When Problems Seem Big
My father used to live in England, so I visited often. On one trip, while touring historic sites in London, I found myself weighed down by problems back home. The problems had something to do with church, though the details escape me now. As I walked through those ancient landmarks, two thoughts crystallized. First, the world is vast. Nobody here knew the people or problems troubling me thousands of miles away. Second, my perspective was painfully narrow. My problems felt enormous in that moment, but I knew that a hundred years from now, even ten years from now, I wouldn't remember them at all.
I return to those observations often. We habitually see only what's happening right now, and as a result, we're easily overwhelmed. We desperately need perspective: our lives are small, and this moment will pass.
But we need a corresponding truth as well. I thought of this as I read Isaiah 51:12-13 this week:
I, I am he who comforts you;
who are you that you are afraid of man who dies,
of the son of man who is made like grass,
and have forgotten the LORD, your Maker,
who stretched out the heavens
and laid the foundations of the earth,
and you fear continually all the day
because of the wrath of the oppressor,
when he sets himself to destroy?
And where is the wrath of the oppressor?
Our problems don't just seem huge; people seem huge. Our troubles loom so large that we forget how small people actually are. We lose perspective and forget that only the Lord deserves our fear, and that he has promised to comfort us.
Spurgeon's insight on this passage is brilliant. He observes that we're often influenced by things not because of their actual size, but because of their proximity:
Objects often influence us out of proportion to their value because of their nearness. For instance, the moon is a very small insignificant body compared with the sun, yet it has far more influence over the tides and many other matters in the world than the sun has, simply because it is so much nearer to the earth than the sun is.
He then applies this to our spiritual perceptions:
The life that is to come is infinitely more important than the life that now is, and I hope that, in our inmost hearts, we reckon that the things that are seen and temporal are mere trifles compared with the things which are not seen and eternal; yet it often happens that the less important matters have a greater influence over us than those which are far more important, simply because the things of earth are so much nearer to us. Heaven is infinitely more to be desired than any joy of earth, yet it seems far off, and hence these fleeting joys may give us greater present comfort. The wrath of God is far more to be dreaded than the anger of man, yet sometimes a frown or a rebuke from a fellow-creature will have more effect upon our minds than the thought of the anger of God. This is because the one appears to be remote, while, being in this body, we are so near to the other.
We fear oppressors, "yet we forget the almighty God, who is on our side, who is stronger than all the oppressors who have ever lived, and who has all people and all things under his control." Why? Because we can see the oppressor with our eyes and hear them with our ears. We need "the joy and comfort which, though more remote, ought still to be more powerful over the mind and heart because of its real intrinsic greatness."
What a needed reminder. (The entire sermon is worth reading, especially for those who struggle with fear and worry.)
Our problems seem big, but most aren't. They're just close. What we need is a bigger view of God. I saw my problems differently through the lens of geography and time; how much more should we see them differently when we look to the glory and power of the mighty God who comforts us?
