Growth can be difficult and painful. We might not understand why, but we know, through experience, that it is the way of things. “No pain, no gain” is a popular expression of this truth. To develop, we will go through growing pains. We will be tried and challenged with difficult tasks which will determine who and what we are to be.
Some people, understanding this, take it to heart in an extreme fashion. Thinking all pain will lead to some gain, they seek actions which they believe will increase their trials and tribulations so as to hasten their personal development. We can see this in the spiritual life in the way some misunderstand fasting; seeing that it can be a good, they become extreme in their fasting, so extreme that they end up breaking down physically, mentally, and eventually spiritually. Whatever gain they could have attained by moderate fasting is not only lost, they find themselves becoming set back, as instead of progressing spiritually they find themselves in a spiritual regression.
What is important is for us to grow. Sometimes, that will be by being challenged. Sometimes it will not. We should accept such challenges when they come to us, but we must not needlessly seek them out. And when we go through them, we should keep hold of our hope, knowing that they will only be temporary:
Be sober, be watchful. Your adversary the devil prowls around like a roaring lion, seeking some one to devour. Resist him, firm in your faith, knowing that the same experience of suffering is required of your brotherhood throughout the world. And after you have suffered a little while, the God of all grace, who has called you to his eternal glory in Christ, will himself restore, establish, and strengthen you. To him be the dominion for ever and ever. Amen (1 Ptr. 5:8-10 RSV).
As we grow, we should find grace coming to us, grace which will not only help us reach our potential, but to transcend it. Grace perfects nature so that then it can next be deified. Throughout our lives, we will likely find ourselves being challenged, and, thanks to those challenges, find ourselves growing in grace. Often, such challenges will include some sort of tribulation which we will have to face. We should hope, one day, we will transcend such trials, that we will find ourselves transcending suffering, as our goal is the kingdom of God, where there will be no pain or sorrow.
Knowing all of this to be true, we still want to know why this is the way things are. Due to our limited knowledge and experience, we will only be able to give provisional, speculative answers to this question. The problem is, none of the answers will seem to satisfy, meaning, we will likely seek for better and better answers to deal with our existential concern. It is like other questions which we cannot answer by ourselves, such as why things exist instead of not existing. We know they exist, all we will be able to do is point out that fact and offer mere speculation as to why things exist because our limited intellect does not comprehend being, a prerequisite in order to properly answer that question..
Such questions are important and should not be ignored, but we must also accept our limitations in trying to answer them. Sometimes, instead of becoming stuck in contemplation trying to answer them, we must be practical, accept the way things are, and act upon what we know and understand. When we do so, we will find, not only will we be doing something which will hopefully make things better, our actions will provide our intellect new experiences to use in its speculations.
Thus, though we have questions, important questions, we must realize practical answers must come first, and in regards trials, the practical one is simple: “You also, therefore, do your best to come out victorious from your trials. For of necessity those who receive blessings are bound also to endure trials.” [1] That means, we must accept the fact that we will experience all kinds of trials and tribulations in our lives, and the answer to them is not to ignore them or try to avoid them, but to deal with them as they come. In doing so, meeting them head on, we will be able to grow and become better than what we were like before we had them. This is what St. Ammonas wanted his monastic readers to understand in his words of wisdom which have value beyond the monastic environment:
I know that you are in travail of heart, and have entered into great trial. But if you bear it nobly, joy will come to you. For if trial does not come upon you, either openly or secretly, you cannot progress beyond your present measure. For all the saints, when they asked that their faith might be increased, entered into trials. For when a man receives a blessing from God, at once his trial is increased by the enemy, who wants to deprive him of the blessing with which God has blessed him. [2]
The more we develop, the more we will grow in grace. With that grace, hopefully we will be given some comfort or consolation, some joy which helps us as we go through life’s troubles. The more we grow, the more avenues there will be for us to be challenged. We must not let ourselves rest in our achievement, thinking we have ever become all we could be. There is always room for us to grow some more. And sometimes, that growth will require us to take what we have been given, and remember it, allowing the remembrance of us sustain us as we find ourselves temporarily cut off from it:
You must know how, in the beginning of the spiritual life, the Holy Spirit gives people joy when He sees their hearts becoming pure. But after the Spirit has given them joy and sweetness, He then departs and leaves them. This is a sign of His activity and happens with every soul that seeks and fears God: He departs and keeps a distance until He knows whether they will go on seeking Him or not. [3]
The supposed departure of the Holy Spirit is only perceptual, as the Spirit will always be with us, giving us the grace and inspiration we need. But the Spirit will often do so in a hidden manner so as not to override our agency. The Holy Spirit will empty itself in this fashion to give us the room we need to choose for ourselves what we will do next. Grace makes us more and more autonomous, that is, it will give us more and more freedom, but as a consequence, we will find with an increase in our personal potential, we will find ourselves given more challenges alongside it. To make this point, Ammonas wrote: “So in your case, my beloved, since you have received the blessing of God, be prepared to receive trials until you have passed beyond them; then you will have great progress and increase in all your virtues, and great gladness will be given you from heaven, such as you have not known.” [4]
We should accept our lives will be filled with challenges so that we can grow and become great, not just on earth and temporal existence, but in eternity. Our hope should be that such challenges will come to an end, if not in our temporal existence, then in the eschaton. We should hope to participate in the divine life with the joy and glory which is found in it. And, it should likewise be our hope, by such participation in the divine life, we will come to know the answers to the questions which we have had. That is, we hope will not have to rely upon speculation, but rather, our experience will enlighten us and help us make sense of everything. But until then, we should expect such questions will remain with us, and though we can and will offer speculative answers to them, we must do more than merely speculate, but act, that is, live out our lives, for we know, we have been given life for a reason and it would be a shame not to realize that reason when we have been given the chance to do so.
[1] Ammonas, The Letters of Ammonas. Trans. Derwas J. Chitty (Fairacres, Oxford: SLG Press, 1995), 11 [Letter IX].
[2] Ammonas, The Letters of Ammonas, 11 [Letter IX].
[3] Ammonas, The Letters of Ammonas, 12-13 [Letter IX].
[4] Ammonas, The Letters of Ammonas, 12 [Letter IX].
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