The degenerative & painful pathway to wrinkledom (#1)
Watching a loved one, slowly and painfully wilt away is something few of us ever consider before it hits us. There's wisdom in avoiding that; morose dwelling on the possible consequences of living in this broken world isn't advisable if you wish to remain sane and enjoy life, but we all know that life with throw us some good bits and some tough bits and we all know our trajectory as finite physical beings.
There was a day when looking in the mirror wasn't a nightmare-inducing horror show, but we know the reality: every day our bodies are gradually aging. Pertness goes south and what were once (if ever!) chiselled features, are softened through weathering in life’s storms. And, if we’re married, the same goes for our spouse. On our wedding day, we made the catch-all phrases of our covenant vows – 'in sickness and in health' and 'for better, for worse’. On the day itself, these words easily trip off the tongue without penetrative application. That's ok – married couples can enjoy the heady mist of romance and the joyful celebration of one-flesh union, without venturing into a rabbit hole of despair. But at some point, all of us need to take a moment for a reality check because degeneration is a hallmark of life, and eventually we will hit the ‘in sickness’ and ‘for worse’ part of our lives. Married or not, we try and deny it for a while. We can distract ourselves by buffing up the veneer, but in the end we all realise, as physical beings we are locked into a degenerative, painful pathway to wrinkledom.
So over the next few posts, I will share a few things I have been forced to consider, earlier than anticipated, as I have watched my wife's body wilt away with multiple sclerosis – four wee lessons for the degenerative and painful pathway to wrinkledom.
Lesson 1: It is hard, so fight
Watching a loved one suffer is horrible. The sadness can be overwhelming; there can be a sense of loss and frustration about missed opportunities. It feels unfair and especially cruel in a world that prizes physicality. It is a hard fight and a fight none of us can avoid, so fight.
Fight to appreciate what you have.
For example, family, friends, jobs, safety. Discipline yourself to thank God for blessings, however small. Praying, "Thank you, God, for clotted cream and good quality strawberry preserve on freshly baked scones" is a regular gem of my prayer life!
Fight to uphold the dignity and beauty of being created as a physical human being.
Being made in God's image can be easily forgotten when your body is failing and it's easy to stop fighting and to simply give in – don't. We are not to idolise our bodies but as the pinnacle of the created order we are called to rule over creation (including ourselves), to have dominion over and not to dominate and destroy. That is hard when aches are overwhelming and the aesthetics are depressing, but fight to lovingly do what you can. One Christmas, a very wealthy lady at a previous church gave my wife some Christian Dior hand moisturiser, which cost more than the second-hand phone I had recently bought! It was beautiful: beautifully smelly, beautifully slimy, and as I applied it to my wife's hands, it made her feel amazing. The rest of her body was a wreck, but I was determined to uphold her dignity in that small way as a creature made in the image of God. Plus, she would get to heaven with the softest, rose-scented hands!
Fight to see yourself and your situation relative to those who suffer far more than you ever will.
The news always reports someone who is having a harder time, and that is a helpful, relativizing reminder. I've also found it helpful to hear and read stories from church history of those who have endured far more than I can ever imagine.
Perhaps my top three Christian dead blokes who suffered terribly are the great hymn writer William Cowper, the missionary Adorniram Judson, but above them all and perhaps the one that I turn to most is David Brainard. Brainard took the gospel to the native Indians of North America. He died in 1747 aged 28, in Jonathan Edwards' house. With no pain relief, Brainard endured the most excruciating existence as he coughed up blood for nearly ten years, before finally dying of tuberculosis. He once wrote in his diary:
‘Exercised with a violent cough and a considerable fever; had no appetite to any kind of food; and frequently brought up what I ate, as soon as it was down; and oftentimes had little rest in my bed, by reason of pains in my breast and back: was able, however, to rode over to my people, about two miles, every day, and take some care of those who were then at work upon a small house for me to reside in amongst the Indians..’
(David Brainard)
Even when life was unbearably painful, Brainard rode to his people, he cared for his people, and he shared Jesus with his people. I have listened to John Piper's biographical talk on David Brainard dozens of times on a morning run, and I have often prayed at the end, using Brainard's words, "Lord, 'may I not loiter on my heavenly journey". When life is hard it is so easy for self-pity to cause us to loiter – don't! See how others have not loitered and pray for the strength to fight and to keep going.
Fight to look to Christ.
Christ suffered more than all of humanity has ever experienced collectively. When Jesus cried out on the cross 'My God, my God, why have you forsaken me', it was the only time he didn't call his Heavenly Father, ‘Father’. Why? Because there he was experiencing God as just Judge; he was removed from the loving embrace of his Heavenly Father. He was experiencing the worst of all, the supreme suffering, a suffering we deserve, a lonely abandonment from love, knowing the full weight of God's justice. It was a pain and suffering that none of us could ever bear or imagine, an incomparable injustice.
Bearing shame and scoffing rude,
in my place condemned he stood,
sealed my pardon with his blood:
Hallelujah, what a Saviour!(v2 of Man of Sorrows by P. P. Bliss)
Whatever life throws our way, we will never experience anything close to what Christ endured, which helpfully relativises our suffering, gives a partial explanation for our suffering (more of that to follow), but it also gives us someone to turn to:
“‘For we do not have a high priest who is unable to empathize with our weaknesses, but we have one who has been tempted in every way, just as we are—yet he did not sin.’”
Jesus gets what you are going through when no one else does. Although it is hard, fight the temptation toward introspection, turn to him, and talk to him, because he knows what you are going through, even better than you know it yourself.
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