Have you ever been going through something and struggled with seeing the light at the end of the tunnel? You find yourself so overwhelmed with the turmoil, the frustration, and there might even be a bit of sorrow mixed in – you find it difficult to have any positive outlook for the future. I’ve mostly experienced this in relationships. People are hard, aren’t they? You want to shine God’s light and bear His image well, but sometimes all you want to do is smack someone upside their head.
I’m going to give you a bit of background, and it might cause you to think my husband is a saint, but like the rest of us, he has his shortcomings. My husband and I have been married for 15 years, but the first half of that was not all sunshine and rainbows. And it was mostly because of me – I was the one needing the smack upside my head. We had the typical growing pains of learning how to jointly budget, jointly set goals, and jointly do anything. That’s all normal. But I was carrying a lot of past hurts into our future that I didn’t care to jointly share with him.
For a rocky seven and a half years, my husband struggled to hang on to his sanity because I had turned to drinking instead of sharing my hurts with him and allowing God to heal them. As much as he probably wanted to, he didn’t slap me upside my head, he didn’t berate me, and he didn’t leave me. He chose to love me. For anyone who doesn’t know our story, God set me free from having any desire for alcohol in December 2018. I was fully set free – and God has been healing my hurts ever since.
But that time in our marriage was messy. It was ugly, filled with hurts, and all I wanted to do was ignore what was going on around me, to me, and what I was doing to others. I wanted the happy and healthy marriage, but I found that I couldn’t skip over the ugly stuff to get there. We can’t go through life ignoring the ugly and hurt-filled places – it’s just not possible.
Maybe you’ve never heard of Holy Week – well, the week leading up to Easter is it. Every Christian church will be celebrating Jesus’ resurrection on Easter Sunday because Jesus coming back to life is pretty stinking awesome! It’s an incredibly beautiful moment that deserves to be celebrated! But Holy Week – It’s the last few days before Jesus was actively betrayed by Judas, before He was arrested, before He was denied by Peter, and before He was mocked, beaten, spit on, crowned with thorns, and nailed to a cross.
Holy Week, for Jesus, was filled with hurts and sorrows… it was ugly, but it was necessary.
It’s ugly to think about an innocent man being whipped so many times that His skin hangs off and His bones can be seen. It’s ugly to think about a crown of thorns digging into His head while being mocked and then beaten. Hands and feet being nailed to a rough, wooden cross is ugly! Jesus is described as not even looking human when He hung on the cross (Isaiah 52:14)! Holy Week is filled with ugly, and it’s filled with hurts.
While I wish I could go back and redo the first half of our marriage, there is something beautiful that came from all of the ugly. There’s something of value that I’m not sure I would appreciate as much had we not struggled through the hurt-filled years and ugly moments of our relationship. I have an appreciation for my husband that I wouldn’t have today had we not gone through what we did.
When I was at my lowest, I can see that God never left me or gave up on me. While our marriage was struggling, God gave my husband wisdom, patience, and fortitude. God met us in the ugliest moments. And that’s exactly what He does.
Pick any story from the Bible and I bet you’ll see that God was with His people. I so appreciate thinking a little more on Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego (Daniel 3). Because they refused to worship anyone other than God, they were going to be thrown into the furnace – a death sentence. The furnace was so hot that the soldiers who were leading them there were killed – what kind of ugly must they have been experiencing? But God was with them in the fire. They came out and didn’t even smell like smoke – but I bet they were changed (all of those around them were).
Look at Joseph – he was sold into slavery by his brothers, was believed to be dead by his family, and thrown into prison because of false accusations. We could look at Bathsheba – probable forced adultery, unplanned pregnancy, loss of husband, and then loss of baby. Job lost everything – family, fortune, health. People all across history have experienced so much hurt – but they always have the opportunity to experience the good on the other side.
I don’t always give a lot of thought to what Jesus went through. I don’t want to ponder the size and strength of the thorns, I don’t enjoy thinking about the pieces of metal in the whip that stripped away Jesus’ skin and tore at His muscles. I don’t like to think about how the cross was probably not sanded to a smooth finish. It’s not enjoyable to think about what it felt like to have nails driven through His hands and feet. I don’t want to think about how hard it was for Jesus to breathe while He hung on the cross. And I hurt thinking of how his mother must have felt.
