By Chad Pierce

The shock had worn off, and I found myself weeping alone in the dark.

The emotions of the previous 48 hours finally had taken their toll. It had started out innocent enough. I had just taken my boy to the batting cages. After showing him that his old man still had it, we went home. As he came out of the bathroom, he told my wife and I that something was wrong. After the initial visit in the ER we found ourselves on the way to the local children’s hospital. My son’s kidneys were failing.

I took the first overnight shift in the hospital as my wife stayed home helping one of our other, more dramatic children, work through the trauma of having her first cavity. The next day was filled with doctors, nurses, specialists, theories, and so much more. We took each round with our heads held high, not wanting our son to be alarmed at the potential outcomes. That night, when I went home, everything came to the surface.

In the midst of the darkness, a friend called. He didn’t ask so much as he told me he was on his way over. He let himself in, sat in the dark, and let me cry. Then, he cried with me. There were few words exchanged, but I don’t remember any of them. But I do remember him just sitting with me. As I think about it now, I remember his compassion.

The word compassion comes from two Latin words. (Thank you Magistra Swart and Dr. Bratt!) Com — with. And, Passio — suffer. My friend took the time to suffer with me.

Compassion, although not unique to our faith, seems like one of those Christian words we like to toss around without ever really knowing what it means. I would imagine many Christians would wholeheartedly agree that we should feel sorry for those who suffer. I guess that is noble. But if our compassion ends at a feeling, then we really don’t have compassion at all.

In Luke 7, Jesus encountered a funeral procession. The text says that seeing a widow grieving the loss of her son moved Jesus to compassion. God, in human form, suffered with her. And it was only after Jesus suffered with the mother that he brought healing to her boy.

Of course that’s not the only way that miracle stories work in the New Testament. But in this story, we hear that healing comes when we experience or offer compassion. Life happens when people suffer with us and when we suffer with others.
While I understand that I’m painting with a rather broad brush, I wonder if North American Christianity has lost its compassion? I think so.

One of the main reasons appears to be our unwillingness to choose what Henri Nouwen refers to as “downward mobility.” We set up our lives, we vote for policies, we make excuses for, we condone, and, at worst, we celebrate thoughts, words, and actions that hurt those who are suffering the most.

We give a host of reasons for why. Or are they excuses? Safety. Laws. Even patriotic duty, to name a few. I guess that’s fine, as long as we don’t mind the reality that in doing so we are abandoning the compassion of the Lord. It seems ironic that a religion whose whole ideology is based on a God who was willing to exemplify downward mobility is now used to trample the lowly. A God who suffered with us is now called upon to justify the suffering of others. A God who had compassion on all law breakers is now boldly named by those who seem to have none.

I get it. “What Would Jesus Do” bracelets and “As for me and my house, we will serve the Lord” plaques are a lot harder to live into when we actually follow the path of Jesus. Compassion is so much more difficult when it means having to get close to those who suffer. Christianity appears to be less appealing when the path to victory can only be found when we are required to stoop low.

I am not intelligent enough to have answers for all the suffering around us today. But what I do have is the ability to demonstrate compassion. I have the opportunity to meet, embrace, love, and suffer with those who weep today in the darkness. And the miracle is that it’s precisely there in the darkness that life, flourishing, and Christ himself is most likely to be found.

About the author: Chad Pierce is pastor of Faith Christian Reformed Church in Holland, Michigan.

This essay was originally published as “Compassion and Stooping Low” on the The Reformed Journal blog and is reprinted with permission.

Editor’s note: when we reached out to request permission to reprint Chad’s story, we asked how his son was doing. We are glad to report that Chad’s son is in full remission now.