Empathy Archives

What to do when you’re overwhelmed by the world’s suffering

This past week, I opened my computer and logged in to Facebook. I read an article about a recent shooting, scrolled past a post about a new virus, and read someone’s account of living with long COVID (long-term effects from the infection). Moving on to Twitter, I skimmed through a heated argument about the Dobbs decision, read news about famine and war, and saw several death announcements. I decided not to move on to Instagram.

I often feel heavy and overwhelmed after spending time online, and I know I’m not alone. Someone recently shared with me how much he had struggled after reading about the Ukraine war. He saw pictures of a family being separated and began to replay these images in his mind. Lying awake at night, he considered what he would do in a similar scenario.

Another person described her struggle with anxiety and racing thoughts. She had watched a video of a recent school shooting and couldn’t stop thinking about it. She worried about her own children. She grieved the children who were lost. The thoughts would not relent.

Constant online access has made us daily witnesses to the grief and trauma of millions of people. Each time we open our internet browsers, we encounter news that forces us to consider issues of political conflict, theological disagreement, global suffering, financial stress, illness, and war. Many people feel a sense of tension. We want to stay informed, but too much information can leave us weighed down with thoughts and emotions that feel too heavy to bear.

What should we do? Should we attempt to carry the sorrows and burdens of the world? Or should we distance ourselves from other peoples’ suffering to protect ourselves? Perhaps it is some of both.

Remember those who suffer

Scripture suggests there is something good and holy about remembering other peoples’ suffering, even when they are physically distant from us. Hebrews 13:3 tells us to “remember those in prison as if you were together with them in prison, and those who are mistreated as if you yourselves were suffering.” We honor people in their suffering by not forgetting about them. Instead of withdrawing from the world, we bear witness to other peoples’ pain and remember them in the same way we would want to be remembered in similar circumstances.

Remembering often awakens a sense of compassion, which often leads to a desire to act. It might lead us to pray, give money, volunteer, speak up, or push for change. These are all good things. But too much remembering can lead to racing thoughts and anxiety. Overextending compassion can result in compassion fatigue. Giving to the point of exhaustion can lead to burnout. Absorbing too many stories of other peoples’ trauma can result in secondary trauma. That feeling of tension remains.

Carry your own load

We can break out of this tension by balancing wisdom from Hebrews 13:3 with wisdom from Galatians 6:5. A few verses after we are told to carry other peoples’ burdens in Galatians 6:2, we are instructed to each carry our own load.

Recently, I realized that I was trying to carry someone else’s load. This person was experiencing a heavy struggle, and there were some practical ways I could help to carry her burdens. I could listen and ask good questions. I could sit with her in her grief. But I could not fix the problem. There was a depth to her emotional pain that I could not truly, fully understand. Aspects of her suffering could only be carried between her and God. I had to let go. I had to let her carry her own load.

As we are inundated with stories of global suffering, we may be tempted to carry loads that do not belong to us. We may hold on to a false sense of responsibility that leads us to overextend ourselves in our care and compassion for other people. We may attempt to fix problems and over identify with burdens that were never given to us to carry.

Cast your anxiety on the Lord

The other day, after I closed out of Facebook and Twitter and went to bed, my mind remained filled with thoughts about what I had just read. What if I also get long COVID? What do I think about this or that debate? How should I respond to this person or react to that cause?

Lying in bed, I used a strategy I often teach people who come to me for counseling. I closed my eyes and began to mentally list my concerns. I gave each concern a name and visualized myself writing it down on a slip of paper. The pandemic and fear of illness went on one slip. Images of hungry, displaced people went on another. A political post that frustrated me, a news article about a school shooting, and several death announcements each got a slip. I took each slip of paper and visualized myself placing them inside a box one at a time. I closed the box and remembered that God was right there with me. I handed him the box and prayed a short prayer, releasing my concerns to him.

In counseling, this strategy is called containment. In Scripture, we see this idea described in 1 Peter 5:7 as casting our anxieties on the Lord. It is a way to set aside thoughts, feelings, and images that feel upsetting or distressing so we can proceed with our day. The goal of containing our thoughts and giving them to God is not to ignore or downplay important issues. It isn’t being selfish, indifferent, or ignorant in the face of suffering. Instead, it is a way to accept God’s care for us. He invites us to trust him by releasing to him the fears, problems, and concerns we cannot solve.

