Sharing the suffering of others

Loving God, your Son Jesus Christ, wept over Jerusalem.
Today, we weep over Ukraine.
We weep for those uprooted from their homes and lives.
We weep for those cowering in basements.
We weep for those who have witnessed death and destruction on their streets.
We weep for those separated from parents, from children, from spouses and siblings.
We are amazed at the resilience of people seeking to comfort those in need and so we pray for Governments opening up borders so that Ukrainians can have safe passage.
We pray for churches and individuals providing food, clothing and shelter.
We pray for medical workers ensuring that shattered bodies are put back together again.
We pray for ordinary Russians demonstrating and voicing their disapproval of the military actions in Ukraine.
May the Holy Spirit give us the willpower to turn our tears into action also.
May we, through our words, prayers and example pursue the things that make for a just peace in the world today and especially in Ukraine.

In the name of Jesus Christ, we pray.

Amen

“Good Friday People” is a profoundly honest and moving book,  that looks unflinchingly at the reality of suffering. 

Following the journey of Jesus towards the Cross, Sheila Cassidy encourages us to walk alongside him and alongside her 'Good Friday people' - a motley group of saints and sinners mysteriously called to share the suffering of Christ. Some them are victims of violence like Archbishop Romero and other caught up in oppression in El Salvador; Victor Jara who was tortured and killed in Chile; the people of Auschwitz. Other suffer physical illness like Fr Jimmy Doherty, a priest with multiple sclerosis; David, a boy with a brain tumour, and Suzi Lovegrove, a woman with AIDS. Sheila Cassidy invites us to share the pain of her Good Friday people, and so to share more deeply in Jesus' story. It is a difficult, often harrowing, journey, but one which takes us beyond the Cross, helping us to meet the risen Christ who is 'permeating the suffering, suffusing the darkness' 

Two quotes that stand out in the way Dr Cassidy sees how care and suffering are paralleled in the Christian life are: “The world is not divided into the strong who care and the weak who are cared for. We must each in turn care and be cared for, not just because it is good for us, but because it is the way things are.” and “More than anything I have learned that we are all frail people, vulnerable and wounded; it is just that some of us are more clever at concealing it than others! And of course the great joke is that it is O.K. to be frail and wounded because that is the way the almighty transcendent God made people.”

God is infinitely interested in the care and comfort of his sons and daughters in all their afflictions. So we are never alone in our suffering, whatever the pain or loss might be.

But notice God’s purpose for his comfort. As we look to God for comfort and hope in suffering, he means to spur us on to comfort others who are being afflicted with the same comfort we’ve received from God.

God comforts us so that we can comfort others.
God grants us mercy so that we can be merciful to others.
God stands whole-heartedly with us in our suffering so that we will stand whole-heartedly with others who are suffering.

God never leaves us alone in our suffering so that we won’t leave others alone in theirs. It’s beautiful when comfort spreads in this way, and it should happen often in the body of Christ. It is sweet to see people redeem their suffering by taking their eyes off of themselves and turning them toward God to find strength, and then toward others to offer the comfort that God provided them.

Thank You, Lord, that You truly are the Father of mercies and God of all comfort, and I pray that just as You have used many of Your children to draw alongside me and accompany me through those troublous times, that You would take my life and use me as a vessel of comfort and solace to others, who are facing similar difficulties and are themselves in need of comfort and help. Use me I pray, to comfort others who are suffering affliction, with the godly comfort with which I myself has been comforted by You. I ask this in the name of Jesus,

Amen