There are times in our lives when, with the best of intentions, we foolishly reassure a suffering friend that we understand his/her pain and misery even though we have had no similar experience. And when the cause of a friend’s suffering is extremely traumatic or bears no similarity to anything we have undergone, we have absolutely no right to suggest or claim that we understand another’s suffering and pain. Thus, even though we share a common humanity and our own unique experience of suffering and pain, we cannot always adequately understand a brother or sister’s anguish and pain. That being so, how can we even begin to understand God or adopt God’s perspective on reality?
Peter encounters this problem when rebuking Christ after he foretells his violent death at the instigation of the elders, chief priests, and the scribes. Jesus, in turn, rebukes Peter and insists: You are thinking not as God does, but as human beings do. Of course, the question becomes: How could Peter think in any way other than a human being? Does Jesus’ rebuke of Peter imply that although we are human—and will remain human, divinization notwithstanding—we can nevertheless acquire the capacity to think as God does, and so break free of our otherwise very limited and shortsighted human perspectives on reality.
In his letter to the Corinthians, Saint Paul seems to answer in the affirmative by first posing the obvious challenge, namely, who has known the mind of the Lord, so as to counsel him? But then he offers the solution saying, but we have the mind of Christ. Likewise, he exhorts the Philippians to let this mind be in you which was also in Christ Jesus. And then, in writing to the Romans, Paul explains how we might acquire the mind of Christ: Do not conform yourselves to this age, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that you may discern what is the will of God, what is good and pleasing and perfect.
Not conforming ourselves to this age includes that very difficult act of relinquishing control over our lives and surrendering to the wisdom, knowledge, and unfailing love of God’s saving providence. The Prophet Isaiah describes this relinquishing of control as opening my ear that I may hear, and not rebelling or turning back, but humbly submitting to those who beat me and not shielding himself from buffets and spitting. This difficult surrender and relinquishing control can result in total inner confusion and perplexity. Accordingly, through faith we sometimes have to simply set our faces like flint and trust that God is working out our salvation in the darkness and trials of our spiritual journey.
And by patiently and trustingly enduring what seems like losing our life, we ever so gradually begin to acquire Christ’s perspective, and slowly begin to think as God does. Then, like Christ, we no longer simply obey and do God’s will, but God’s will and our will become one. Then, although having seem to have lost our life in relinquishing control over at and trustingly surrendering to God, we have the joy of discovering that we have actually saved our lives and become God’s beloved sons and daughters who now (in the words of the psalmist) walk before the Lord, in the land of the living.