Hurt

Ever wonder why people don't show hurt easily? Why people allow other offensive feelings to surface and show rather than sit down and cry and whine, "That hurts me! I am so destroyed! I hate it when people do that to me!" I hardly ever see that, except in children occasionally. No, adults get even. They hold their breath till the tears come out in anger rather than show vulnerable hurt.

Last night in my Bible study we were talking about this, somehow in relation to the unforgiving servant in the 18th chapter of Matthew. We tend to ramble sometimes. Somehow we got to talking about holding anger toward people and finding it hard to forgive. And I wondered aloud. Why don't we simply say, "You hurt me, I am so broken by that, I don't know what to do."? Instead, we try to make nice. But that often includes holding secret hatred toward the person, talking about them behind their backs, feelings of revenge...not nice at all, exactly the opposite.

Why is it so hard to show hurt? We all feel pain. We all know when someone is feeling pain, we can practically feel it with him, we know it so well. So, then do we say, "You know? It was a rotten thing to do to you, and you must be feeling tremendous pain. What can I do to help? Wanna cry on my shoulder?" Nah, that's uncomfortable and mushy. We'd sooner offer to help devise a plan of attack and revenge, allowing the hurt person to sit on his pain and pretend he is only concerned with carrying out justice, or even that justice could remove pain anyway.

I think maybe a part of denying our pain is indignation. Certainly, we don't think we deserve pain and he who inflicts it upon us must go. We are resistant and unwilling to be a part of "The Pain" that Henri Nouwen refers to in his book The Inner Voice of Love. The common pain, the world's pain, everyone's pain that is inherent among us. Sure, there is pain in the world. It's just not my pain. I don't want to be a part of it or have it touch me. It shouldn't touch me. I've done nothing wrong, or that wrong, enough to have pain. If we understood that we are part of the world's pain, that the world's pain is our pain, then we could cry and shrivel and moan. We could say, "Yes. I do hurt. I hurt. I am feeling it. It brings me sorrow." The instrument of the hurt would be less important. One might say, "the pain of this earth we live on, this imperfect, full of lousy circumstances - earth has just touched me and it came through you today." Instead, we point the finger. "You! YOU! YOU!!! You must pay!" As if we have no debt to pay ourselves.
And so, there is the unforgiving servant, begging his master for mercy, for a break, and receiving it. Then turning, rising up out of that humble, humiliated position before [God] and pointing to one who owes him, demanding nothing less than perfection.

Imagine if someone told you that you hurt them the minute you sinned against them, instead of silently planning your demise all night, cursing you to their confidants. Imagine if we had the chance to say we were sorry right away and address and immediately heal those issues that can hopelessly divide families and friendships for decades. Imagine if people admitted that they had tremendous hurt without lifting their finger to point to the perceived or actual source. We may not be able to stop sin, but we can heal and give God a chance to heal us when we bring forward our pain, let the sun shine on it, let the fresh air bring life to it again, let people pour some of their love upon it.