I wanted to take a few minutes to share why I have been writing so much in this time of suffering. My blogging journey has been anything but consistent. I have set schedules and goals, but I always find that the needs of family and pastoral ministry make blogging seem less important. Let me also be honest: I stink at consistency to my own shame.
In the last two years, I have also found writing to be incredibly difficult for me. I have not been able to write anything that I thought had real and lasting value. I would work at it and work at it, but hours of trying brought little to no fruit. This was painful for me because writing is part of who I am. I have always been a writer. I have always processed my thoughts through talking and writing. My sermons are worked out on pages and pages of scrap paper and put together in an almost manuscript. The inability to write in these past two years has really affected me. It has almost been like an identity crisis.
Of course, I don’t know all the reasons that the Lord has given me this particular trial of writer’s block, but I know it is for my good and his glory (Jeremiah 29:11; Romans 8:28-29). I do know some of the truths I have learned or deepened in through this crisis of not being able to write.
One of the truths I am being confronted with and am deepening in by God’s grace is that my worth is not in productivity and output. My worth is found in Christ. My identity in Christ is where my worth and purpose and hope are found. Even if I never write another word, I am in Christ because of his work on my behalf. This is enough.
A lesson that I have been learning is that it is often better to be quiet. Oftentimes, it is better for me to be silent and not write or speak. I need to be more diligent to take time to think before taking to the keyboard. I have often been too quick to write and too slow to stop and meditate on the Gospel of Jesus. I have been too quick to give an opinion when I needed to allow the Holy Spirit to transform me as I silently gaze at the face of Jesus in the Bible. The two years of near silence have been difficult, but they have been good. Forced silence through the inability to write has humbled me in the best of ways by reminding me that I don’t know everything, and I don’t always have to make my thoughts known. The hard work of consideration, reflection, and formulation of convictions in silence is one of the most important parts of writing.
In the last week, I have been doing a lot of writing. There are many things I have written that are likely never going to appear on the blog or anywhere in public. I have written multiple blog posts this week, and I have been looking back at some old posts for revision. Why the sudden increase in writing? Suffering.
When my Dad passed away, I did not have my laptop with me. I was on vacation in another part of the United States when I heard he had suddenly died. I had intentionally left my laptop at home and only brought a journal and pen. I am so thankful I did. The first two weeks after his passing, I needed to be silent. I needed to process grief. I needed to meditate on truth. Until I reflected and had my soul looking at the situation according to God’s Word, I needed to be silent. Of course, my silence included private cries to God for mercy, strength, wisdom, endurance, grace, faith, and for every need, especially spiritual and emotional needs, to be met according to his riches in glory in Christ Jesus (Philippians 4:19). Sometimes, the cries were more like groans, but praise God that the Holy Spirit interceded on my behalf (Romans 8:26-27). I needed time to keep everything to myself and allow the Holy Spirit to comfort and convict me. I still need this.
When our family returned home, it was as if a floodgate opened. I had to type. I had to post. I had to share. I also had to build a storehouse of things that came together and “clicked” after some years of meditating and processing. Many of the things I have written have nothing to do with suffering or grief, although I have been mainly posting things related to my grief journey in Dad’s homegoing. Lot’s of dangling issues with theology and application have been clicking in these past weeks and days.
The doorway the Lord had me walk through to bring many of these things together was Dad’s death. Death and the sorrow surrounding it have been the key to open up the world of writing again. Not only has the suffering been the doorway, but the blessed hope of Christ’s resurrection and return has been the balm that has allowed my mind to clear and my fingers to type.
The reality that Christ is the Resurrection and the Life makes doctrine brighter and sweeter. The truth that the one who believes in Christ has eternal life and never really dies causes me to see this, even this suffering, as a gift of God’s grace to me as his child. The truth that Dad’s death is not only working for my good but actually accomplished Dad’s good makes my heart rejoice even in grief. The final enemy could not ultimately harm my Dad, but the Lord of Heaven and Earth used death to bring my Dad safely into his presence forever. This is true because Christ, through his death and resurrection, has destroyed the one who has the power of death, the Devil, and has set his people free from the fear and power of death.1
All of this causes my heart to sing, my mouth to speak, and my fingers to type the marvelous works of God in Christ by the Spirit.
- John 11:25–27 (ESV)
25 Jesus said to her, “I am the resurrection and the life. Whoever believes in me, though he die, yet shall he live, 26 and everyone who lives and believes in me shall never die. Do you believe this?” 27 She said to him, “Yes, Lord; I believe that you are the Christ, the Son of God, who is coming into the world.”
Romans 8:28–39 (ESV)
28 And we know that for those who love God all things work together for good, for those who are called according to his purpose. 29 For those whom he foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the image of his Son, in order that he might be the firstborn among many brothers. 30 And those whom he predestined he also called, and those whom he called he also justified, and those whom he justified he also glorified.
31 What then shall we say to these things? If God is for us, who can be against us? 32 He who did not spare his own Son but gave him up for us all, how will he not also with him graciously give us all things? 33 Who shall bring any charge against God’s elect? It is God who justifies. 34 Who is to condemn? Christ Jesus is the one who died—more than that, who was raised—who is at the right hand of God, who indeed is interceding for us. 35 Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or danger, or sword? 36 As it is written,
“For your sake we are being killed all the day long;
we are regarded as sheep to be slaughtered.”
37 No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. 38 For I am sure that neither death nor life, nor angels nor rulers, nor things present nor things to come, nor powers, 39 nor height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.
Hebrews 2:14–15 (ESV)
14 Since therefore the children share in flesh and blood, he himself likewise partook of the same things, that through death he might destroy the one who has the power of death, that is, the devil, 15 and deliver all those who through fear of death were subject to lifelong slavery.
Titus 2:11–14 (ESV)
11 For the grace of God has appeared, bringing salvation for all people, 12 training us to renounce ungodliness and worldly passions, and to live self-controlled, upright, and godly lives in the present age, 13 waiting for our blessed hope, the appearing of the glory of our great God and Savior Jesus Christ, 14 who gave himself for us to redeem us from all lawlessness and to purify for himself a people for his own possession who are zealous for good works. ↩︎
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