Become a Nike Christian

Is wailing biblical? Is it biblical to long for heaven and live passionately for God and others while still on earth? Is groaning with hope scriptural?

Desperate Desire

Consider Romans 8:18-25 and its support for wailing as a stage of acceptance, as God’s plan for responding to suffering.

“I consider that our present sufferings are not worth comparing with the glory that will be revealed in us. The creation waits in eager expectation for the sons of God to be revealed. For the creation was subjected to frustration, not by its own choice, but by the will of the one who subjected it, in hope that the creation itself will be liberated from its bondage to decay, and brought into the glorious freedom of the children of God. We know that the whole creation has been groaning as in the pains of childbirth right up to the present time. Not only so, but we ourselves, who have the first fruits of the Spirit, groan inwardly as we wait eagerly for our adoption as sons, the redemption of our bodies. For in this hope we were saved. But hope that is seen is no hope at all. Who hopes for what he already has? But if we hope for what we do not yet have, we wait for it patiently.”

Paul couples suffering, frustration, eager waiting, and pregnant groaning. “Frustration” suggests the ache that we feel due to the emptiness and void we experience living in a fallen world. It’s the same Greek word (mataioteti) used in the Septuagint to translate Solomon’s word “vanity”—meaningless, soap bubbles, unsatisfying, pointless, absurd—all of this describes life south of heaven.

“Eager waiting” pictures ferocious, desperate desire. When we wail, we declare how deeply out of the nest we are, how far from home we’ve wandered, and how much we long for heaven.

Paul illustrates our desperate desire using the image of pregnancy. He describes a woman groaning as in labor that lasts not hours, not nine months, but a lifetime. Imagine a pregnant woman in labor for seventy years! That’s groaning. Groaning not only the pain of seemingly unending labor, but groaning the pain of not having the joy of the baby.

East of Eden

That’s our current condition. For our allotted years on this blue planet, we’re pregnant with hope, groaning for Paradise, for Eden, for walking with God in the cool of the day, for being naked and unashamed, for shalom.

When we groan, we admit to ourselves and express to God the pain of our unmet desires, the depth of our fervent longing for heaven’s joy, and our total commitment to remain pregnant with hope—labor for a lifetime.

Thriving

And what’s the result? Weak, mournful surviving? No way. The result is thriving.

In Romans 8:28-39, Paul insists that even in the midst of trouble, hardship, persecution, and suffering, nothing can separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus. He teaches that in all our suffering we are more than conquerors through Him who loved us so.

“More than conquerors” comes from the Greek word nikao from which we gain our word “Nike”—victors, Olympic champions, winners. Wailing empowers us to long passionately for heaven and to live victoriously on earth. Wailing moves us from victims to victors in Christ.

So What?

What difference can this make in the lives of others? How can we use these truths to help our grieving friends? Back at ya’ tomorrow!