In the midst of our current numerous difficulties, we are all suffering. The pandemic has revealed our vulnerabilities, that despite our confidence in our great advances in many fields, a simple virus has uncovered our weaknesses. Compounding the impact and threat of the disease itself is the blow that has struck so many businesses, threatening people’s livelihoods, and unfortunately some of the impact may be yet to come. Ever-present racial wounds have bled afresh. While some dismiss the notion that inequity exists, others plead for us all to acknowledge that we have never been the land of the free for everyone.
If these oppressive, collective sufferings were not enough already, inevitably they are seized opportunistically by those who covet political power. Our burden of suffering is increased as the health crisis, economic hardship, and racial inequities are used for gain by individuals and groups longing to increase their own influence and control.
Clearly, our collective suffering has not been a uniting experience, but tragically, one that has made even more apparent the divisions that exist among us. Ironically, though these are shared and common problems, we turn against one another, rather than toward a shared and common good.
Are any among you suffering? They should pray. James 5:13
Given all the turmoil and stress that we are experiencing together, to make no mention of many situations and sources of grief and hardship that exist for each individual, how can James’ instruction not sound simplistic and trite? We could retort that we have prayed! We have been praying for months, for years, and yet here we are. What can James mean by urging us to pray when we are suffering?
One possibility is that James is saying we need to “return” to prayer so that the current sufferings will cease and not reoccur. This is what so many seem to imply by citing 2 Chronicles 7:14, that our present difficulties are either punishment or, at the least, the consequence of not being prayerful. This view makes us responsible for our own suffering, and scolds us for bringing it on ourselves. I do not believe this is what James means. We are not suffering because we failed to pray.
Another possibility is that we need to ask more for God to remove these very different evils. The virus a “natural evil” of a disease, racism a “moral evil” of our inhumanity to one another along with the sin of greed of those who would use our suffering to advance their own interests. However, I do not believe that James is talking about petitionary prayer, that is, begging God more fervently and frequently to remove these.
I understand that James is talking about prayer as the way in which we hold ourselves close to God. We know that God is always close to us, closer than we are to ourselves. But for our part, we easily slip into a negligence that impoverishes our spirit, and diminishes our participation in all that God gives. Suffering cannot be avoided. When we find ourselves in the midst of individual agony or collective pain, James says that we need to especially focus on attending to our closeness to God. In Christ, we have seen that our God suffers with and for us, One who is intimately familiar with all our hardships and far more. We persevere through trials and temptations by drawing close to God, and that through centering, contemplative, constant attentiveness to the One who grieves with us and is our Savior. If ever there was a shoulder to cry on, it is God’s.
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