The God Jesus knew was the God of Moses, a God who heard the cry of the people in their slavery and bondage. "Indeed I know their sufferings" says this God in Exodus 3:7, and then God acts in and through Moses to free God's people. At his baptism, Jesus heard this God proclaim to him, the new Moses: "You are my beloved son in whom I am well pleased." Jesus let this truth in from His head to His feet and such faith in this reality freed Him up to be Jesus! He could trust that nothing would happen that He and his Abba could not handle.

I believe there wasn't a masochistic bone in Jesus' body. He did not see suffering as a value in itself. Instead, the scriptures show us Jesus trying to avoid suffering wherever possible. He escaped from the enemies' hands at Nazareth when they tried to throw him off the cliff; he went down to Jerusalem at night to avoid the enemy. He cried out of the depths in Gethsemane to not to have to suffer and die. Years ago Anthony Padovano wrote: "It is not a love for suffering which Christ reveals, but a love which prevails in suffering. It is not the physical death of Jesus which is redemptive, but the love of Jesus for us even unto death."

The God revealed in Jesus has an enlarged heart that is filled with compassion in the sight of suffering: a woman bent over; a man born blind; a woman suffering from hemorrhage; a man who is paralyzed; a widow burying her only son; a man who is hearing and speech impaired; a mother at the foot of a cross. But nowhere does Jesus say, "God bless you; grin and bear this, for this is God's will for you." Instead, his aching heart reaches out with a healing touch. Our God, revealed in Jesus, longs for our wholeness and our happiness.

Walter Bruggemann was right when he wrote: "What we make of pain is perhaps the most telling factor for the question of life and the nature of our faith."² It is one thing to believe and trust in a good and provident God when all is going well -- as Job, Jeremiah, and Jesus could attest -- but when one is stripped of family and friends, a job, possessions, reputation, and maybe even experiences of God's seeming absence, then faith and trust and love are challenged to cry out of new depths. In the book Challenges of Jesus, John Shea says: "God raised Jesus from the dead not because he never flinched, talked back, or questioned, but having flinched, talked back, and questioned, he remained faithful."³

At an early age I witnessed a Christian response to the problem of suffering. It was October 31, 1943, and the family was gathered at the dinner table. My father had died the previous year, leaving my mother to raise seven children and to care for her own invalid mother. The doorbell rang. A telegram! Initial excitement that it may be news that my brother in the Air Force was coming home! A blue star on the cover, however, dashed our hopes: "Missing in Action."

We prayed out of the depths together; mother then called the Rectory to ask for the prayers of the Church community. Then she said, "Now, if we are people of faith and believe that God has heard our prayers, we need to show our trust. Joan and Marybeth, you were scheduled to go to a party; I was to go play pinochle. Let's be about life!" The priest came over to console my mother, and we had to say that she was out playing cards. I don't know what this clergyman thought, but to us, we saw a faith-full woman dip deep into herself, and find the courage and trust that she had developed in her Christian life. We knew that she was not just repressing the reality or the pain, but she believed that faith had to be put into action. "Blessed is the one who trusts in the Lord, whose trust is the Lord," says the Book of Jeremiah. "She is like a tree planted by water, that sends out its roots by the stream, and does not fear when heat comes, for its leaves remain green, and is not anxious in the year of drought, for it does not cease to bear fruit."

Some years later we were gathered together again as a family in the waiting room of University Hospital of Ann Arbor. The doctor came to report that the surgery on my twenty-eight year old sister discovered the much-feared brain tumor. They were unable to remove it. If she lived through the recovery period, there were many obstacles and sufferings down the line. I could handle most of what I heard, even her possible death; but when the prognosis indicated that she may become violent and have to be institutionalized, I broke down. My mother sat me down. "Now look here, young lady," she said, "you are all upset about something that hasn't happened and may never happen. We have the grace and God's help to get through today. If God allows something more to happen, your sister and all of us will get the help we need at the time. You can't live tomorrow's crosses on today's graces. The Scripture tells us, 'Sufficient for the day is the evil thereof.'" Yes, indeed, "What we make of pain is perhaps the most telling factor for the question of life and the nature of our faith."

My sister lived, not five years as predicted, but fifteen; she did not become violent as predicted, but more and more docile. A card hung at her bedroom door saying: "Call me when you're ready, God, just make sure I'm ready when you call!"

As Jesus experienced the totality of our human condition, and therefore, the mystery of suffering, I assume that possibly the words of the Psalm 130 were on his lips often: "Out of the depths I cry to you, O Lord. Lord, hear my voice!" As he knew the pain of rejection by his own, knew the loss of a friend, Lazarus; knew so called "failure" of his life's work; knew fear; knew betrayal; knew the anguish of Gethsemane and the torture of Calvary; and the feeling of abandonment by his God in the midst of it all, we have one who understands when we cry:

Out of the depths I cry to you, Lord. Lord hear my voice.
I wait for the Lord, my soul waits, and in God's Word I hope;
my soul waits for the Lord more than those who watch for the morning,
more than those who watch for the morning.
O Israel, hope in the Lord!
For with the Lord there is steadfast love,
and with the Lord is great the power of redemption.

Lydia Talbot: Thank you Joan, for your inspirational message. You know, the image of your mother is so very, very, incredibly energetic still, even though she has passed away. You must tell us what that role model means now for you.

Joad Delaplane: Well, I think for certain of the impact that she had also on my sister, and the two of them have become role models of faith for me, in times of that strength of character that comes when one believes that a God of love is holding us gently and firmly and strongly in hand. And I see it over and over in Jesus. Both in Jesus and in my mother and in my sister, it's that faith in God's saving love that continues to impact my life.

Talbot: And this majestic response to it. And yet there are so many people who experience pain and loss and suffering each day who place God on the hook for it. Now, theologically, break that apart.

Delaplane:  Well I think that's why that opening story. Because I think we don't let God off the hook. I think it is in the mystery of suffering and the mystery of evil in the world where we bang our heads against the wall and will not find an answer. And that's why again, my focus always has to be on how you cope and deal with it and find in Jesus people like Marge Delaplane, Mary... What does one do? I don't think it's what happens to us so much as what we do with what happens, and wherein we ground ourselves so that we somehow can find meaning, even in the midst of mystery.

Talbot: And language and mystery are sometimes problematic to people who don't understand that it is the compassionate, loving God who weeps, too, who can't prevent tragedies or losses, but weeps too.

Delaplane: Yes, that's right. I think William Sloane-Coffin, so powerfully speaks of that when he talks about when his beloved son was drowned, that God was the first to weep as the waters covered that car. I think that we're talking about a faith experience. It's coming out of faith alone. There really is not another way to address the issue except out of that perspective.

Talbot: And, Joan, as a woman of faith -- as a leader in your profession, your work in education, homiletics, professor of homiletics -- tell us a bit about your calling. What was it that inspired you to ministry?

Delaplane:  Well, I think that calling started way back as a little girl in a desire really to make my life meaningful. I remember even later at sixteen or seventeen was the final decision and in contemplating, sitting up in the window of my mother's bedroom, looking at the whole universe. And thinking of our Creator God and of our world, I wanted to make certain that my life didn't all of a sudden fall through my fingers and I realize it's over with, that I wanted to make certain that it was used well. And that meant service to God and God's people.