Sunday, December 18, 2011

The Penalty of Suffering

By now many of you in Central Florida are aware of the recent murder trial of millionaire developer Bob Ward, who shot his wife in the face from a distance of eighteen inches.  He was found guilty in September and was sentenced to 30 years in prison for second-degree murder.  At his sentencing hearing Friday, one of his daughters said, "Justice for my mom is not locking my dad behind bars for the rest of his life.  It's giving our family a second chance."  I was struck by that comment, because a daughter who has suffered is so clearly mistaken about what justice is and, having lost her mother, must now have her father taken away as well. 

A great deal of confusion arises in our society today, and even in our faith, because we blur the meanings of words.  Imprecise use of words can also affect how we interpret Scripture.  In the case of suffering caused by sin, we must clearly define forgiveness, punishment, restitution, and revenge.  Since we are dealing here with a case of crime and punishment, let us first look at what this means.

 Sinful behavior may result in many consequences, such as alcohol abuse leading to cirrhosis or smoking leading to lung cancer.  However, in situations where God has ordained authority of one person over another, such as the criminal justice system or the parent-child relationship, the concept of justice truly applies. It usually has two components, punishment and restitution.  Punishment is the applied penalty or consequence for the offense.  If you rob a store, you go to jail.  If you lie to your parent, you may get a spanking.  Justice is indeed served when offenses are punished, and it is important that offenders experience those consequences.  In situations where there is no God-ordained authority, then we are not allowed to punish others ourselves.  If you are a friend and lie to me, I am not allowed to spank you. 

We speak of a criminal who has commited a crime as having now created a "debt to society," which must be paid by undergoing punishment.  This is a nice metaphor but not correct.  There is no person named "society" and there is no way to "pay" for some crimes to society or anyone else.  Bob Ward cannot "pay" his wife or anyone else for killing her.  In some cases, however, people can make restitution for losses they caused someone, as in repaying money that has been embezzled.  In no case, either those with God-ordained authority or without, are we allowed to exact revenge.  Vengeance belongs solely to the Lord. (Deuteronomy 32:35, Romans 12:19)

Forgiveness, our last term, has several definitions; to pardon, to cancel a debt, to cease to feel resentment.  And it is certainly possible in rare circumstances for someone in authority to pardon an offender, although if this was done in every case, then there would be no such thing as punishment.  And we as individuals could forgive or cancel a criminal debt, such as ceasing to seek restitution.  Ceasing to feel resentment frees us from letting someone else's behavior control how we feel.  And since forgiveness is such an important spiritual topic,  I will discuss that on a later post.

Let us return to the case of Mr. and Mrs. Ward.  Bob Ward shot his wife in the face at point-blank range, and for that the State of Florida criminal justice system must obtain that justice and punish him.  He must experience that consequence of his actions by doing time in the penal system.  ("Penal" and "penalty" come from the Latin word poena or "punishment".)  The "family" does not get to define what constitutes justice in this matter; they do not have authority over him to decide to punish him or pardon him.  They can certainly forgive him and cease to feel resentment towards him.  It is sad that the family will have to experience the consequences of Mr. Ward's actions, and suffer the loss of their father, but Diane Ward does not get a "second chance" either.  It is important for us to soberly remember that our sinful actions can have suffering consequences for not only ourselves, but others. 

And finally, there is another system of ordained authority, that of God over us.  And because of original sin, we experience the consequences of the sins of Adam and Eve.  As horrible as it seems, God's justice is obtained when He condemns us to eternal punishment and suffering  Many will say, simlarly to what the Ward daughter said, that "Justice for God is not sending people to hell," but they would be just as wrong.  However, unlike in our criminal justice system, a pardon is available to all who seek it.  And uniquely, it is because He punished someone who was innocent.  Our pardon is assured if only we will accept this fact into our hearts along with Christ our savior.

Sunday, December 11, 2011

The Unwants. Deleting The Suffering.

