Who do we go to for comfort?

Layla literally will follow us around like a little puppy. Some of her favorite spots are under our chairs, on the stairs, under our feet while cooking and so on. The sad consequence is that we sometimes stepped on her paw or tail.

The interesting thing is how she responds. She'll let out the regular yelp as we all would but then she turns to us and starts wagging her tail, expecting comfort and pets, which we provide.

The interesting thing is that this is often so far from human experience. When I am hurt the first place I go for comfort is not the one who has hurt me. I often run away, seek comfort somewhere else, or from someone else, or I might even respond in anger or in some way to push the person or hurt away.

Yet outside of abusive relations (sadly there are too many) or moments where anger is still fresh, Layla's is actually the most life giving, healthy and relationship restoring response. If we look at it from the lens of justice, it is the duty of the perpetrator to do the work of restoration and to correct wrongs. If we look at it from the lens of a relationship, a trust has been broken and the one who broke it needs to make amends. Our hurt, just like Layla's, is more than just physical and so the person that acted against us is often the only real one who can heal it.

This makes additional sense to the reason why we need to turn to God in repentance and obedience. We have hurt God immensely, through what we did to Christ, what we did to ourselves, this world and the way we reject him daily. The amazing thing is that God comes to us, all the way but we still need to turn to him and make recompense.

The even more amazing thing I see in Layla is that she might show an initial shock and pain, but almost immediately she switches to an excitement for how we might comfort her. She knows we didn't mean to and that we want to make up for it. Somehow she seems to see that the redemption will be better then the pain.

We struggle and are faced with pain a lot in this life, but what would it mean for us to know that the redemption is far greater than the pain? What if we knew our master well enough to know how he would comfort and relieve our suffering? It's not that we would seek pain, but I don't think we would mourn it the way we do. Maybe like Paul we would even rejoice at our suffering for God, especially because we know what it means.