A Word from Bob: Thanks for coming back. You’re reading Part 4 in my blog mini-series on Half Biblical Ministry to the Suffering. Here are titles/links to my first 3 posts:
- Half Biblical Ministry to the Suffering
- Counseling Without Loving Compassion
- Mingling Our Sufferings and Sorrows
Listening to Sad Stories
In Mingling Our Sufferings and Sorrows, we witnessed Olaudah Equiano’s depth of suffering with his sister. Like Olaudah Equiano, Octavia Albert knew something about suffering and about comforting others in their suffering. Albert was an ex-enslaved college-educated African American pastor’s wife living in Louisiana. In the 1870s, she ministered to many other ex-enslaved men and women by recording their stories of suffering. One of those individuals was Charlotte Brooks. Of Brooks, Albert writes:
“It was in the fall of 1879 that I met Charlotte Brooks…. I have spent hours with her listening to her telling of her sad life of bondage in the cane-fields of Louisiana.”
If we would do what Albert did, then we would be miles ahead in our biblical counseling: spend hours listening to sad stories. Rather than rescuing and compulsively fixing, we need the courage and compassion to listen to stories of suffering.
Empathy: Not a Secular Trojan Horse
As we listen to our spiritual friends’ earthly stories, we need to empathize with them in their story. Empathy is not some secular Trojan Horse. It is a biblical word and a scriptural concept. Think of the word: em-pathos: to enter the pathos or the passion of another, to allow another person’s agony to become your agony, to weep with those who weep (Romans 12:15).
Notice how Octavia Albert allowed Charlotte Brooks’ agony to become her own:
“Poor Charlotte Brooks! I can never forget how her eyes were filled with tears when she would speak of all her children: ‘Gone, and no one to care for me!’”
Albert pictures for us the essence of sustaining empathy: climbing in the casket. I derive this phrase from Paul’s words in 2 Corinthians 1:7-9, where he invites the Corinthians into his casket of despair and feelings of death.
“We do not want you to be uninformed, brothers and sisters, about the troubles we experienced in the province of Asia. We were under great pressure, far beyond our ability to endure, so that we despaired of life itself. Indeed, we felt we had received the sentence of death.”
Compassionate Commiseration
Not only must we feel what another person feels, we need to express and communicate that we “get it,” we feel it, we hurt too. Consider how Octavia Albert does so with Aunt Charlotte.
“Aunt Charlotte, my heart throbs with sympathy, and my eyes are filled with tears, whenever I hear you tell of the trials of yourself and others.”
What she modeled in 1879, the Church has long called “compassionate commiseration.” Don’t let these two beautiful, powerful words intimidate you. Co-passion: to share the passionate feelings of another. Co-misery: to partner in the misery of your spiritual friend.
Pointing People to Jesus: Jesus with Skin On
Aunt Charlotte describes the result of Octavia Albert’s ministry in her life.
“La, me, child! I never thought any body would care enough for me to tell of my trials and sorrows in this world! None but Jesus knows what I have passed through.”
Octavia Albert was Jesus with skin on. Her care gave Aunt Charlotte a human taste of Jesus’ care—a taste Charlotte thought she would never receive this side of heaven.
In our last post (Mingling Our Sufferings and Sorrows), we talked about entering another person’s story and becoming a main character in their life narrative. Empathy goes deeper.
Continuing the “story” idea, in empathy we seek to enter into their character’s soul and experience their suffering as they experience it. It is rejoicing with those who rejoice, mourning with those who mourn (Romans 12:15), and suffering along with those who suffer (1 Corinthians 12:26). We suffer in the soul of another person, feeling with and participating in their inner world while remaining ourselves. We seek to understand their outer story and their inner story from their perspective.
Rich soul empathizing is entering into another person’s soul and experiencing their suffering as they experience it.
The Rest of the Story
I often learn best by how not to do it. So, in our next post, we’ll explore Job’s Miserable Counselors and learn together how not to engage in compassionate biblical counseling.
More of the Story
Today’s vignette’s from Black Church History and principles from God’s Word come from my book, Gospel Conversations: How to Care Like Christ and also from my book Beyond the Suffering: Embracing the Legacy of African American Soul Care and Spiritual Direction.
Join the Conversation
How hard would it be for you to listen for hours to sad stories of suffering?
In your life, who has been like Charlotte Brooks and climbed in the casket of your sorrow and suffering—joining with you in your pain and hurt?
