Earlier this week I sent my resume to a children’s hospital in Columbus to be considered for a part-time chaplaincy position. I covet your prayers for this opportunity. I was sitting in my car when I first prayerfully considered applying for the position. I wept alone in just thinking about the pain that individuals and families go through in such environments.

But, I remember something C.S. Lewis said many years ago, “In a sense [Christianity] creates, rather than solves, the problem of pain; for pain would be no problem unless, side by side with our daily experience of this painful world, we had received what we think a good assurance that ultimate reality is righteous and loving” (from The Problem of Pain). Christianity creates the problem of pain, rather than solves it. The solution is an ultimate reality (namely, God), not a temporal ‘quick fix’(religion, prayer, karma, etc.). Being religious will never address the reality of pain in this world. But trusting an eternal God who promises restoration, then initiates it on His own behalf through the most unjust pain in the history of the world – the cross, is a magnificent starting point in addressing pain.

I linger on Lewis’s words and I think to myself, ‘Who better to be in the midst of such pain in these environments than the church?’

Whether or not I have the privilege of getting the chaplaincy position at Children’s Hospital, Jay and I have talked a great deal about proactively seeking such opportunities for ourselves as well as mobilizing others who are joining God’s story of transformation and renewal – relaying the message of ultimate restoration offered by God. That, after all, is church.