This Is Why Your Suffering Needs A Voice

When I was young, I did a rap in our Easter church service while pulling off some pretty white girl choreographed moves—thank God no one recorded it.

I think it was from DC Talk or Carmen (oh, yeah). But it was all about the death and resurrection of Jesus and I remember just selling my rap part and feeling like I was changing the world one rhyme at a time (see what I did there?).

Easter was the biggest party of the year.

It was a remembrance how love really does conquer death, a celebration of the rebirth of the soul. It was a time to remember the rhythm of death and life which is woven into the fabric of everything.

And a remembrance of how the Easter Bunny was thought up by Satan.

We were great at celebrating, dancing around like a bunch of crazy hippies for hours, waving streamers and flags (“praise flags” to be exact) and feeling the full wonder and redemption of Easter.

But there was a practice I missed when growing up, a piece of the church calendar I never knew held much importance:

The season before celebration, Lent.

In the Christian tradition, Lent is the 40 day period of time leading up to the resurrection of Jesus. During those 40 days, you can reflect, pray, or give up food, tv, negative thinking, or anything you feel you need to do without.

Photo Credit: minka6, Creative Commons

It’s a re-training of the brain and body. It is also a time of repentance—reflecting on what you have done and left undone.

My first experience with Lent was a pretty heavy one.

We were in a room with other people we knew, and we were invited to give voice to suffering; unashamedly, unreservedly, speaking it out loud. Then, we would collectively respond with “Lord have mercy, Christ have mercy.”

The idea of being vulnerable, letting people in on some of the deepest pain in your life, was… well, difficult to say the least.

And at first it was incredibly awkward…but then one person spoke.

It was something like “help my brokenness.”

Then everyone said “Lord have mercy, Christ have mercy.”

Then another “why did that happen to me?”

“Lord have mercy, Christ have mercy.”

And then it was like something opened up—permission to be honest about the darkness.

“Why did my marriage fail?”

“Lord have mercy, Christ have mercy.”

“I thought You said You would always be with me, where are You now?”

“Lord have mercy, Christ have mercy.”

“He cheated on me, why did that happen?”

“Lord have mercy, Christ have mercy.”

“My baby died, why did she die? I’m wrapped in grief and can not see any light!”

“Lord have mercy, Christ have mercy.”

Darkness was given a voice, and through the bold act of speaking it out loud, we all felt united. There was no answer given, no three point process of what to do now.

We just sat with it, fully facing the darkness.

For some of us, facing the darkness may be easy and welcoming, but for others it is incredibly difficult because it hits at core issues like loss, racism, addiction, depression.

We want to move forward right away, be happy, positive, love the person who hurt us, be over the grief of a lost life. But Lent calls us to face the darkness head on; to not put a lid on our anger about whatever suffering we have experienced, but to look at it for what it is.

Because when we give our suffering a voice, that is when it begins to lose its power.

Let this season of lent not be skipped over.

Let us pause and face the things we have buried—hurt from racism, hurt from religion, hurt from family, from friends, from ourselves.

It may heal us, it may ground us, and connect us with our humanity in a way we haven’t experienced before.