I had a patient who was quite old and quite sick.  He was in his late eighties and had a heart valve problem.  This is fairly common, and we do surgery on the elderly all the time; however, the risks in this age group are significant, for heart valve surgery in older patients can come with numerous complications.  And this patient, in particular, had many other medical problems that would make his recovery from surgery difficult.  He was undecided as to whether or not he wished to proceed.  He was quite worried that even if he survived the surgery, his quality of life might be worse than it already was.  He wanted an exellent quality of life all the way up until his death, for as he said to me, "I want to be alive when I die."

In this day and time, we are so used to having our every need met, and especially our basic needs.  Things that only a hundred years ago were impossible are now taken for granted.  There were more people connected to the internet in 2000 than were connected to running water in 1900.  Even America's poorest live in the top 30% of worldwide income. Heart surgery as we know it today did not exist until sixty years ago.  And beyond those basic needs such as food and shelter, we are used to getting our desires met right down to the correct size and color and flavor.  In other parts of the world, where any food would be welcome, we are able to order our meal with potato chips, french fries, seasoned fries, sweet potato fries, or home fries. 

And with health care, a hundred years ago kidney failure was fatal. You didn't have the option to go for dialysis or a kidney transplant.  Seventy years ago, if you had a heart valve problem, you died.  Now you can choose between mechanical heart valves or tissue heart valves, ones made with cow tissue or pig tissue, and from having a full chest incision to having minimally invasive valve surgery with a small incision.  So we expect to be able to choose the quality of our life up until the end. 

Much of our prayer life is intercessory in nature, for others and ourselves.
                      We pray for God to give us what we want, our wants.
                      We pray for God to take away from us what we do not want, our unwants.

Clearly, suffering is an unwant.  We desire to hit the "Delete" button and correct this bad thing that has come into our life.  The problem is that what is absolutely guaranteed to happen is what God wants.  And the unfortunate thing is that unless our wants and unwants are aligned with God's wants we tend to be discontented.  I think this level of discontent today is much worse than it was years ago, where we had less ability to satisfy our own wants.  There was more acceptance of things that could not be changed when there were so many things that could not be changed.  There was more dependence on God to change things because that was the only way they could be changed.  If you had a heart valve problem seventy years ago, you could not change how and when and where you would die or what your quality of life would be, which was pretty bad.  And the only way you could be healed was for God to work a miracle. 

God's soverign will is what is going to happen, what He wants.  We should be so very thankful that our unwants today, awful as they can be when they happen to us, are so much less common than before.

Saturday, December 3, 2011

Doubting the Benefit-- What Good is Suffering Anyway?

So I am in a hurry at the grocery store and I need to check out as quickly as possible.  I head straight for the express lane with my seven items (yes, I count them).  As I maneuver into position there is a young couple ahead of me with a month's worth of groceries laid out on the conveyor belt ahead of me. 

To my way of understanding, going through the express lane with more than the allowed ten items should be a capital offense, or at least a felony; the punishment should both deter and ensure that there are no repeat offenders.  There wasn't any point at even trying to count all the multitude of groceries stretched out ahead of mine; I could only glare at them.

I Corinthians 13:4-7 gives us the oft-quoted scripture from Paul defining love.  "Love suffers long and is kind; love does not parade itself, is not puffed up; does not behave rudely, does not seek its own, is not provoked, thinks no evil; does not rejoice in iniquity, but rejoices in the truth; bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things."

Although it is not in this or other passages of scripture, one other message on love that I came across last week is, "Love gives others the benefit of the doubt."  Now, in my world, there are no shades of gray.  Things are either black or white, good or evil, saintly or wicked.  It is a stretch for me to see extenuating circumstances, although we would all, myself included, like to be given the benefit of the doubt when we fall short.  I have been blessed many times by others extending me this benefit.

Anyway, the cashier felt prompted to say something to these wretched violators of decency.  She admonished them, "Next time I will need you to use one of the regular lanes.  This lane is for ten items or less."  And the young couple, who were well-dressed and appeared educated, stared with mouths partly open at the express lane sign, saying "Oh.  We didn't know."

