“Stand Fast”                   Dr. Julie Adkins

                   Text:  1 Peter 4:12-14, 5:6-11

 

SERMON

 

So, this week we come to the end of

          our lectionary journey through Peter’s letter.

And bless his heart,

          once again we find him on the theme of suffering.

Really, he seems rather masochistic by modern standards.

Were Peter to approach a modern-day pastor,

          with this fixation on suffering,

                   we’d probably send him to a psychotherapist.

Yet in his time,

          his was a message that the Christians desperately needed to hear.

In the past few weeks,

          we’ve talked about the sorts of persecutions

                   his readers may have undergone,

          and how tempting it must have been

                   to stray from the right path …

We’ve talked about how in ancient times,

          people didn’t have the same expectation we do

                   that all suffering can be avoided.

In some ways,

          Peter’s world was very different from ours.

 

And in other ways, not so very different.

Our world still knows plenty of suffering.

Ever our own private worlds seem at times

          to have more than their fair share.

Does Peter have something to say to us,

          about our particular brand of suffering,

                   whatever it may be?

I think he does …

But in order to see it clearly,

          it may help us

                   if first we look at some of the ways that

                   we tend to deal with suffering as it comes to us.

The things that seem to be our “natural” reactions.

Things we do without even really stopping to think about them very much.

 

One of our all-time favorites is avoidance.

          And it can work in two ways.

First, if we are doing a particular something

          and find that it causes us pain or distress,

                   we will probably stop doing it.

Second, if in fact our suffering does stop,

          then we are likely to make serious efforts

                   to avoid doing that thing in the future, as well.

Now, that’s a perfectly natural reaction;

          it has helped insure survival!

Even animals as low on the scale as worms

          seem to be able to learn to avoid certain behaviors

                   which have caused them pain in the past.

Speaking as a higher animal,

          I personally am glad that I figured out one fine day

                   that I could avoid a lot of migraine headaches

                   if I avoided diet sodas.

That is suffering I can do without.

But sometimes,

          avoidance can get us into worse trouble.

What happens over the long haul

          if one bad trip to the dentist

                   persuades you to avoid going at all

                             for the next twenty years?

What happens if you and your spouse

          keep avoiding talking about something difficult,

                   even though it’s tearing you apart?

What if you suffer for doing something

          that you know is right,

                   like Peter was telling us about last week?

Will you start to avoid doing what is right?

If it causes you pain

          to hear about other people’s suffering,

                   will you cover your ears and close your eyes?

Sometimes, avoidance is unhealthy,

          and can lead to even greater suffering.

 

Another way in which we often react to suffering

          is also natural up to a certain point

                   but dangerous beyond that point.

And that is, we anesthetize ourselves.

We acknowledge that

          we can’t stop a particular bad thing from happening,

                   but we do what we can

                             to shield ourselves from the pain of it.

This happens sometimes in nature.

A person may be seriously injured

          but feel no pain at all

                   until much later, when the healing has begun.

Somehow, our bodies are sometimes able to anesthetize themselves

          to protect us from pain too great to bear.

Sometimes our mind can do the same thing.

If someone dear to us dies,

          it may be a while before we even begin to feel grief.

Our mind goes numb, to protect us

          until we are strong enough to cope with the pain.

But this reaction, too, can be misused or overused.

What happens if we start to try

          to anesthetize all of our sufferings?

If we drink too much,

          to forget how bad things are at work?

If we eat too much,

          because we feel lonely and unloved?

If we work ourselves to exhaustion,

          so we can forget a painful problem at home?

Sometimes, even religion gets misused

          as a kind of anesthesia again the world’s pain and our own.

If we talk only about God’s power and victory,

          we can ignore or deny suffering,

                   because it doesn’t fit into the picture.

If we spend our time

          talking only about rewards in heaven

                   and a glorious afterlife,

          then we can pretend that pain here and now doesn’t matter,

                   and we don’t have to deal with it.

Or if we have a certain arrogance about our faith,

          and believe that our way is the only way,

                   then the suffering of others doesn’t concern us:

Either they deserve it as punishment,

          or they need it in order to make them see the error of their ways.

Whatever our technique,

          it’s fairly simple and potentially dangerous

                   to anesthetize ourselves to suffering,

                   whether it’s our own, or someone else’s.

 

Another way that we might deal with suffering

          tends to be a last resort,

                   used only of the first two fail.

And that is, we simply give in.

We become overwhelmed.

There’s no way to stop the suffering in the world;

          there’s not even any way to relieve our own suffering.

This may leave us in deep depression,

          or it may leave us with a hard-nosed kind of cynicism.

Both of those responses are realistic

          to the extent that they openly agree,

                   there is suffering all around and within,

                   and it can’t always be avoided or ignored.

But they are both responses of powerlessness.

The cynic says,

          Suffering is all around me,

                   therefore if I mistrust everyone and everything,

                             I can at least protect myself a little.

          But I certainly can’t alleviate any suffering;

                   it would be foolish for me to think that I could.

Depression says,

          Suffering is all around me,

                   and it has taken hold of me,

                             and nothing can be done to save me.

Now – it is true

          that there is suffering in the world around us,

                   and within our own lives,

          that we cannot forever avoid

                   and that resists our attempts at anesthesia.

But being passive, and giving in to it,

          is probably not the most helpful or appropriate response.

Peter, who is addressing suffering people in a situation where

          neither avoidance nor anesthesia is going to work,

                   does not suggest giving in to suffering,

                   or to the forces that cause it.

Peter’s counsel is that we must stand fast.

We may not be able to avoid

          the suffering that comes to us …

          but we should stand up to it

                   instead of knuckling under to it.

He seems to say that we may, in fact,

          succumb to suffering, or to the things causing our suffering,

                   but that we should go down fighting!

He doesn’t say that we should go on the attack …

          that’s a different issue altogether! …

                   but he does say that we mustn’t give in.

“Discipline yourselves [and] keep alert,” he says.

          Not anesthetized, alert.

Resist your adversary.

          Not avoid, resist.

Evil is around, looking for someone to devour.

It could get you from without or within.

But don’t run away, and don’t give in to it.

          Resist.  Stand fast.

 

That isn’t necessarily easy.

How do we persuade ourselves to stand fast

          when we could end our suffering

                   just by walking away?

I don’t think we can,

          unless we remind ourselves

                   that we’re only a little piece of the whole picture.

Humanly speaking,

          it’s probably impossible, or nearly impossible,

                   to stand fast for any length of time.

But we don’t look at our lives from only a human perspective;

          we have to factor God into the equation.

So hear again Peter’s words:

          “After you have suffered for a little while,

                   the God of all grace,

                   who has called you to his eternal glory in Christ,

          will himself restore, support,

                   strengthen, and establish you.”

That’s not just a pie-in-the-sky promise.

It doesn’t say that God will keep us from all suffering;

          we know already that isn’t true.

But God does know our suffering,

          and God knows our standing fast,

                   and God will restore us, strengthen us, establish us.

The final victory belongs to God.

Our sufferings, although they are very real,

are only a piece of the struggle.

May we keep alert, and resist, and stand fast.

May God give us strength to do so.

 

Amen.

 

© 2002 Julie Adkins (e-mail: DrJAdkins@trinitypresdallas.org)