What people, causes, local issues, and global concerns weigh on you today? Sit for a moment and honor those who suffer by remembering them. Perhaps choose one or two ways to carry someone else’s burdens. But then, let go. Carry your own load, and let your neighbor do the same. Release your anxieties to God. The world is not yours to carry.

Helping parents navigate conversations about race

By Marie Delph / Feb 25

The calling we have as Christian parents is to help shape the worldview of our children toward one that increasingly reflects the heart and mission of God. This includes talking about things like personal integrity, love for neighbor, generosity, and peacemaking. As a parent to four young children, I’m convinced this must also include conversations about race and justice.

American culture has been guilty of the sin of racism. It goes all the way back to colonial times; European settlers stole land from the Native Americans and brought African slaves to North America. In short, this is not a new problem, and tragically, white evangelical Christians in particular have often passed down an indifference toward issues of race and justice from generation to generation — an indifference that persists even as our country grows more divided. Brothers and sisters, this should not be.

Many of us struggle to engage in what are challenging and increasingly complex conversations on race in our country. To that end, I want to share a few guiding principles and practical steps you can take in this direction with your family. The goal is not to have all the answers, but to engage with a posture of humility — listening, learning, and depending on God, his Word, and his people.

Educate yourself about God’s heart for justice in the Bible. As a pastor, I have found that many of the people I shepherd are surprised by how much the concept of justice is talked about in the Bible. Spend some time digesting the prophetic books where you read things like these passages from Isaiah and Jeremiah:
Learn to do good; seek justice, correct oppression; bring justice to the fatherless, plead the widow’s cause. (Isa. 1:17)
Thus says the Lord: Do justice and righteousness, and deliver from the hand of the oppressor him who has been robbed. And do no wrong or violence to the resident alien, the fatherless, and the widow, nor shed innocent blood in this place. (Jer. 22:3)
As you can see from these passages, the process within your family must move from education to action. For those committed to following the way of Jesus, these are not optional tasks.

Educate yourself about injustice in our nation’s history. All of our children should be learning about the evils of slavery and the significance of the Civil Rights Movement. They likely know the names Martin Luther King Jr., Harriet Tubman, and Rosa Parks. But as you do your own research, tell them about the figures and stories you come across that they may not necessarily read about in textbooks. The Equal Justice Initiative has been an incredibly helpful resource for me in this area. In 2019, I purchased their calendar where you can learn about a different historical event in the realm of social and racial injustice in America’s history each day. deBecoming aware of deeper history will help our kids become advocates and burden-bearers for those who have been oppressed by racism, and help them not become casualties to the ignorance that erodes into damaging indifference.

Educate yourself about injustice in your city. I live in Kansas City, a place with a long history of racial division. A street called Troost serves as a modern-day “dividing wall of hostility” that continues to remind us of our dark past and remaining socioeconomic and racial divisions. Every city and state has stories like these, so do the work to learn them, share them, and model for your kids what it looks like to strive for righteousness.

Be intentional about sharing what you learn with the next generation. We drive across Troost every day as a family. I’ve shared some of that history with my kids in age-appropriate ways. I’ve also tried to translate the complexities of redlining or racially-restrictive housing covenants into language they can understand more easily, so they can begin forming a wider perspective of institutional practices that have handicapped millions of minorities in our city and how those things are not in alignment with the kingdom of God.
In the student ministry I led, we toook a driving tour of our city with historical commentary of the role of segregation. We do this in an effort to educate and create space for questions and dialogue, in hope that we may not be guilty of the same sins of our ancestors.

Cultivate empathy. As we watched the events surrounding the death of George Floyd and the following global protests, we talked about the imago Dei, the dignity of every human being made in God’s image, and the pain related to various forms of injustice our brothers and sisters of color have carried for so long — injustice that my kids will most likely never have to experience personally. They saw my wife and I weep and lament the injustice in solidarity with our brothers and sisters of color. My friend Brian Key says, “When you weep with someone, you identify with them in their pain. It is humanizing in the face of the dehumanizing pain of grief. It somehow makes the grief less lonely, though not less painful.” That’s the kind of posture we want to cultivate in our kids. It didn’t take eloquent speeches from us to point them that direction; it just took tears.
We want to stir empathy, compassion, and understanding in the hearts of our sons and daughters because that reflects the heart of our God. And we want to be the ones shaping the narrative biblically, not the media or their friends. This requires being proactive rather than reactive, and an eagerness to truthfully and courageously confront racist realities we have been born into as Americans.

