In Any Affliction

I was never a drug user. I’ve done plenty of dumb things over the course of my life, and indulged in plenty of sin, but drugs were simply never part of that picture for me. I tried speed one time and it made me so paranoid that I knew I’d never do it again, and so ended my “wild party” days. But, surprisingly enough, God has used me for the last five years to counsel and disciple men and women who have struggled with addiction. If I believed that I couldn’t help them because I had not experienced first-hand their struggle then I would have missed out on a great deal that God was doing my life and in their lives. God equips believers to offer counsel to anyone in any affliction, regardless of mutual experiences.

Aaron (not his real name) was a student of mine when I taught logic and argumentation for a local university. When he found out I was also a pastor he came and confessed to me that he was addicted to meth, that he wanted to sober up, that he wanted help. At that moment I had no clue what to do or how to help him, but I also knew I couldn’t refuse. It took a great deal of humility and desperation to confess his sin and ask for help. I wanted to take his confession seriously and link arms with him. So we began to meet. It became clear pretty quickly that I had not experienced first-hand his struggle and that in many ways I wasn’t really sure what the best approach was, but Aaron was patient with me. I genuinely believed that I could still provide help, even if I hadn’t been a meth addict myself. One verse of Scripture in particular helped me to keep pressing on: 1 Corinthians 1:3-4. Here’s what Paul writes:

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

We are comforted in all our affliction so that we can comfort those who are in any affliction. It’s that word any that held out hope for me.

Paul does not state here that we can only comfort those whose suffering is like ours. He goes on in verse 6 to say that we share comfort as we endure the “same sufferings,” but I think Paul has something bigger in mind by this expression. In verse 5 he states that we share in the “sufferings of Christ.” The shared sufferings are those we share in Christ. They may not look the same in their detailed expressions, but at the heart they are the same because we are counseling believers. We can comfort those in “any affliction,” Paul states. This was motivation I needed to move forward and to keep trying to help my brother get out of his bondage to addiction. This concept put in place several key motivating reminders.

First, I was reminded that all truth belongs to God and not to my experiences. I could speak the truth into my friend’s life because ultimately truth remained the same whether regardless of whether I had experienced the desperation of his situation. It should be accompanied by sensitivity, of course. I don’t want to simply state truth callously or harshly. I don’t want to be naïve either. I don’t want to suggest that if I just tell someone the truth then they will hear it and change. In Aaron’s case he had a lot of related factors that needed to be addressed to help him get clean. I couldn’t just state truth and let that be enough. But I knew the truth applied to him and I knew I could communicate what God wanted from him because it was God’s truth. What he needed to do was the same thing that I needed to do and every other believer. Helping him do it may have required some more specific application to his situation, but the truth didn’t change. That was an extremely helpful reminder.

Second, I was reminded that all afflictions share similarities. There’s a sense in which the experiences of all people are common to all people. Philosophically speaking there’s a sense in which everything in the world is analogous to everything else, and everything in the world is different from everything else. Learning is really a coming to understand these likenesses and differences. There’s a sense in which I simply could not relate to Aaron. I didn’t know what it was like to use meth, or to feel a biological and psychological dependency on it. In another sense, however, I knew exactly what it was like to feel enslaved to a sin you both hate and don’t want to give up. I could relate very easily to that reality. I could relate to many of the emotional and psychological backdrops that had tempted Aaron to run to drugs for salvation and escape. We had far more in common than perhaps I realized when we first started meeting.

Thirdly, I was reminded that comfort goes beyond the details. Comfort is such a powerful concept. We shouldn’t overlook it here in the text of 2 Corinthians. Bob Kelleman and Greg Cook help clarify the importance of the word by giving us some definitions. They write:

Comfort is a powerful word both in the English and the original Greek text of the New Testament. In English, it highlights cofortitude – the idea that we are fortified when we stand together, that we are strengthened when others weep with us and grieve with us (Romans 12:15). In the Greek text, “comfort” derives from a compound word – para kaletic, or para klesis. It means “one called alongside to help.” (Christ-Centered Biblical Counseling, 381)

We are being called to come alongside and help someone else, that is a powerful idea, one that goes well beyond my experience. I know for my friend Sarah (not her real name), she just needed to know there was someone in her corner. We are seeing tremendous growth in her life and I think that is in part because she feels like she has linked arms with people who care about her. Some of us don’t know what it’s like to be an alcoholic, but we love Sarah and we are walking through the valley with her and that motivates here greatly. Furthermore, this text tells us that the comfort we give is not from us. Rather it is from God. Paul says that the comfort we receive is from the “Father of mercies…who comforts us in our afflictions.” This is the comfort we share! It’s a comfort that goes well beyond my experiences and comes from the Father of mercies.

The truth is if I didn’t believe in this principle of “In Any Affliction” I don’t think I would help anyone. Everyone’s experiences and afflictions are unique. Everyone is different and the details all play out differently. To speak into anyone’s life, to bring comfort to anyone, I need to believe that I can be helpful to anyone regardless of mutual experience.

I wish so much that Aaron’s story had a happy ending to it. I wish I even knew where he was today, but sadly he bailed several months after our first meeting. But my time with him set me up to better serve others. I am thankful to say that God has helped me to help others. Regardless of your experiences you too can bring comfort to those in any affliction.