A Christian in the face of sickness and suffering
Very often the value of a person is equated with health. How healthy - it's useful. There is a lot of talk about such people, their achievements and successes are listed in detail. Especially when it comes to more outstanding people. But let some misfortune happen to someone, illness or disability, and his name very quickly disappears from the columns of newspapers and from people's lips. First, a short note appears : ,,NN fell seriously ill…"Or ,,NN had a serious accident ", a few details, and then silence. Sometimes for the rest of my life. It is said then : the end of man.
Is it really so ? Whether disease or disability completely destroys a person and makes him worthless ?
You are young and healthy at the moment. So maybe you too think the same ? Consider : do you have a proper view of the sick people ?
“Someone is sick among you…”
Diseases accompany all people. Maybe you even have sick people among your loved ones. We try to come to their aid by all possible means and make their hard times pleasant. There is always better food for a sick person, more comfortable bed, money needed for medicine, etc.. Visit, flowers, Good word, smile - they do not fight the disease itself, but they contribute to it, that the sick person feels better and heals faster. A sick person can sometimes be capricious and very unpleasant to those around him, but the relatives bear it patiently and are understanding for him.
The patient is also surrounded by the loving care of the state. Even the poorest man, who has no money for a doctor, he is not alone in his illness and can always count on the protection of society. Doctors, Nurses and other health care workers who serve the sick also follow Christ's command to love their neighbor, by their work, they prolong the action of God's love among us.
Now try to think, what we, healthy people, we owe it to the sick. Well, a sick person gives us a wonderful opportunity to do good, sometimes for sacrifice and sacrifice. This triggers in us and accelerates the development of various social virtues, without which a person could become unbearable to those around him. When we minister to the sick, we develop such virtues, how : kindness, patience, gentleness, generosity, indulgence, generosity, etc.. Without these social virtues, man would be useless to society.
The sick person has one more precious gift for us. In health, you don't think about illness, death and the next life. These things seem so distant, yet they are very close to every human being. Other people's disease opens our eyes to them and teaches us, how fragile our life is. It will always remain a mystery, why people have to suffer so much. However, we should be asking, how to help the suffering and what to learn from them.
"I fill the deficiencies of Christ's sufferings" (Col. 1, 24)
This sentence of Scripture. it guides our thoughts from the sick bed to the cross of Jesus. The Cross of Christ explains our suffering. It has to make sense, since the salvation of the world was achieved through suffering. God, though so good, however he wanted to, that his Son would go through suffering. The passion of Jesus freed us from many effects of original sin, and yet it did not free from the necessity of suffering and pain. Why ? Evidently, suffering plays a useful and salutary role in our lives, since good God did not separate him from us. What is it about ?
Every suffering, i to, which we observe, i to, which we experience ourselves, has some purifying power. Suffering makes a strange change in a person. Sometimes people get up completely different after their illness. They think more seriously, they treat others with greater understanding, they become more focused, composed, etc.. Suffering cleans a person internally. Often a serious illness teaches people to pray and awakens religious feelings in them. “When my life was fading away, I remembered the Lord " (Jon 2, 8). The sick person does not do it out of fear of death, but that's why, that is only now beginning to understand, how trivial things were, which he has been dealing with so far, towards the problem of life and death.
The cross teaches us even more. If the sick understand, that he is in a sense similar to the suffering Jesus and will be united with Him spiritually, his sufferings take on, as it were, saving power. Then human sufferings are immersed in the sufferings of Christ. Offered for another human being can obtain many God's favors. “In my body I am filling the deficiencies of Christ's sufferings for the good of his Body, which is the Church " (Col. 1, 24). The sick person surrenders their suffering to Christ with faith, who connects them with his own. The sick person can then say : "I fill the deficiencies of Christ's torments".
And this role of suffering is not always noticed, even among believers. That is why the Church often reminds us, that sick people are not at all excluded from social life. Even seemingly, that they are useless in social and economic life, through their connection with the sufferings of Christ, they become useful to all mankind.
How will I answer God ?
You are young, healthy boy or girl. You finish primary school and think about the future. You are pleased with the world and drawn to it. The matters of suffering seem strange and distant to you, pain, infirmity and old age. But are they really that far away? ? Have you never met them ?
So far you have related to the sick ? How you will relate to them now ? I will also think about myself - how to prepare for a while, when pain and disease stand in my way ? How to take them ?
I will reflect on the words of the song composed by Fr.. K. Antoniewicz, who himself suffered a lot in his life :
"L / l / of the cross suffering, salvation in the cross, learning in the cross of love.
Who the cross will guess, this one will not fall in a pain inflicted upon the heart
■ Think :
1. What people do for the sick and suffering ?
2. How a person's life is enriched, who is willing to help the sick ?
3. How faith explains to us the meaning and value of suffering ?
4. What is the true value of suffering ?
■ Remember:
54. How a Christian should behave in sickness and suffering ?
A Christian should unite his illness and suffering with the saving sufferings of Christ on the cross.
55. How should a Christian deal with the suffering and the sick ?
For the sick and suffering, a Christian should be patient and self-sacrificing.
■ Task :
1. Look for a sick or incapacitated person in the vicinity and look after them as far as possible.
2. find out, what people say about sickness and suffering and compare with that, what you heard about today.