My husband Kevin and I went to watch our friends’ sons play a soccer game. At the end of the match, I went up to one of the teenagers and congratulated him. He asked me why, so I confidently told him, “Because you won the game.”
His response shocked me, “Ms. Shannon, we lost.” As a competitor it would already be difficult to lose a game, however, my comment only made the matter much worse. Evidently, I was the only person in that crowd who did not know about the team’s loss. Unfortunately, my husband could not rescue me in time before I made my blunder. Kevin saw the opponent’s goals because he paid attention to the game.
How did I miss the goals the other team scored? For one, the opponent’s goalie distracted me. He wore a soccer uniform the color of Pepto Bismol, bright pink from head to toe. Questions raced through my mind. Where do you find knee socks that color pink? Does that uniform glow in the dark? Did he know it would be that shade of pink or did he order it on-line and it seemed a bit more subdued? Beyond pondering soccer uniforms, I chatted quite a bit with parents in the crowd. Instead of fully watching the game before me, I allowed conversations to distract me. Lastly, I did not engage with the events on the soccer field because every little thing lately has been reminding me of a very difficult situation in my own life. My thoughts have been consumed by my own personal pain and loss, instead of being fully present in the moment and seeing what others before me are experiencing.
It is easy to be distracted in life. We get caught up in our own thoughts, emotions, and agendas. However, this keeps us from seeing the possible moments of ministry to others. I went from cheering on students at a game, to making a defeat even more awkward afterwards. Unintentionally, my focus on my personal pain caused me to hurt another.
In the book of Genesis, we find another whose overwhelming pain caused heartache to others. Jacob felt distracted by his own pain, loss, and grief. Jacob fathered twelve sons but his favorite was son number eleven, Joseph. His older brothers felt extreme jealousy of Joseph so they sold him into slavery. Then they used false evidence of a bloody coat to convince Jacob that his precious son had died. Little did he know that through a series of events over the span of around twenty years, Joseph went from a lowly house slave to second in command of all of Egypt.
Jacob still resided in Canaan and during this time a terrible famine struck the land. Jacob sent his ten oldest sons to buy food in the land of Egypt, while keeping the youngest with him at home. The sons ended up in the presence of Joseph even though they did not know the identity of this royal official. Joseph, however, instantly recognized his brothers and asked questions about the family. The brothers told Joseph about their younger brother and father. In a desperate plan to see if his brothers had changed, Joseph imprisoned Simeon until all the brothers returned to Egypt. Nine of the brothers returned to Egypt. Sadly, Jacob in his grief and fear of losing another son did not let the brothers return, thus leaving Simeon in jail. Months dragged by and eventually the time came for the purchase of more provisions for the family. Let’s pick up the story in Genesis 43.
Now the famine was still severe in the land. So when they had eaten all the grain they had brought from Egypt, their father said to them, “Go back and buy us a little more food.”
But Judah said to him, “The man warned us solemnly, ‘You will not see my face again unless your brother is with you.’ If you will send our brother along with us, we will go down and buy food for you. But if you will not send him, we will not go down, because the man said to us, ‘You will not see my face again unless your brother is with you.’”
Israel asked, “Why did you bring this trouble on me by telling the man you had another brother?”
They replied, “The man questioned us closely about ourselves and our family. ‘Is your father still living?’ he asked us. ‘Do you have another brother?’ We simply answered his questions. How were we to know he would say, ‘Bring your brother down here’?”
Once again, Simeon is still in prison in Egypt! Jacob in his pain and distress is not paying attention to the pressing needs of others. He is focused only on his pain and his fear of more potential loss in the future. His delay caused an emergency situation for the rest of the family as well.
Then Judah said to Israel his father, “Send the boy along with me and we will go at once, so that we and you and our children may live and not die.
Here is a matter of life and death, yet Jacob ignored the needs of everyone around him, as well as his son still in prison because of the grief in his heart. Eventually, he was forced to take action but he still focused on his personal pain, completely oblivious to those in desperate situations around him.
Take your brother also and go back to the man at once. And may God Almighty grant you mercy before the man so that he will let your other brother and Benjamin come back with you. As for me, if I am bereaved, I am bereaved.” So the men took the gifts and double the amount of silver, and Benjamin also. They hurried down to Egypt and presented themselves to Joseph.
Upon this second visit to Egypt, Joseph released Simeon from prison and revealed his true identity to his brothers. A family torn apart experienced a joyous reunion. All of this could have taken place earlier if only Jacob had chosen to respond to the needs of those around him instead of focusing solely on his own grief.
We all hurt. We all suffer terribly. We need to work through our pain, not deny or suppress it. However, sometimes helping others during our difficult times, can help us find restoration in our own hearts and lives. Jacob would have been reunited with Joseph earlier if he had chosen to look up from his own pain and took action to help others.
One of my favorite examples of someone who looked past their grief to minister to others would be Corrie Ten Boom. Her entire family died in Nazi concentration camps during World War II. Yet, after the war, she did not retreat into her own pain. Instead, she traveled throughout Europe promoting the gospel message, showing people how to accept and give God’s forgiveness. Thousands of lives were transformed by her story. She chose to focus on others, to see them healed and whole from their own tragic loss and pain, instead of wallowing in her own grief.
Lives are impacted by our response to pain, for the good or the bad. We can choose to look down at our own pain or to look up to minister to others. For me, it may be a small decision to fully pay attention to a soccer game, to think of those players out there and what they are doing instead of the painful thoughts bombarding my mind. Next time, I will hope for their win but if there is a loss, I will console the team! My response will match their need compared to showing an obvious deficit in my own heart. But to be completely honest, I still may be a little distracted by the pink goalie outfit!