When Hearing Hurts

(by Dave, 15min)

Spiritually deaf

Jesus says he who has ears let him hear or something like it many times in the gospels. Study Bibles often give two explanations for this expression. It’s an attention getter because once he says it you think again about what he said. It’s also a true statement. Some people will hear the teachings of Jesus and understand, and others will not.

When first considering faith, I heard a few sermons on the parable of the Sower (Matthew 13:1-23; Mark 4:1-20; Luke 8:1-15). Seeds fall on ground of different sorts and experience different fates. On hearing this for the first time I knew seeds were not the focus but couldn’t discern what else the parable was about. The pastor then provided the explanation from Jesus. I was disturbed at not being able to see past the literal meaning, but also because at the conclusion of the parable Jesus says: “whoever has ears let them hear”.

Apparently, I did not have ears. Jesus offers hope for someone like me when he concludes his explanation of the parable in Matthew: “For this people’s heart has become calloused; they hardly hear with their ears, and they have closed their eyes. Otherwise they might see with their eyes, hear with their ears, understand with their hearts and turn, and I would heal them.” Callousness of heart is apparently the pivot point between understanding and not understanding.

The options

Early in my Christian journey I spoke with Mary, a kind Christian woman who barely knew me. When asked how she came to faith, she said God called her with audible words. I believed she was a victim of desire-fueled delusion. People can convince themselves of anything if they want it enough.

Maybe Mary never heard audible words from God. After all, there was no one else with her to hear them. Maybe my interpretation that follows is complete religious contrivance. How could I truly know the insights are accurate when my mind is involved in the interpretation? It is understandable for someone to read this piece and believe Mary and I are overly zealous and confused by religious devotion. Alternatively, maybe both of our stories accurately convey the truth.

When hearing hurts

Previously I mentioned a chronic pain condition from which I suffer. The official name for it is ankylosing spondylitis with non-radiographic reactive arthritis. For me, this autoimmune condition produces inflammation and pain in tendons, bursae, and joints. My day is organized around pain avoidance because sitting too long causes inflammatory pain as does walking, sleeping, or any other activity that calls for repetitive motion or sustained positioning.

When the condition first emerged I didn’t know what was happening, and ignorant of any solution, the pain and swelling flared out of control. Sleeping became difficult because there was no position in which my hips did not become swollen and painful. After some desperate days, I discovered that flexing my hips to 90° while lying flat on my back would ease the pain. To hold this position, I propped my legs up on a giant pile of blankets, strapped my knees together with a Velcro strap and put frozen peas directly on the bursae to get through the night.  Alas, eventually that just transferred the pain to the weight bearing surfaces of my legs and I was in a quandary.

I did not take this well. When my increasing prayers for healing produced none, the prayers changed. I pleaded with God to bring me home and end this. Please Lord, I would pray as intensely as possible. What good can this possibly serve? I can do nothing for you. I am a burden to my family. I cannot preach as I was taught and hoped to do in retirement. I am of no use to anyone and have no purpose for living. Why not bring me home and end my suffering. This was my prayer.

I heard nothing from God. It seemed prayers for healing or an end to my life were rejected. Most believers will tell you that there are no unanswered prayers. God is saying no or not now. But what if neither of these is true? What if my prayer for healing was being answered by the persistence of pain?

Maybe struggling with pain is uniquely necessary for me to push through a callousness of heart that prevents me from having ears to hear. While I don’t think God gave me pain, perhaps relieving pain might stop the very healing I need most. A healing God very much wants to give.

Over the next few months my problems worsened and within weeks many of my strategies for pain control began to fail. I went off to see an orthopedic surgeon who diagnosed irritation of the peroneal nerves as they passed behind my knees. He said you need to remove the irritation because you don’t want surgery of this nerve. It is very difficult and hazardous.

The only way to remove the irritation was just get my legs out straight again instead of propping them up on a heap of blankets. I tried it and the hip swelling returned, so I rebuilt the pile and endured the pain. My wife left the bedroom unable to sleep as I repetitively tore everything from the bed and rebuilt it hoping some subtle change might help. All through this I was in relentless prayer for physical healing which never happened.

One night I had an insight. What if the persistent pain now being caused by the blankets was God’s way of giving me help. A second insight occurred, reduce the pile a little at a time.  The idea terrified my sleep deprived brain. Any adjustment could make the pain in the nerves behind my knees or hips worse and I was already sleeping just a few hours of interrupted sleep a night. So, after reducing the pile, but not eliminating it, I crawled into bed with a single new prayer. “Lord God I am at your mercy and have nowhere else to turn but you.” I fell asleep and awoke with pain in both areas, but less than it had been in either. Over the next several nights I made other minor adjustments and offered the same prayer, and eventually found a level of support for my legs that allowed me to sleep.

This has now happened a few times as I’ve addressed problems with sitting and pain in my elbows. Each time when I threw myself into utter dependence on God some new solution came to mind and would help. It was after a few of these that I started believing God was using my pain to help me with the pain and simultaneously draw me into a deeper relationship.

With each occurrence came ears to hear as the callousness of my heart was shaved back a bit. What I have as a result is the healing Jesus promised in the quote above. Not a healing of body, albeit I am more functional now, but a healing of my soul as I replaced confidence in my own abilities with confidence in the tender mercies of God.

I believe this is what Jesus was talking about. The callousness of heart with which I struggled was an overwhelming confidence in my ability to solve the problem. Once I pushed that away, I was able to conquer my fear of pain, throw myself into the arms of God, and make the changes He gave me.

I understand that this may seem fanciful to you. There is no certainty here. But I’ll finish the story this way. If I could go back in time and live without the pain until now and have my old relationship with the Almighty, I would not do it. I hate this pain. It’s ruined the quality of my life in every regard but one. Without it I could not have the relationship I now have with God. I would have no understanding of how comprehensively I trusted my reasoning alone and how independent of God I was. God used my pain to draw me into dependence on Him, but my heart had to become less calloused to hear His voice specifically tailored for me. Had God healed my pain when I asked, I would not truly have been healed.

Concluding remarks

Is there something God is using in your life right now to call you home to healing? It might not be a physical issue like mine because God speaks to each of us knowing the way we think and our unique past experiences. But is there something you prayed to God about or cursed God because of that is still with you? Could it be that a calloused heart is preventing you from seeing that the very thing you want removed is God’s steady hand calling you home?

Maybe my interpretations are hogwash. Maybe Mary never heard the voice of God. Or, maybe a callousness of heart is all that is preventing us from perceiving the healing hand and mercy from God in the most unlikely experiences of our lives.

Well, food for thought y’all. Many blessings to you today and every day and I hope you feel God’s comforting presence with you today,

Dave