Pain and Pleasure

It was August in southern California. (Okay, it was August around the world, but you know what I mean.) My wife and I went with another couple to this cool event called the Laguna Sawdust Festival. They had crafts and arts and stuff. Nice time. Well, halfway through the afternoon, everything went dark. I mean everything. No electricity at all. They closed the festival and we headed home. And there was no power anywhere. The entire west coast was dark. No traffic signals. Nothing. We made our way carefully to our friends' house and left them there and then headed home. As we arrived back in our neighborhood, I noticed something odd. Usually it was extremely rare to see a neighbor anywhere, but now they were everywhere. They were out in front yards with coolers and umbrellas and portable radios, chatting, visiting, almost a party atmosphere. The whole neighborhood. It was like the old days where neighbors interacted with neighbors, where they were all outside all the time being friendly and, well, neighborly. And it occurred to me what changed those old days. It was air conditioners. Okay, well, not just AC. It was walls and entertainment and comfort. It was computers and the Internet and social media. It was modern technology where to be comfortable you needn't leave your home; it's all there. In fact, if you left your home, you would be missing out. Missing out on your favorite shows, missing out on your AC and your Internet and ... everything that makes us comfortable ... and isolated.

You can see this in the recent hurricane disasters. Cut off their comforts -- their homes, their electricity, their technology -- and what do you get? You get neighbors from states away crowding around to assist, to aid one another, to pick you back up. They can hardly help jumping in to help out. Strangers who are "neighbors" either in person or in nationality or perhaps just on the same continent. Stripped of modern conveniences, people seem to interact much more.

Now, I'm not saying that modern conveniences are evil. Hey, I live in the desert. Not having AC can be lethal. They are not evil in themselves. I'm saying that we're misusing them. Because it's what we do. God designed food for a particular purpose for our good and we turn it into gluttony. God designed pleasure for a particular purpose for our good and we turn it into hedonism. God designed sex for a particular purpose for good and we stretch it into one of the leading sins. It's just what we sinful human beings do.

But there is another point. We all (including me) complain about tough times. When we encounter pain or loss we often ask God, "Why?" with either anger or bewilderment. Well, wonder no more.

Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of mercies and God of all comfort, who comforts us in all our affliction, so that we may be able to comfort those who are in any affliction, with the comfort with which we ourselves are comforted by God. For as we share abundantly in Christ's sufferings, so through Christ we share abundantly in comfort too. If we are afflicted, it is for your comfort and salvation; and if we are comforted, it is for your comfort, which you experience when you patiently endure the same sufferings that we suffer. (2 Cor 1:3-6)

We encounter suffering for our benefit and for the benefit of others. Paul said of his "thorn in the flesh", "Three times I pleaded with the Lord about this, that it should leave me. But He said to me, 'My grace is sufficient for you, for My power is made perfect in weakness.' Therefore I will boast all the more gladly of my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ may rest upon me." (2 Cor 12:8-9) For Paul's benefit. James wrote, "Count it all joy, my brothers, when you meet trials of various kinds, for you know that the testing of your faith produces steadfastness. And let steadfastness have its full effect, that you may be perfect and complete, lacking in nothing." (James 1:2-4) For your benefit. And the passage in 2 Corinthians says that when we are comforted in affliction, we can share that comfort with others who share the same affliction.

We shouldn't turn our pleasures into our idols. That happens both when we indulge them so much that we forget others and when we lose them and can't function without them. God gives suffering for a reason. It is both for our own best interests and the interests of others. So let's properly enjoy the pleasures God gives and the afflictions He gives for ourselves and for others.