Holding the Cup

DAILY BYTE

While I’m not a parent, I have spent a lot of time caring for other peoples’ children in my life. And one of the many things you learn when caring for small children is that they don’t know naturally that they must hold a cup with two hands. It only takes watching one grubby, little hand attempt to grab a cup and promptly spill it all down the front of her shirt to realize that some gentle instruction (and a clean shirt) may be necessary.

We’re talking this week about the surprises of God in the midst of suffering, and let me suggest today that one of the beautiful surprises we gain in confronting suffering is that we live in community that bears suffering with us. We learn to bear the cup of suffering in a similar way that a child learns to carry a cup with two hands. We don’t learn on our own how to endure tragedy and grief. Instead, when we are learning to carry a load that is particularly heavy or difficult to balance, others who have endured suffering before can teach us how to bear it carefully and tenderly.

When my mother died a few years ago, I was inconsolable for a long time and was often sent into even deeper grief by well meant but ultimately unhelpful comments about the ways that people who really didn’t understand exactly what I was going through claimed that they did. It took me a while to realize that those who had gone before me and had experienced similar tragedy, including my own mother, as part of the communion of saints, could actually help me to wade slowly through my pain. People who had endured similar life experiences did have some helpful wisdom. They had strategies and patience, and they were the only ones I was able to listen to.

When Jesus cried out to God in the Garden of Gethsemane with the prayer that God might take away his cup of suffering, Jesus showed us the need for even God in human form to draw other human beings alongside of him and allow them to be present with him in his suffering.

Who are you helping currently to carry their cup of suffering? Who are you allowing to draw alongside of you, teaching you to endure your own struggle?

FOCUS READING

Mark 14:32-36

They went to a place called Gethsemane, and Jesus said to his disciples, "Sit here while I pray." He took Peter, James and John along with him, and he began to be deeply distressed and troubled. "My soul is overwhelmed with sorrow to the point of death," he said to them. "Stay here and keep watch." Going a little farther, he fell to the ground and prayed that if possible the hour might pass from him. "Abba, Father," he said, "everything is possible for you. Take this cup from me. Yet not what I will, but what you will."

PRAY AS YOU GO

Caring God, you are a god who exemplifies community in your very self. You are one God and yet Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. With everything that you are, you teach us to rely on others and on you. You teach us to reach out to others and reach out to you. Encourage us in our journeys of helping others and ourselves bear the cup of suffering in this life with care and tenderness. Amen.