Giving Thanks Even When It Hurts
As a physical therapy student I met a man once who was soon going to pass away from ALS (Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis), a brutal diagnosis. He was young; about the same age as me. His muscles slowly stopped working until he couldn’t walk, or sit, or breathe unsupported. I remember him so well, not because he was suffering (I saw suffering all the time), but because he was so joyful. He gave us the biggest smiles while we worked to strap him to a standing frame and get him upright. He would tell us how amazing we were and he just kept thanking us. He told me I was “awesome” and that he was happy to see us. He was so incredibly thankful through every struggling moment. He would grin the entire time. We would safely and carefully push him to move and exercise. One more rep. One more time. We worked hard to keep him from stiffening up while his muscles wasted away. I know it was so difficult and painful for him.
In the end this man had so little. He wasn’t surrounded by his possessions. In fact he had almost nothing of his own but some clothes and an old ball cap in his room. He hadn’t accomplished a Hollywood success story of a life. He could barely speak above a whisper. In the eyes of the world, he was the very definition of powerless. And yet, the only words on his lips were praise. You would think by looking at his demeanor that he had everything.
It was in those days of working with him that I began to really see that thanksgiving and joy had very very little to do with circumstance.
The Bible says that suffering happens to everyone who lives. No matter what your belief, suffering will come knocking and there is no telling what form or how severe it will be. So why have faith? If by having a relationship with Christ we aren’t sheltered from harm then what does Christianity (becoming like Christ) do for anyone? Why should the hurting people of the world hear the gospel? The answer is hope.
If you believe that all we have is this short life then anything negative that happens in it is devastating. Any time spent saddened, oppressed, inconvenienced, or in pain is the second worst thing that can possibly happen, the worst thing that can happen is death. The result of living this way is a life filled with stress and fear that something could go wrong at any moment. It is also a life that focuses on self because survival and success is the number one goal. I’m not saying all people with this belief are always selfish by any means. Many times they really want everyone else to be happy too because they perceive that to be life’s biggest goal. But what I am saying is the same thing the bible says and my personal experience has confirmed: living this way is exhausting and like chasing after the wind. How can we be thankful if we always believe we are missing something?
What if we believed life was eternal through faith in Christ? What if by believing God’s promise of living forever, redeemed by Christ’s sacrifice, we had absolutely nothing to loose? What if nothing in the universe, not even physical death, could take God’s love away? What if we lacked nothing? What we had all we needed and all time spent on Earth was a blessing? What if time was always on your side? What if even when our bodies fail, even when people walk away from us, even when we suffer, we still had hope? We could be thankful in any situation, in all circumstances. We could celebrate differently.