House on the Rock

It’s ironic, since I married a math teacher, but my body still has a visceral reaction when I think about my experience with high school math. And middle school math. And, really, with the exception of multiplication tables in second grade (all memorizable), all math. Through all years. I never understood proofs. Algebra made no sense to me. While my friends floated along to their academic honors diploma in high-level Calc, I was more than happy to step down into the uncivilized world of non-honors Algebra 2.

It is an actual fact that my high school math hallway had no windows in it. An equally true fact is that when I became a teacher, the high school where I taught also had fewer windows in the math hallway. There was even one math classroom that had no windows at all. What can we chalk this up to? The sun doesn’t shine where math is being taught. Or at least that’s what I’ve believed. I was the fifth-grade embodiment of that tried-and-true tale: a helpless girl at the kitchen table with her frustrated father wiping tears off a long division worksheet (the tears both his and hers). I had wonderful math teachers, yet my hatred for the subject remained unchanged. Perhaps part of the reason I married Joe was grounded in the knowledge that he would handle the math side of our kids’ homework. I’m sure there were other reasons too.

But despite all my disdain for that dreaded subject, there is a concept that has stuck with me far beyond the walls of CHS. It’s that nifty geometrical hack which ensures that if A = B and B = C, then A = C. Oh Captain my Transitive Property, you were the one thing in all of my classes that clicked.

And I’m glad it did, because I’ve stumbled across a biblical syllogism which has brought about great peace amidst a season of grief. It’s something I continue to fall back on when my pain isn’t making sense. It’s a beautiful bridge from Psalm to Psalm, grounding us in God’s goodness when the world feels so not.

So if A is that God is near to the broken-hearted (Psalm 34:18), and B is that the nearness of God is my good (Psalm 73:28), then there must be a sweet, soul-soothing sense that in some way, (C) it is good for me to be broken-hearted.

It’s why Chuck Swindoll writes that when he asks people to describe a time when they grew the most spiritually, “They never describe an easy time. Never.” It’s also why the saints of old with the most grueling lives have come to treasure Christ more than those who had it easy.

God really is near to us when we are broken — in fact, the gentle and lowly heart of Jesus is most drawn to sinners and sufferers. His nearness is better than any trophy or triumph or a raise or, dare I say, remission? Could it be that suffering in the precious fold of our Father is better than a clean bill of health year after year after year?

This is not to say we inflict suffering or even long for it. But for me, it takes days like last Monday, when another negative pregnancy test threatened to turn my world upside down, and it refreshes me with the quiet peace of His presence. It assures me that for some reason, in some strange act of providence, it was better for my soul to see a single line stained on a stick and to know that it was good for me to be broken. To weep. To collapse on the couch and cry out like the Psalmist, “You are my God — I have nothing good besides you!” (16:2).

But the Lord does not delight in our suffering. Our faithful Father does not gloat when we are forced to fall at His feet. But He does promise to be near in the midst of it. Working for our good and His glory. Allowing us to become a little less enamored with this earth, and helping our hearts to be homesick for Heaven.

I still don’t like math. And I still don’t like suffering. But I’ll appreciate what the math taught me about how to suffer: He is near when I’m hurting, and His nearness is my good. Beyond what my finite mind can comprehend, I have come to trust that this hurting is for my good.