From the way Job’s friends tried to console him, we learn a basic principle about giving comfort to others. It is this: A comforter’s ability to help is not so much his talent for using words, but rather his capacity to be sympathetic. That’s the type of understanding Job longed for when his friends began trying to correct him.
Dr. Paul Brand has beautifully expressed this truth in his book Fearfully and Wonderfully Made. He writes: “When I ask patients and their families, ‘Who helped you in your suffering?’ I hear a strange, imprecise answer. The person described rarely has smooth answers or a winsome, effervescent personality. It is someone quiet, understanding, who listens more than he talks, who does not judge or even offer much advice. ‘A sense of presence.’ ‘Someone there when I need him.’ A hand to hold. And understanding, bewildered hug. A shared lump in the throat.”
Sometimes, in trying so hard to say the right thing, we forget that the language of feeling speaks louder than words. The apostle Paul told us to “weep with those who weep.”
Yes, helping others in distress begins by sharing our pain. – Martin R. De Haan II
Lord, keep me merciful and kind;
With Thee, O Christ, first in my mind,
Teach me to feel another’s woe,
And mercy to all people show. – Brandt
Sympathy is two hearts tugging at one load.
- October 6, 1990, Our Daily Bread
For You 