Searching for Grace: A Weary Leader, a Wise Mentor, and Seven Healing Conversations for a Parched Soul by Scotty Smith & Russ Masterson

Author:Scotty Smith & Russ Masterson [Smith, Scotty & Masterson, Russ]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: RELIGION / Christian Living / Spiritual Growth, Religion, Leadership & Mentoring, Christian Living, Discipleship, Spiritual Growth, Christian Ministry, RELIGION / Christian Ministry / Discipleship
ISBN: 9781496444035
Google: -awjEAAAQBAJ
Publisher: Tyndale House Publishers, Inc.
Published: 2021-11-15T23:49:38.879812+00:00

Entering Suffering

“WE ALL HAVE PAIN,” Scotty told me. “My pain has been stockpiling with interest as a result of sexual abuse at age eight, the death of my mom when I was eleven, the death of a girlfriend at eighteen, and then the perpetual emotional absence of my dad.”

We were in the church he had once led and now hangs around as a mentor. We were holed up in a conference room on the second floor where no one could find us. I wasn’t sure what to say to Scotty about his abuse. He had mentioned it to me only once before, without any detail or reflection.

“Is being abused something you talk about?” I asked hesitantly. “We don’t have to talk about it if you don’t want to.”

“It’s okay. It’s something I didn’t begin talking about until recently, even though it was part of my healing process. My abuse wasn’t episodic, but a horrible incident involving a neighbor and pornography and unwanted touch,” he said.

“What did that trauma do to you as a boy?”

“As a child, I heard the mantra ‘Big boys don’t cry.’ I got the message that sadness and pain were not okay, so I hid. Now I understand the trauma as a violation of God’s image inside me, a violation of how the world should work.”

“How do you react to that trauma now that you’re not hiding?” I asked.

“I try to validate the pain and sit in it rather than hide from it. Letting myself feel sadness has been an important part of my healing. I used to fear that if I really started grieving, I might never stop. We experience trauma not just as a result of the bad things that happen but also as a result of the good things that didn’t happen. Being ignored can be just as traumatic as being abused. Not all of us have stories of horrible events, but we all have real stories of pain.”

This felt like a revelation for me, and I sat there trying to take it all in.

“We become more real by entering suffering, not running from it,” he went on. “I had to acknowledge the abuse, loss, and neglect . . . and the pain associated with each. The world—even Christian subculture—wants us to move on, get over it, busy ourselves with something more productive. But that’s not the way of the gospel.”

Finally I asked, “What should we do?”

“Russ, most people have a reservoir of undealt-with grief. I was fifty years old when I began to acknowledge and grieve my abuse, to grieve any of my pain. It’s good news that people can deal with trauma and pain at any age, but do it now. Don’t wait. I wish I’d grieved Mom so much sooner. Much sooner.”

Later, as I reflected on my conversation with Scotty, it struck me that suffering comes not just in the original event but also in the reaction to the event. In the face of grief, my tendency was to stay busy.

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