quotation lead

Facing the waves

“It requires more courage to suffer than to die,” said Napoleon Bonaporte.

Suffering? It’s not new to us. Personally, I already met countless sufferings in my almost twenty years living in this world. Some were solved while some still remains unsolved until now and I know I’m not the only one experiencing this.

Wherever you look, you can see and hear people suffering. Some suffers from poverty, some from sickness, and many others. Problems are all around. It runs from personal, family, local, national and even universal. I believe everybody suffers something. Really, suffering is such a vast topic to tackle.

Some times in my past, I came to a point of wanting to die just to escape from problems. Not through suicide of course. I just asked God to take me away from this miserable world. Problems were like waves who were calling out my name and laughed at me, reminding me of all the times I tried before and failed. They kept on telling me time and time again that I’ll never win, that I’ll suffer ‘till death.

Death? Oh, it takes just a time to be experienced. When you die today then that’s it, it’s done. But do sufferings also take just a time? I doubt they do. You suffer today, the next day and until you find the solution. And solutions sometimes are not that easy to find. After it is solved, another will replace, perhaps, not right away but for sure there will be. They will only stop haunting you when you die that’s why it requires more courage to suffer than to die.

Lately, I cried a river of tears when my parents informed me that they can’t afford to send me for our practicum this summer. The idea of failing to take the practicum which means failing to graduate on March 2009 frightens me day and night. I tried to be strong and strived to be okay though in the inside I’m absolutely not. Yet, I kept my faith knowing that earth has no sorrow that heaven cannot heal (Thomas Moore).

Yah, we will really can’t have that great courage to face sufferings, we really would want to die if we face problems with our own strength and wisdom, if we depend much on our selves. We need someone who will fight with us. We need Him, we need God. As in the text message: Dear soldier, I see you are tired. I tell you, drop your sword and put down your shield. Why worry about the fight? After all it’s not your battle, it’s mine. All you have to do is be in the battle field then against the thousand who tried to destroy you, there I will stand and rescue you. Winning this war requires neither only me nor only you, but rather me and you—God.

Indeed, we live here to fight, and in the fight we should aim to win.