Evening Sermon: The Role of Suffering in the Destruction of the Passions

Job 6: 4

“The arrows of the Almighty have pierced me.  My spirit has drunk in their poison.”

    This verse from the sixth chapter of the Book of Job gives us an apt description of the way that we often experience suffering, privation and sorrow in our lives. Very often we feel like the unwitting victims of a unfriendly and chaotic universe.  Yet, at the same time, the Holy Apostle assures us that “everything works together unto good for those who love God.” Reconciling the aforementioned feeling with what should be normative Christian belief (as expressed by Paul) is one of the major tasks of the spiritual life. 

     Theodicy (the philosophical inquiry into the justice of God and how it is manifested in our experience) is of major concern for Christianity, because we believe that God is kind and loving.  St. Isaac of Nineveh tells us:

Divine love is beyond human understanding and above all description in words.  At the same time it is reflected in God’s actions with respect to the created world and humankind: “Among all His actions there is none which is not entirely a matter of mercy, love and compassion: this constitutes the beginning and the end of His dealings with us. Both the creation of the world and God’s coming on earth in the flesh had the only aim, “to reveal His boundless love to the world.”

     In the abovementioned passage, Job calls out in anguish that the Almighty arrows have pierced him.  This is an expression of how he feels, since, at that point in the story, he has had to endure incalculable sufferings.  At certain times, he even prays for death.  He refers to his sufferings as “the arrows of the Almighty.” St. Isaac certainly would not be able to dispute that Job experiences his suffering as “arrows” from God. Nevertheless, Isaac would argue that they are “loving arrows.” But Job continues, “my spirit has drunk in their poison.” Job makes it clear that he has experienced God’s action in his life as “death-dealing.”

     As impossible as it might seem, both St. Paul and St. Job the Long-Suffering are both right.  The sufferings of this life are indeed arrows from the Almighty.  It was, after all, God Who permitted them.  But they are “loving arrows” in the sense that the Lord has permitted them for the good of the one who endures them.  These sufferings will indeed work together unto good, if they are received and used rightly.

     Further, the sufferings of this life do indeed introduce a death-dealing poison, just as St. Job says.  It is a death-dealing poison, because it kills the “old man.” This image is used repeatedly in St. Paul’s thought.  For example in Colossians 3:9 he says: “Never lie to one another, for you have put off the old man, and have put on the new man, who is continually renewed in fuller and fuller knowledge, closer and closer to the image of his Creator.” What St. Paul is referring to here as “the old man” is the fallen human nature that is controlled by the passions.   The passions have to be stripped off, in order for us to be conformed to Christ.  The positive aspect of the spiritual life is being conformed to Christ through the practice of virtue.  The negative, but just as necessary aspect, is the destruction of the passions.  The arrows of the Almighty are directed towards us in order to destroy the passions, and give us an opportunity to exercise positive virtues: resignation, patience, charity, etc.