Well, talk about adding insult to injury.  I would have rather that they just completed their business and gone on their sinful way without trying to play dumb about it.  I mean, really, who in America above the age of two doesn't know what the express lane is for?  To stand there and pretend ignorance as an excuse for such uncivilized behavior was galling.  Please, just take your truckload of groceries and go.

The couple explained they were visiting from another country.  They really didn't know what an express lane was.  They apologized to the cashier, to me, and to the person in line behind me.  I had made a lot of assumptions in condemning them.  I had jumped to conclusions. I had not given them the benefit of the doubt. 

So, we who would all like to be shown the benefit of the doubt need to show it to others.  I think there is another scripture in there somewhere about, "...just as you want men to do to you, you also do to them likewise."  And do we give our Lord the benefit of the doubt?

You see, when suffering comes upon us, we often see no good in it.  We don't trust God's plans for us, His love for us, His caring for us.  In these situations, when we do not give God the benefit of the doubt, we are doubting the benefit.  As it says in Romans 8:28, "And we know that all things work together for good to those who love God, to those who are called to His purpose."  When we suffer, we must not jump to conclusions.  We must go back to those things His Word tells us, the things we know to be true.  We must remind ourselves that not only is God in control, but that He cares for us and will work all things for good.  What seems so cruel and unfair to us in our limited understanding is promised to us by Scripture to be for our eternal benefit, a benefit which we must not doubt.

Saturday, November 26, 2011

Noah and the Bugs-- Seasonal Suffering

Many people are aware of bacteria and viruses, but not exactly what they are.  Bacteria are small, single-celled organisms that can live in all different environments, including humans.  We all have bacteria on our skin and in our mouth and nose and in our intestinal tract.  The bacteria in our gut are very helpful, helping us to digest our food.  Other bacteria cause infections and other serious problems.  Bacteria can be grown in a culture, usually by depositing them onto a culture medium like agar in a culture plate which is then kept in a warm environment.  The agar is like gelatin, providing nutrition for the bacteria.

Viruses, on the other hand, are not cells.  They barely qualify as one of God's creatures, but are more like one of God's things.  They are a collection of genes inside a structure that invades human cells.  Unlike bacteria, they do not survive outside of a host organism for very long.  Whereas bacteria are perfectly capable of reproducing anywhere they live, viruses can only reproduce inside a cell.  They invade the cell and hijack the cell's own DNA, forcing the cell to make more copies of the virus.  After enough virus has been made, the virus particles rupture the cell, spreading on to the next cell and throughout the body.

This Thanksgiving I have been suffering from a particularly vicious cold, caused by one of the common cold viruses.  The common cold is caused by a huge number of different viruses, usually a rhinovirus or a coronavirus. Once you have been infected with a specific cold virus, you will develop immunity to that virus and not get infected with it again, just like you only get the measles or mumps one time.  The problem is that there are at least two hundred different cold viruses, and they keep mutating into different versions, so it is impossible to develop immunity to all of them.  This is the same reason that an effective vaccine to the common cold cannot be developed.  Although antibiotics work well with most bacterial infections, they do not work at all on viral infections.  Basically, then, the only weapon we have once we get a cold is prayer.  Each time I get a cold and I have prayed for healing, God has always answered my prayer-- seven to ten days later.

So colds are part of the suffering that God has in his plans for us.  I try to imagine the difficulties Noah had in preserving all these bugs that afflict us.  For the bacteria, I imagine he would only need to get all the different bacteria, load them onto culture plates with agar, and place them into his wood fired incubator.  The viruses, on the other hand, would have to be carried by humans.  So I guess that Noah, Shem, Ham, Japheth and their four wives would have each carried around twenty-five cold viruses to survive the flood.  I am surmising that God, in His mercy, would have somehow protected them from all the symptoms of having twenty-five colds at one time or that would have been one miserable ride on the ark. 