Pursue expressions of diversity. In heaven we will worship with every tribe, tongue, people, and nation. But in the U.S., most of us have inherited the reality of living in more homogenous communities. It will take creativity and commitment to continually pursue diversity across the spheres of our life.

Prioritize the conversation

What we talk about reveals the disposition of our hearts. This is what Jesus was highlighting when he said, “out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaks” (Luke 6:45). As evangelicals we have done a good job of prioritizing conversations around sexuality, gender, and the sanctity of life — as we should. But we must also not neglect topics of racial justice or treat them as less important issues.

The opportunities are all around us, whether it be in the history they are learning in school, the political debates they are increasingly aware of, or the questions they ask about people they see every day. So the next time you see something on the news, or your kids share about what they are learning in American history, or when you take them to Ephesians 2 in your family devotional time, seize the opportunity to point them to God’s heart for racial reconciliation and pray with them along those lines. Repent of apathy, and pray for opportunities to live out justice in your community.

May we not be guilty of turning a blind eye or passively handing over discipleship to the culture. But with confidence in Scripture and the calling we’ve been given to be ambassadors of God’s love in Christ to the world, instill in our children a heart that pursues justice, loves mercy, and humbly submits to the God who tears down dividing walls for his glory and the good of the world.

Read

Watch

All God’s Children: Growing Children who Embrace a Biblical View of Racial Unity —Panel Discussion
“Equipping the Next Generation to Embrace Gospel” —Jackie Hill Perry at the MLK50 Conference
The Verge Network’s series on Racial Reconciliation
Movies like Remember the Titans, Black Panther, Jingle Jangle, Coco, Just Mercy, and The Hate U Give
“Justice”—The Bible Project
Grace, Justice, and Mercy: an evening with Bryan Stevenson and Tim Keller

Listen

“Bearing Each Other’s Burdens: Addressing Racism as Christians” —Russell Moore
“As in Heaven” —a podcast series on race and justice from The Gospel Coalition
Christian hip hop artists like Lecrae, Tedashii, Trip Lee, Andy Mineo, Shai Linne, and Propaganda

Why we need to transform our political instincts

By Marie Delph / Jan 19

As far back as 1800, just 24 years after the ink on the Declaration of Independence had dried, fear was already emerging as a prominent political instinct in America. As recounted by John Fea, “In 1800, a Federalist newspaper that supported President John Adams in his reelection campaign against Thomas Jefferson, suggested that, if the Electoral College chose Jefferson, the founding father and religious skeptic from Virginia, the country would have to deal with a wave of murder, atheism, rape, adultery, and robbery.”

Of course, Jefferson would go on to win the election, becoming the third president of the United States. And while these fears propagated by the Connecticut Courant proved to be unfounded, the strategy of stoking alarm among citizens for political purposes took root in American life.

Though our country’s current political milieu is not without precedent, American politics is increasingly becoming an exercise in fear-mongering. We are conditioned to fear the opposing parties and their candidates, to fear immigrants and refugees, to fear policies, government overreach, the loss of liberty, and more. For as long as anyone can remember, we’ve been warned of the imminent demise of our republic. And, to be fair, things are changing. Freedoms are being redefined, public virtue and morality have waned, and our divisions are more pronounced and volatile now than in recent memory. But fear, particularly in a political context, is an emotion that leads us into our respective partisan corners, away from any hint of or effort at unity. In other words, fear is a destructive, divisive political instinct.

Empathy as a new political instinct

Considering the current American political scene, surely we can all agree that our civic sensibilities are leading us in the wrong direction. And because the state of American politics is, at some level, the responsibility of each of us, it seems we need new political instincts.

