It Could Be Worse

Recently I've been dealing with a trial--a hurtful situation that left me feeling discouraged, sad, and disappointed. On the spectrum of tragedies--well, it wouldn't even make it onto the spectrum of tragedies, and it's a situation that I would have been happy to have remained silent about, for the most part. But the miracle of Facebook left me responding to questions I hoped wouldn't be asked and addressing concerns that I hadn't wanted to share, and when I explain the situation, I quite frequently get the response, "Well, it could be worse." (I'm thankful to say that the situation has been resolved, and, for the most part, all is well.)

Yes, thank you, I know that. It could be a thousand times worse. Give me a pen and paper, time me for two minutes, and I can probably make a list of at least twenty-five ways it could be worse.You see, back in the nineties, I was the poster child for worse. My twenty-year-old sister died as a result of injuries she received in a car accident in 1990. Then in 1994, my thirty-three-year-old husband was diagnosed with acute myelogonous leukemia. And--worse--he died after extensive treatment in 1996 and left me a widow in my early thirties with two toddlers to raise alone. In the last half of the nineties, my two remaining grandparents died, along with an assortment of other relatives. Early in the great new millenium, I found myself employed by a Christian organization (not Discovery House Publishers, which was a tremendous blessing) that mistreated me, and with the cumulative effect of everything I had been through, I sank into a deep, clinical depression and was placed on medication.

I know about worse.

Yet when I think about all those tragic events, in every one I can imagine that things could have been worse. My sister and my former husband knew the Lord and are in heaven with him now. It could have been far worse if they had not been people who loved the Lord. I was not left penniless, with a terminal illness, all alone. My children and I were physically healthy through all of this (with the exception of my depression). I had been well educated and was able eventually to find work that I loved and a reasonably good salary to live on. As bad as all that was, it could have been worse.

Think about the worst thing that has ever happened to you. Now think about how it could have been worse--no matter how bad it was. You can think of something, I'm sure.

I once broke a small bone in my wrist. It hurt really bad. If someone had said to me while I was still in pain, "You know, it could be worse. You could have an inoperable brain tumor," she would have been absolutely right. But it wouldn't have taken away the pain of my small, minor fracture--or the reality that it needed treatment of some sort to heal and strengthen.

So I'm not quite sure what to do with the counsel that it could have been worse. I'm not sure that's the best thing we can say to a brother or sister who is hurting--whether we understand their pain or think they're overreacting or just know that something we personally have experienced was so much worse--and maybe it was. Pain is pain, and telling someone who is in pain that he or she could actually be experiencing even greater pain may be true, but it's not necessarily helpful. When we tell someone that things could be worse, it's as if we're saying that the pain they're feeling now is irrelevant because he or she could be experiencing greater, more intense, longer-lasting pain. But it doesn't take their very real and present pain away.

We can tell a person in pain that we're praying for her, that we love her and hope that she'll soon be able to sort things out. We can tell her we're sorry for her pain. We can offer to listen, and, as the Holy Spirit gives opportunity, give gentle, compassionate advice where it is needed and wanted. We can speak of the ways God has helped us in painful situations--how he has not left us alone and has given us all that we need in his Word to cope with the painful providences of our lives. But whatever the source of pain is, it is there, and there need to be healing and strengthening. And with that will eventually come the realization that God owes us nothing, and then we experience gratitude because the situation could always--and forever--be so much worse.