Want a little Whine with that? Are you Lamenting or Complaining?
The culture today is full of complainers — Christians and non-Christians both. It’s hard not to whine about the constant disruptions affecting our lives. We are creatures of continuous unhappiness and traumatic events. A recent Barna research reveals that 82% of teens (13 to 18 years of age) admit to having a traumatic experience in their life, an experience which can continue to haunt them throughout the rest of their lives. Even in the best of situations, complaining seems to be the only way to vent our emotions after a life-changing event. Overcoming it, however, involves more. It means confronting the painful experience, changing our thinking, and waiting on God’s final return to repair our broken world that caused it in the first place. After a year of pandemic disruptions, can we prepare our thoughts for Good Friday and Easter 2021 with a posture of lamenting and not complaining?
Can we think differently? What if we purposefully practice lamenting instead of complaining?