15 For we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but we have one who has been tempted in every way, just as we are—yet was without sin.
Sometimes we feel like we are all alone in our weaknesses, our struggles. As I have talked with many other chaplains in the Army, I have found one thing in common with those who have been deployed: almost every one of them struggles with the things they saw and experienced while being deployed. Another equally common experience is that they have not talked about those experiences with someone else. They bottle them up, not willing to let anyone see their inner world. This bottling up can have long-term negative consequences in life. When someone is abused growing up, they need to have space to figure out how those abuses fit into how they view the world, how they view God, how they view other human beings. When a tragedy happens, we need to talk it through. We each need someone in those times of need with whom we can connect, in whom we sense a sympathetic ear. We need someone who, as we share, connects with our story and our pain. They seem to ‘get us’ and what we are going through. We don’t want a person who is disconnected from our experiences. As we share we want to sense that they are somehow with us in our pain, that their hearts join in with ours and feel the hurt. We also often feel alone in our temptation struggles, that we are the only ones failing in our spiritual walk. This sense of aloneness in struggle and weakness can be spiritually crippling. It keeps us from doing the very thing that will bring us through that time: drawing near to the Lord. We can connect with Him because He too has struggle as we are struggling. The encouraging thing is that when He struggled, He didn’t slip into sin. He was able to stay with the struggle and not fail. That is the kind of help I need when I am feeling weak. Jesus is someone with whom I connect and was also triumphant in the struggle. Victory is possible. Draw in close to Jesus.
The Arnold Journey 