I really don't know why God allows suffering or why he allowed us to get colds.  It goes back to original sin, the fall, when Adam and Eve disobeyed Him and brought sin into the world.  Back then, in the Garden before the fall, Adam and Eve must have lived peaceably with the cold bugs.  But now we do not, and I'm not sure there is a great personal lesson to be learned from this form of suffering.  It happens because we live in a fallen world, and sometimes bad things happen to us for no other reason.
Although we can draw closer to God in all of our sufferings, not all of them bring a message. It is part of the human condition, only to be rectified when we get to heaven, and if I don't survive this cold (and it sure feels like I won't), fortunately it will be my last one. I am hoping to be blessed to be around long enough to get many more colds.

Saturday, November 19, 2011

Are You Blessed or Cursed? Marginal Suffering.

What is the opposite of black?
What is the opposite of lost?
What is the opposite of hero?
What is the opposite of blessed?

If you are like most people, you answered "white", "found", "coward", and "cursed".
But what if something is neither black nor white? Can something be found if it was never lost? Just because you are not a hero, does that mean you are a coward? If you are not blessed, does that mean you are cursed?

From a Christian standpoint, if we have a saving relationship with Christ, then we cannot think of ourselves as anything else but blessed with regards to the ultimate blessing. We will get to spend eternity in Heaven. For others, only the opposite is true. There is no second, third, or fourth place; if you don't go to heaven you don't have other options for eternity in Detroit or Philadelphia. If you are not eternally blessed, you are eternally cursed, to spend that eternity in hell.

Earthly, temporal blessings, however, do come in different degrees. Some people are blessed a lot, and others not so much. And there can be blessings of different degrees in different aspects of our lives-- you can be beautiful and poor and healthy and smart all at the same time.

The problem arises when people raise the suffering flag just because they feel they aren't blessed as much as someone else. This is envy. And we have seen a lot of that lately.

The Westminster Shorter Catechism was written in the 1640's as a way to teach common people theological truths. It does this with a list of questions and answers. Question 80 asks "What is the Tenth Commandment?" And the answer is, "The tenth commandment is, 'You shall not covet your neighbor's house; you shall not covet your neighbor's wife, nor his male servant, nor his female servant, nor his ox, nor his donkey, nor anything that is your neighbor's.'"

Question 81 asks, "What is required in the tenth commandment?" And the answer is, "The tenth commandment requires full contentment with our own condition, with a right and charitable frame of spirit toward our neighbor, and all that is his."

Question 81 asks, "What is forbidden in the tenth commandment?" And the answer is, "The tenth commandment forbids all discontentment with our own estate, envying, or grieving at the good of our neighbor, and all inordinate motions and affections to anything that is his."

Right now in this country, there are a lot of people who think that they are suffering because they do not have as much as someone else. Many people running for political office are promising to fix their problem by taking from one person and giving it to another. But are you poorer because someone else is wealthier? Are you poor because Donald Trump is rich? Are your finances weak because Oprah's are strong?

I am particularly fascinated by the Occupy Wall Street Crowd and their Occupy movements in cities across the land. Although they may have a legitimate grievance about government bailouts of the financial industry, they are not protesting the government who took the money from some and gave it to others, they are protesting the people who received the money and then turning around and demanding that the same be done for them. They are looking at the wealthy and "grieving at the good of our neighbor", and having "all inordinate motions and affections to anything that is his."

Just because you are not blessed does not mean you are cursed. A lack of blessings is not suffering. The things that I envy are the qualities of Christ where others seem to have been more blessed-- the qualities of people who are kinder, more caring, and more full of mercy for others than me.

Saturday, November 12, 2011

The Suffering Schedule

What if you knew when and how you were to suffer?  Suppose you knew that you were going to have a car wreck Wednesday at 2:00 pm?  How about if you knew in advance that in the second week of next month you were going to be diagnosed with cancer?  Suppose you were given notice that tomorrow when you went into work you would be called into the office and told your services were no longer needed?  Would you like to know beforehand that this weekend your child would be hit by a car?

