Now I know Jesus wasn’t a masochist, but when a childhood friend drops you like a hot potato, when she tries to hurt you and talks behind your back, when she makes your life miserable and you consider unfriending her on facebook (gasp!) when you want to move toIceland to get away, where does Jesus get the gall to say “blessed are you”?
This unfriended, discarded puddle is where I found myself after college.
Splashing and muddy, I hear Jesus murmer, Blessed are you.
What in tarnation is that supposed to mean? I reply indignant. What is blessed about this situation? Have you forgotten that blessed means in the Greek? In case you forgot it means HAPPY. (I get sort of snappy when I’m suffering).Blessed are you when people persecute you.
Really?
How is persecution happy? I asked my good friend, Su, between hiccups and tears.
There is no happiness in being misunderstood. No zippy spring in my step.
Su wondered if the time hasn’t come yet. If this is a time for patience in what God is doing. She knows waiting. We’ve walked alongside her and her family as life savings disappeared in the stock market. She knows patience and its ploddy growth. Even patience grows slowly, like gamble oak. A centimeter every, say, ten years.
But the fruit of His Spirit is patience.
“And you might feel more peace as time moves you through this,” Su adds.
I sniffed a little, already wondering.
“Actually Su, I feel peace right now.”
That’s sort of weird. Peaceful, painful me. That’s VERY weird as in supernaturally weird. My anxiety has fallen off like a sundress. And I’m bare, cold and still very peaceful. VERY weird.
The fruit of His Spirit is peace and joy.
I know people say joy is not a feeling. “Joy is based on reality not on happenings, like happiness.”
But Jesus said I would be happy. That’s what blessed means.
Blessed are you when people insult you and persecute you, and falsely say all kinds of evil against you because of Me.
Who else got this bizarre painful happiness?
All those prophets that Jesus footnotes. Isaiah, Hosea, Jonah.
Weren’t they the happy ones.
Then, there’s Mary, who was pregnant and unwed. And Ruth who had to propose to an older guy at night in his barn. Sounds terrifying, mortifying, “asking for trouble” and so cheery. They must have had all kinds of false things said about them, and all on account of God and his plans.
Blessed are you when people insult you and persecute you, and falsely say all kinds of evil against you because of me.
Rejoice and be glad, for your reward in heaven is great; for in the same way they persecuted the prophets who were before you.
Okay, rewards. Let’s talk about that.
What kind of rewards are you taking about, Jesus?
Kingdom of heaven rewards, stuff that won’t need polishing or get moth holes.
Could you let me peek into the kind of kingdom life Hosea and Amos, Rahab and Mary are enjoying right now. Maybe a dream tonight? Maybe just a hope of what’s to come.
Faith, hope and love.
Splashing about in my suffering I wonder what kind of supernatural God could make me feel compassion for my persecutor. What kind of God could do that. In me.
My compassion child, Anita from Ecuador, draws me pictures in carefully shaded crayons on the backs of her letters. She is now a young teen and realizes I’ve been calling her a princess for the last decade.
She calls me Princess Jonalyn in her replies.
Anita sent me an installment during that time that included an embellished printing of 1 Corinthians 13:13 with pink scrolls at the corners, the verse written in nearly flawless English.
I re-read her crayoned lines.
Now abide. Faith, Hope, Love. But the greatest of these . . .
Love,
Princess Anita
Blessed.
first appeared in Breakfast Reading, where I post monthly with seven writers on what it means to follow Jesus in real life.
I never knew “blessed” meant ‘happy’,pretty interesting. In various churches, ive learnt that much emphasis has been placed on joy. It often seemed that joy was the better of the two worlds and that being happy or happiness in itself was the lesser. Clearly scripture tells us that happiness is also part of Gods wills and plans for our lives. Blessed are you…
Kesara,
It’s easy to miss that God also cares about our happiness. I’ve heard quite a few sermons that God doesn’t.
I think blessed means more than mere happiness, but it certainly isn’t less.
Thanks for blessing me,
Jonalyn
I relate to this but I have concerns about the hermeneutic you employ with those scripture references. When the Lord says that we will be blessed when we suffer and endure does that entail all kinds of sufferings or just the suffering that comes for being a follower of Christ? Can it also apply, say, to the suffering one experiences from betrayal of a friend or family member?
Aleshia,
Fantastic question!
I do not think Matt 5:11-12 indicates that God promises blessing in or for all suffering. These verses are primarily speaking to those suffering FOR being Jesus’ followers, “because of me.”
Some backstory might help. After my friend’s unkindness I sensed God asking me to return kindness instead and to try to be kind for a sustained amount of time. It was hard, but I sensed God’s idea behind my attempts at love.
When I was cold-shouldered and then gossiped about directly after my attempts to be loving, I realized this verse could apply to me.
I was suffering as a result from obeying Jesus’ command in my life to be loving.
I knew that my suffering wasn’t just a bad spot in a friendship, it was actual persecution for righteousness, one of the few I’ve distinctly known.
Because we all know instances where people claim any calamity is a result of persecution and we might want to tell them, “Well, no, actually your suffering is a result of your unawareness, or your meanness or your blindspot or etc.”
To carry then point, any pain or suffering could a suffering for righteousness, but it is also quite possible that suffering is a result of many other things: sin (theirs, yours, both), weakness, temptation, etc.
However, I do think God promises to be near those who are broken and crushed (whether their suffering is a result of sin or not see Ps 34:18) and in many ways his nearness often translates into a type of blessedness, though I wouldn’t use Matt 5 to argue for that.
Hope this makes things a bit more clear!
This poem speaks to the healing. I will just quote the pertinent sections.
The river takes the land, and leaves nothing.
Where the great slip gave way in the bank
and an acre disappeared, all human plans
dissolve. An aweful clarification occurs . . .
The earth, even, is like a flower, so soon
passeth it away. And yet this nothing
is the seed of all-heaven’s clear
eye, where all the worlds appear . . .
The maker moves in the unmade, starry the water until
it clouds, dark beneath the surface,
stirring and darkening the soul until pain
perceives new possibility. There is nothing
to do, but learn and wait, return to work
on what remains. Seed will sprout in the scar.
Though death is in the healing, it will heal.”
read the whole piece!
The Slip
By Wendell Berry
This is EXACTLY what I needed to read right now, at this moment! Thank you so much for the post and the poem … so encouraging … you always are!
Thank you, Amy.
This was very timely for me, we have recently been cut out of a group of friends that we were really close to for a very long time. Their reasons are sad and earthly…because some of them are not Christians I have been trying to reconcile. If nothing else just so that they know that I still love them, but everytime I am ignored or disrespected I feel sad and inadequate.
Thank you for sharing and reminding me that I am BLESSED.
Kyla,
I am sorry… how painful.
Grateful to have you and your experience in this fellowship of suffering. You may find comfort from this post on friendship that talks about the difference between forgiveness and reconciliation. “What Watercolor Taught me About Friendship“.
God’s speed to heal and strengthen you.
Bless you.