God's Mercy in Emptiness

A few weeks ago, one of the members in our church shared about a past short-term mission in which he spent time ministering to a man who was stricken by leprosy. He gave a brief, but informative overview of the disease, which despite it's paucity compared to biblical times, has not completely been eradicated in this world.

Leprosy, he explained, does not directly lead to the damage to skin and limbs. Instead, lack of nerve function in leprous areas of the body make those parts impervious to pain. As a result, a body part can be unknowingly but terribly damaged, scratched, lacerated, bruised and even broken, but the failure to feel pain in that area lead to continued damage unbeknownst to the afflicted. Eventually, gangrene and infection settle in, and loss of body parts and sometimes death follows.

Sarah and I were talking in the car on our way to church on Sunday, and we started talking about what great mercy there was in the sense of "emptiness". We realized that when we have failed to avail ourselves to the means of grace - which we cleverly remember in our church with the acronym FWPSM (Fellowship, Word, Prayer, Sacrament, and Mission) - our lives begin to feel purposeless and empty. Sure, in our sin we can fool ourselves temporarily by throwing ourselves in our work, our children, or even odd diversions either here or there in the form of music, sports, entertainment, social outings, vacation, or your random shopping binge; but ultimately life begins to feel empty.

And this is God's mercy, isn't it? Insomuch as we sense dryness and misery when we have not put God and the Kingdom in its proper perspective, we ought to be immeasurably grateful that, to use the leprosy analogy, that we correctly should feel the "pain". Or put another way, how tragic would it be if we were to be oblivious to the futility and meaninglessness of lives which were truly futile and meaningless?

To waste life and to not be cognizant of running towards a path of destruction and eternal insignificance is nothing short of tragic. In this case, ignorance is not bliss. We all ought to pray for eyes to see, ears to hear, and "spiritual nerves" to feel - even when the feeling feels pretty lousy.