Are you prepared to suffer?  You're saying, "Dr. Moore, of course I am prepared.  I have automobile insurance in case anything happens to my car.  I have a great health insurance plan from my job that will cover me in case of illness.  I have an emergency fund and unemployment insurance in case I lose my job. My children are covered if anything happens to them."

No, I didn't ask you if you were financially prepared.  Are you, yourself, prepared for the suffering that is to come upon you?  I don't want to shock you, but these things are going to happen.  Everyone that has lived, is living, or is yet to be born is going to suffer.  Unfortunately, we are not given a schedule in advance that tells us exactly how we are going to suffer and the exact time.  We have to know in advance that these things are going to happen to all of us.  As Jesus says in I Peter 4:12, "Beloved, do not think it strange concerning the fiery trial which is to try you."

Think for a minute about one of my patients who comes in for a lung biopsy.  I perform the biopsy, and they go home and wait for the result.  The pathology report comes to my office and I review it and the diagnosis is lung cancer.  God, in His sovereign power, knew since the beginning of time, before the foundations of this world were laid, that this would be the answer.  I knew the answer when the pathology report reached my desk.  My patient knows when they come into my office and sit down across from me and I break the news to them and their spouse.  At this point, the only one who is surprised is my poor patient.

And that is the way it is for so much suffering.  We are so surprised when it happens.  When our car is struck by another vehicle on Wednesday, we are jolted.  When the phone call comes that our child has been struck by a car, we are overwhelmed by the shock.  If only we could be told in advance, so that we had a schedule of our sufferings, then we could at least plan for it and not be surprised. 

We don't get a suffering schedule, only the advance knowledge that we will suffer.  It is up to us to plan and prepare, to be ready for when it comes.  Hopefully, the discussions that follow will you to plan for these terrible things, to be ready for them, and be better able to deal with them.  Forewarned is forearmed, and although God has not given us foreknowledge of the exact suffering that will be coming, he has indeed given us advance knowledge that we will be suffering.  This should not provoke anxiety but rather calm.  We should not lose sleep over this, but instead sleep peacefully knowing that although these things are forthcoming, God has forseen what is to come and has provided preparation for us.

Monday, November 7, 2011

The Authority of Suffering

Well, hello.  You may be wondering about this blog, who I am, and why I would write on such an unpleasant topic like suffering.


My name is Dr. Tim Moore, and I am a practicing Cardiovascular Surgeon in Leesburg, Florida.  I have been a practicing heart surgeon for nearly twenty years.  You can see my profile below.  I am a Christian heart surgeon and author of the book, Surviving the Suffering, due out next summer.


What makes me an authority on suffering?  Well, first of all, my job is to cause people to suffer.  Each weekday morning at about 7:00 am I take a scalpel to someone's chest and perform heart surgery on them.  This alone is good enough for some short term suffering.  Although I am inflicting pain on my patients, it is for their greater good, and to ultimately relieve even worse suffering from a heart attack or heart failure.


Secondly, my patients' families suffer alongside their loved ones as they recover from surgery.  And on rare occasions, when someone doesn't make it through open-heart surgery, they suffer from the loss of their family member. And I suffer some with them as well.


Patients don't always realize it, but many of the people caring for them have suffered or are suffering.  I see that too, in my colleagues and co-workers and in all the many people that make up our open-heart team. Just like everyone else, we have team members who get ill or lose loved ones.


Finally, I have done a bit of suffering myself.  I was born with respiratory failure and required a tracheostomy as an infant.  I was hopitalized around seventy-five to a hundred times growing up and eventually had to have part of a lung removed.  In addition to my chest surgery as a child, I have had two abdominal operations as an adult. 


By no means is my defintion of suffering restricted to illnesses and surgery.  In my future posts I will explore a variety of different forms of suffering, with the most important message being that all suffering is not the same.  It is when we fail to diagnose the form of suffering that afflicts us that we do the wrong things that make our suffering worse.  Hopefully we can find a better way of surviving the suffering.