At Your Best and Worst

Valleys and peaks: we are familiar with them both and of course with the occasional level stretches in between. We would prefer to plot the points on our life chart and find somehow a gentle, steadily inclining line, low on the left starting point, and now quite high on the right. It depends upon what aspects of life are represented in plot points, but for most everybody, this imaginary chart would show a jagged, saw-toothed image with teeth of varying lengths.

Speaking personally, I could point to a hundred different things, but let me name just one “low” for me. It was physiological and affected everything. I was festering with a particularly vicious influenza, many years ago, I had a high fever. I was listless, dehydrated, and lying on my right side on the edge of my bed. I thought “I should get up and get some water.” I did not move, because I did not care about anything, feeling almost paralyzed in my malaise.

To name a spiritual high, I point to an exercise within a creative liturgy experience at a summer camp for high schoolers. Each staff member was put with two campers for a quiet conversation. There we sat, cross-legged on the ground near the outdoor rock chapel. I listened to the two in our little triad, sharing. It was just after the last light of dusk faded. Pine trees around us silently oversaw our quiet activity. The pines allowed meager bits of light from stars to peak past their branches.

 I paused, waiting for something helpful and meaningful to come to mind in response to the life struggles these young people brought. Nothing did. Instead, I felt placed before a visual image representing the gift Christ made of himself in absolute solidarity with every struggling soul. It was merciful the tears in my eyes and streaming down my face were silent: merciful too that there was not light enough to see the tears. I do not know how long this silence was, or what I said to break it. I only remember feeling grateful and awed by the love of God, perfectly conveyed. Where we often feel helpless to relieve the hardship of another, God makes the opportunity to breakthrough.

The verses, 2 Corinthians 12:2-10 show a mystical vision of Paul conveyed in veiled terms. This must have been a deep spiritual encounter for him that was unmatched anywhere else in his life. This glorious, indescribable spiritual experience he pairs with an element of suffering in his life. This he also shares in quite veiled terms. It is something he calls “a thorn” or stake, given him “in the flesh.” It is an absolute cause for his weakness and therefore produces humility. He asserts he will not boast of the mystical encounter. Rather, if he boasts at all, he boasts of his weakness: “So, I will boast all the more gladly of my weaknesses, so the power of Christ may dwell in me. Therefore I am content with weaknesses, insults, hardships, persecutions, and calamities for the sake of Christ; for whenever I am weak, then I am strong.

Paul feels the Lord saying, “My grace is sufficient for you, for power is made perfect in weakness.” In the life of St. Paul, God has made powerful use of both his highs and his lows. When we recognize the peaks and valleys of our life experience, we can be assured that God is at work in all of it to shape the servants God wants us to be.