s an extract.

The difficult times of pain throughout the world are simply birth pangs. But it’s not only around us; it’s within us. … These sterile and barren bodies of ours are yearning for full deliverance. That is why waiting does not diminish us, any more than waiting diminishes a pregnant mother. We are enlarged in the waiting. … the longer we wait, the larger we become, and the more joyful our expectancy.

― Romans 8:22-25

There’s much in this world that is anaesthetic. Beware! It may dull the pain, but it will also dull the joyful expectancy. Perhaps only when we bear some pain ourselves can we be of any real use in the Kingdom. It need not be our own, but then it’s not too hard to find someone else’s, and wait with them in that. These are the places where God’s grace is most evident.

Wait with joyful expectancy, Amy! 🙏