In his 2018 book, How the Nations Rage, Jonathan Leeman references a conversation he had with Andrew Walker, associate professor of Christian Ethics and Apologetics at The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary. In this conversation, Walker provides an alternative to the politics of fear described above by John Fea when he says, “You must develop empathy as a political instinct.” Now, by even suggesting empathy as a viable political “strategy,” I can already hear the chorus of rebuttals in my head: “empathy is soft and sentimental,” “it’s regressive,” “it has no place in politics.” I would argue, however, that there may be nothing more vital to a healthy democracy, and to healthy political engagement, than the possession and practice of empathetic instincts.

Whereas a political instinct rooted in fear is concerned primarily (solely) with self-preservation, often at the expense of our neighbors, politics rooted in empathy concerns itself most fundamentally with “loving our neighbors as ourselves” (Mark 12:31). For the Christian, it’s one practical outworking of the second greatest commandment given to us by Jesus. Empathy is not regressive, and it’s certainly not soft; it is an instinct that undoubtedly compels us forward toward self-sacrifice. Empathy, at its purest, spurs us on to cross-shaped living. In this way, empathy and convictional kindness are not weak, but are actually the method for waging our war in the public square. We rely not on a Darwinian appeal to power or self-preservation, or the fear stoked by both, but rather rest in the assurance of a victorious King who has redefined victory, not by “owning” his enemies, but by sacrificing himself for them and praying that the Father would forgive them (Luke 22:34).

Cultivating empathy

Developing new instincts is hard work, especially in a political climate that has normalized verbal harangues, diatribes, and rhetorical volatility, all of which are habits rooted in fear. And, new instincts won’t take root, as counterintuitive as it may seem for the development of empathy, without, first, honest self-reflection. While empathy is an instinct that habituates selflessness, it can’t develop until we have humbled our own selves, because empathy depends on humility. Therefore, cultivating political empathy starts by acknowledging that we have, at some level, failed to uphold our end of “we the people,” regardless of any blatant malpractice that we may see “out there” among our partisan opponents. Empathy begins when we recognize our own malpractice, our own sin, and we repent.

But, of course, empathy’s initial inward bend ultimately gives way to the heart of empathy, which is its selfless concern for our neighbors. While a political instinct of fear double’s-down on the partisan aisles that divide us, in homes and neighborhoods and zip codes all across the country, empathy motivates us to cross those aisles, exchanging our wagging fingers and unkind words with handshakes and hugs and words of compassion. To that end, the cultivation of political empathy is not an abstract exercise, it is materially incarnational. It requires enrollment and participation in the academy where empathetic instincts are trained, namely the neighbor relationship. If we want our political instincts to be marked by empathy rather than fear, it may be as simple, at first, as sharing a meal with our neighbors. Don’t underestimate what God may do around a table, in the simple act of breaking bread together.

In a political environment driven so much by the online community, a community where our humanity is all but hidden behind the veil of a screen, fear and rage are increasingly the most prominent instincts represented (and rewarded). In other words, we cannot expect to grow more empathetic by planting ourselves in the weeds of social media and other online communities. Empathy grows only in the context of actual, personal relationships.

Empathy, a work of God

For Christians, we, of all people, are those who have been called to enter the chambers of empathetic dialogue and action. We, of all people, are those who’ve been given a leg-up on the development of new instincts, by the power of the Holy Spirit. And we, of all people, are those who’ve been given a standard of empathy in the person of Jesus, the one whose divine instincts compelled him to sit around tables with sinners and enemies with gentleness and meekness. It is the work of God—Father, Son, and Holy Spirit—through our relationship with Him that births new instincts in us and fans them into flame, and then compels us to foster relationships with people, flesh and blood people, the training grounds where these instincts are exercised and sanctified. Empathy, from start to finish, is a work of God.

As Christians, it is our unique responsibility to let our conception of reality, our Christian worldview, drive all our political assumptions and engagement. What this means, at the very least, is that we should, by the Spirit, wring out any fear still clinging to our political instincts. And then, by that same Spirit, we should make room at our tables, both literal and metaphoric, for men and women of every political and theological persuasion, sinners and enemies, for the glory of God, for the good of his people (those now and yet to be adopted), and, yes, for the preservation of a healthy society.

Tag: Empathy

Why we need to transform our political instincts

Empathy as a new political instinct

Cultivating empathy

Empathy, a work of God

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