a good affliction

Every Tuesday at 3 PM, in the None Prayer Office, I and others read these words from Psalm 119:  Before I was afflicted I went astray (vs. 67).  This psalm has sometimes troubled me with its persistent emphasis on what seems to be works-righteousness (but actually is not) or the writer's boastfulness in phrases like I have more insight than all my teachers and I have more understanding than my elders (vss. 99-100).  But this teaching about how going astray can lead to afflictions, which, in turn, can lead us back to God, is not troublesome to me.

However, several verses later, we read It is good for me to be afflicted so that I might learn your decrees (vs. 71).  At first glance, this is double-troublesome.  Is God's Word saying that the tuition for the school of God's decrees is affliction, whether it be physical, emotional, or spiritual?  I believe not, as this is simply a testimonial from the writer, not a prescription for everyone.  But can affliction, particularly of the excruciating kind, actually be good?  I remember my late wife once saying, "you and I don't really know what is good, or bad: only God does, and His Word shows us His perspective on things."

Let's take her own example, and mine.  Hallie suffered for 15 years with a debilitating neuro-muscular disease, eventually losing the ability to move or talk before she died.  I walked with her in this affliction, which was heartbreaking to watch in its relentless progress.  Was this a good thing?

In a word, "no".  As we said to one another (when we could communicate), we wouldn't wish this on anyone.  But we also added, "we're not sure that we would trade it".  For, in fact, it was good that we were afflicted, since we did learn God's decrees, we grew closer to Him and to each other than we ever imagined possible.  As I think about Hallie's life now in glory, and mine in an ever-closer communion with God and others, I see how all of that goodness derived from our long season of affliction.  Does it fully compensate for her suffering, and mine?  Not fully, or at least not yet.  But I'm beginning to see bright glimmers of that goodness in this life now, a foretaste of the Goodness that Hallie now sees in all of its brilliance.