Comfort

It's winter, there's snow on the ground, there are drafts and cold feet and biting wind...but because of these things, one of the best things in the world can be experienced: climbing into a nice, cozy bed at the end of a long day, that's been gloriously pre-heated by an electric blanket. 


It is the ultimate in comfort. 




Most things in my life aren't particularly full of comfort. The majority of days simply inhabiting my body isn't comfortable. It's usually in the process of objecting to whatever food I put recently into it, causing a variety of physical unpleasantnesses in my abdominal cavity, ranging from bloating and pressure that necessitates wearing only dresses or very stretchy skirts, to sharp pains, to spending hours in the bathroom, to occasional reflux and indigestion...not to mention migraines and insomnia and anxiety/depression and lethargy/brain fog, etc...and this with eating extremely carefully, sourcing my food from specific farmers or growing my own, knowing what food my food eats, using special dish soap and washing my dishes by hand, and so on.  I have had a few days where things have been blessedly calm, where I haven't constantly been very aware of what my digestion is doing, and those days are shocking.  Not being physically uncomfortable...it is almost magical.

And the days when my body is reacting to something that I ate...almost worse than the pain is the not knowing what it was that caused it.



I don't really have any great plan or things to say on this topic today, but I wanted to write something, and this came to mind - perhaps due to the particularly-unpleasant discomfort I'm experiencing currently, but also due to Christmas and the great comfort that God announces to us in the birth of His Son.

"Comfort, comfort my people..."  (from Isaiah 40)  



The comfort that is given to us is not a physical one (at least, not yet exactly, and not in the way that warm blankets are.)   No, this comfort goes way beyond cozy coal stoves or fuzzy slippers or the cessation of digestive pain.  It is a comfort that for the soul (but it's not chicken soup.) 

As unpleasant as physical discomfort is, the spiritual type is far worse and of a far more critical nature.  When we find ourselves face to face with the demands of God's Law, it produces in us (or at least, it should) a profound discomfort as the perfect holiness of God's demands is contrasted with our woeful lack of measuring up to them.  In the light of God's perfection, the darkness of my soul becomes black beyond measure.  

This discomfort, though, is a good thing, as it brings us to The Comforter.

It is only in despairing of self that we can embrace the Gift that brings true peace to our hearts: a perfect righteousness not our own, but given to us freely and without price.  Our pride objects strongly to such an arrangement, to such a lavish gift that cannot be earned.  But what it brings is worth any sting to our ego: adoption as sons and heirs, eternal life and the removal of the fear of death, the end of condemnation, the love of the Father, the joy of the Son, and the true comfort of the Holy Spirit (among other things.)



This comfort is announced to us through the Word, which is a promise that is received by faith.  It also is a physical reality, here and now, in the Lord's Supper, where we receive that promise into our very mouths via Christ's own physical Body and Blood in the bread and wine.  
(Ah, someday in Heaven I'll be blessed to again be able to receive Christ's Body, though for now my own body will only accept the Blood, in and under the wine.  Words cannot express how wonderful it will be to one day again be given His Body as well.)

I long, very much, for physical comfort.  So much of my time and effort are, of necessity, devoted to the pursuit of it, as its lack is such that it makes it nearly impossible to function, to serve my family as I ought to, to be a good wife and mother etc.  But as important and desirable as it is, its need pales in comparison to the need of the true Comfort for which my soul longs, and which is given to me in the here and now (though it won't be fully realized until the Last Day.)

The Aaronic Benediction we receive at the end of each Divine Service is so full of comfort:
"The Lord bless you and keep you; the Lord make his face to shine upon you and be gracious to you; the Lord lift up his countenance upon you and give you peace." (from Numbers 6:24-26)

Because of His sacrifice and the redemption price He paid, Christ looks upon me - His incarnate gaze shining and full of perfect love - and smiles.  

It is this fact that gives the true comfort that sustains, even in the midst of physical pain.

-M