Today’s Word from Pastor Tom Kidd…
Empathy is good, narcissism is bad. Pretty sure you’re with me on this one. Empathy is good, narcissism is bad. Empathy is the gift of being able to feel one another’s feelings, allowing one to be fully present with another. Narcissism is the total inability to empathize with another’s feelings, reducing relationships to a series of transactions. When we hurt, we are ministered to by the one who can empathize with our pain. We know we are not alone. Empathy fosters hope.
There is a discipline about Lent that I have always appreciated. As I have previously written, the season of Lent helps me focus my attention. There is a spirituality in the season that is nurturing for my soul. In years past I would encourage many of my parishioners to consider fasting as a part of their Lenten discipline. I would encourage them to journal their experience with the task of allowing their reflections to become a source of insight and growth and prayer. It is not uncommon for people to view giving up something for the season as a fast. Like chocolate, or desserts, or their spouses (just kidding… though the joke one year was my having to convince Brenda that Lent was 40 days, not 40 weeks).
While I guess, for some, desserts might be a sacrifice, I encouraged the faithful to consider a fast that would challenge their dependency on food. Did you know that fully one half of all Biblical references to prayer are to “prayer and fasting?” True, there is a linkage. Apparently, there is nothing that helps focus prayer like fasting. Today will be my 5th Thursday when I have fasted. From Wednesday dinner to Friday breakfast, I refrain from eating. I journal and pray and stay busy with tasks to be accomplished. It is not a big deal, in fact, hunger is typically not an issue. There are things I miss, though. I miss the social aspect of a meal. I miss the routine of putting something in my mouth, but I am seldom hungry. Though, it is curious how our psyche yearns for something we are told we can’t have. Anyway, prayer and fasting go together.
Think on Jesus’ 40-day experience in the wilderness as a time of prayer and fasting. His “journaling” experiences were the conversations he had with Satan, and the temptations he avoided, as he leaned on the Scriptures as his source of strength.
Lenten fasting is often cited as an experience that can assist us in empathizing with Christ’s suffering. Jesus willingly gave up his life, by way of horrific suffering, in atonement for the sin of the world. The faithful have developed traditions over the centuries meant to encourage disciples of Jesus to find a way to enter into our Lord’s experience. I would never cast aspersions over anyone’s attempt at sacrifice. I believe at heart the desire is, in some small way, to empathize with Jesus and his suffering. What can be forgotten, though, is how the Passion of Christ is God’s way of demonstrating how God empathizes with us.
That’s the zinger… the Creator of the stars and worlds yet to be discovered entered into our time and space to tell us, “I’ve got this, I can make good what you cannot.” Isn’t that amazing? The Passion of Christ is God’s love story for creation. It is the story of God empathizing with us. And every time we share in the meal, “This is my body… this is my blood…” we remember God’s love for us is greater than our sin. Every time we share in the Lord’s Supper we share in a holy experience of intimacy. Our Lord says, “Here I am, in flesh and blood, to be with you and to remind you again that God has loved you into eternity.”
Empathy is good, Holy empathy is better, as again this day we are blessed with hope. I earnestly look forward to our being together again.
Pastor Tom