But thinking about it will change a person. We’ll see the ugly, but it will make our praise that much more beautiful.
It was ugly when He cried out My God, my God, why have you forsaken me? He had always referred to God as His Father. He was giving us the right to call God Father. He was turning the ugly to beautiful in that very moment, because in Jesus’ time, they didn’t have books of the Bible categorized as we do today. Instead of shouting out a book, chapter, and verse, Jesus did what was common to do – He spoke the opening line and knew that those who could hear Him would understand that He was referring to what we know as Psalm 22.
If you’re not familiar with the chapter (I’ve included it below), it starts out with the hurt, the ugly, the messiness that we always seem to want to skip over. No one wants to suffer, but this describes a suffering that I’ve never experienced – even at my worst. The chapter is 31 verses and more than half of it is hard, ugly, hurt-filled anguish.
We all want the celebration, the joyfulness… the good. We want the Resurrection Sunday with all the festivities. But I think it’s important for us to see and think about the darkest moments, too. No matter the circumstance, no matter the mess, the ugliness, or the hurt, God is there with us – and He knows what it’s like to go through the worst of all time.
My story didn’t end in the ugly. Bathsheba gave birth to Solomon – and Jesus was in that lineage. God didn’t leave her in the hurt either. Joseph became second in command in Egypt and saved his family from famine. Hurts were healed. God wouldn’t leave me there and He won’t leave you there either. He’s faithful like that.
Jesus endured the ugliest, darkest, most excruciating torture ever – it was the worst because He went through it in our place. He was innocent, we were guilty… He took our place. But by saying My God, my God, why have you forsaken me? He pointed us to the beauty that was coming. Don’t skip the hard parts. Take it in, think it over, and allow yourself to be changed.
My God, my God, why have you forsaken me? Why are you so far from saving me, so far from my cries of anguish? My God, I cry out by day, but you do not answer, by night, but I find no rest. Yet you are enthroned as the Holy One; you are the one Israel praises. In you our ancestors put their trust; they trusted and you delivered them. To you they cried out and were saved; in you they trusted and were not put to shame. But I am a worm and not a man, scorned by everyone, despised by the people. All who see me mock me; they hurl insults, shaking their heads. “He trusts in the Lord,” they say, “let the Lord rescue him. Let him deliver him, since he delights in him.” Yet you brought me out of the womb; you made me trust in you, even at my mother’s breast. From birth I was cast on you; from my mother’s womb you have been my God. Do not be far from me, for trouble is near and there is no one to help. Many bulls surround me; strong bulls of Bashan encircle me. Roaring lions that tear their prey open their mouths wide against me. I am poured out like water, and all my bones are out of joint. My heart has turned to wax; it has melted within me. My mouth is dried up like a potsherd, and my tongue sticks to the roof of my mouth; you lay me in the dust of death. Dogs surround me, a pack of villains encircles me; they pierce my hands and my feet. All my bones are on display; people stare and gloat over me. They divide my clothes among them and cast lots for my garment. But you, Lord, do not be far from me. You are my strength; come quickly to help me. Deliver me from the sword, my precious life from the power of the dogs. Rescue me from the mouth of the lions; save me from the horns of the wild oxen. I will declare your name to my people; in the assembly I will praise you. You who fear the Lord, praise him! All you descendants of Jacob, honor him! Revere him, all you descendants of Israel! For he has not despised or scorned the suffering of the afflicted one; he has not hidden his face from him but has listened to his cry for help. From you comes the theme of my praise in the great assembly; before those who fear you I will fulfill my vows. The poor will eat and be satisfied; those who seek the Lord will praise him—may your hearts live forever! All the ends of the earth will remember and turn to the Lord, and all the families of the nations will bow down before him, for dominion belongs to the Lord and he rules over the nations. All the rich of the earth will feast and worship; all who go down to the dust will kneel before him—those who cannot keep themselves alive. Posterity will serve him; future generations will be told about the Lord. They will proclaim his righteousness, declaring to a people yet unborn: He has done it! Psalm 22 NIV