Human Pain

                C.S. Lewis start out this chapter of the Problem of Pain with the question of why do we have so much pain in the world.  He first suggested that it is because we have sinful creatures and that sinfulness hurts other people.  However, what about the pain not caused by humans, and why do we have so much power to hurt our neighbors?

                C.S. Lewis then goes on to define good as “to surrender itself to its Creator – to enact intellectually, volitionally, and emotionally, that relationship which is given in the mere fact of its being a creature”.  This is a deep goodness that is beyond human understanding except once they have surrendered themselves.  However, in our world today no one seems to want to fully submit to the Lord.  I think this goes back to our selfishness.  Because we can’t understand the joy we will receive from committing our lives to the Lord we only see the problems it will cause to chasing our own dreams.  Instead of lining up our dreams with the Lords, we want him to line his will up with ours.  He says that we need to “die daily”, because we are still rebellious and sinful at heart.  This dying of ourselves does not come without a cost though.  It is hard to give up our own desires and it takes some time to start trusting God and letting him work in our hearts.  Lewis goes on to explain that we need this pain to provide both fear and pity both of which help us to love and bring us back to the Lord. I have also noticed in my own life that fear can help you to prioritize your life.  For example, when you fear death you want to be more cautious as well as to what are most important before you die.  You realize there are much more important things to do because the sand in our hourglass is falling out.  When God is not with you however, fear can paralyze us.  At times I because too cautious when I have an unhealthy fear.  God teaches us through our pain.  He uses that pain to bring us back to him.  This is an interesting concept.  This is an interesting concept for me to try to understand.  I mean if God works through pain to make us stronger Christians does He intentionally give us pain so we can grow closer to him?  If so than does that mean God wants us to be in pain at least temporarily? Or if it’s just a useful consequence of our sin and God doesn’t want us to have to endure pain that wouldn’t he be in a way stunting us from our growth because our adversities can help us grow in a way our prosperity cannot.  It’s a confusing concept all around.  However, even with all the confusion, it is clear that God can work through our pain to bring us closer to him.

C.S. Lewis also explains that in prosperity we are less willing to give up our own free will in order to follow God’s will.  This reminds me of AA.  One of the pastors at my church is a recovering alcoholic and so we have a very strong AA program and we also incorporate Alcoholics anonymous examples in a lot of our messages.  I specifically remember my pastor talking about how most people who successfully go through AA had to hit rock bottom before the program actually worked.  For some reason we don’t ask for help or a better way unless our way isn’t working at all.  Even if we barely getting by we stubbornly keep up our own way of life, unless we are overwhelmed and can’t do it by ourselves.  That is when we ask for help.  We aren’t all alcoholics, but we are all sinful and it’s easier for us to submit to God’s call for our lives, when we have tried our way and it didn’t work.  When we have no other option we go back to God. 

One more thing I really liked that C.S. Lewis talks about is how easy it is to ignore our sins  though they are impossible to ignore.  He says, “We can rest contentedly in ours sins and in our stupidities; and anyone who has watched gluttons shoveling down the most exquisite foods as if they did not know what they were eating, will admit that we can  ignore even pleasure”. I thought this quote interesting first because it touches on how easy it is for us to take our blessings for granted.  When we aren’t in pain we forget what pain is like.  Also this imagery made me picture how easy it is for us to cause pain to others just by being gluttonous we can be.  By indulging and misusing resources we are keeping others from using those resources. It is easy for us to not consider the consequences of these types of actions and not realize that we can cause pain for others by our own glutton. 

This chapter helped me realize, first, that though we are sinful God can lead us and teach us through that pain. Also, I learned that we must be mindful of what we are doing and not to cause pain to others.  Instead we must die every day to our own sinful desires but instead submit our lives fully to the Lord.