We need to talk about something hard today on the porch.
Not with a pointed finger. Not with a raised voice. But with the kind of honesty that only comes when we trust each other enough to sit in the uncomfortable places together.
Because some of you reading this are suffering in ways that most people around you cannot see. Physical pain that does not stop. Emotional pain that has gone on so long you have forgotten what it felt like before it was there. And somewhere in the quiet of your hardest moments the thought has crossed your mind that maybe ending it on your own terms is the most merciful choice left.
We are not here to shame that thought. We are here to sit with you in it.
Assisted suicide is becoming more widely accepted in our culture and more legally available in many places. And we understand why. When someone we love is suffering without relief, when the body is failing and the pain is relentless, the desire to end that suffering feels like an act of compassion. We get that. The heart behind it is not wicked. It is human.
But we believe something different about suffering. And we want to share it gently.
Psalm 139:16 tells us that every day of our lives was written in God’s book before one of them came to be. Not just the good days. All of them. The hard ones. The ones that feel impossibly long. The ones where we are holding on by a thread we cannot even see anymore. Those days were known by God before we lived them and He has not abandoned us in them.
Job knew suffering that most of us will never touch. He lost everything – his children, his health, his livelihood, his dignity. He sat in ashes and scraped his wounds with broken pottery. And he said things to God that would make a lot of Sunday morning congregations uncomfortable. He was raw and angry and desperate. But he did not let go of God. And God did not let go of him.
The sanctity of life is not a rule God made to make our suffering longer. It is a reflection of something profound – that our lives belong to Him. That we are not accidents. That even in the valley of the shadow of death He is there. Psalm 23 does not say He removes the valley. It says He walks through it with us.
We also want to speak to the one whose suffering is not physical. The one whose pain lives in the mind and the soul. Depression lies. It tells you that you are a burden, that things will never change, that the people around you would be better off. None of that is true. Not one word of it. And the fact that you are still here, still reading, still breathing means the story is not over.
Romans 8:38-39 says that nothing -not death, not life, not things present, not things to come -can separate us from the love of God. Nothing you are feeling right now has moved you outside the reach of that love. Not your darkest thought. Not your longest night. Not the pain that has no name.
We do not have easy answers for suffering. The porch has never been a place for easy answers. But we do have a God who entered human flesh specifically so He could know what it felt like to hurt. Jesus wept. Jesus bled. Jesus cried out from the cross asking why God had forsaken Him. He is not unfamiliar with your pain. He wore it.
If you are in a dark place today please do not navigate it alone. Tell someone. Reach out. There are people whose whole purpose is to sit with you in this.
988 Suicide and Crisis Lifeline: Call or text 988, available 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.
You are not a burden. You are not forgotten. You are not beyond hope. And this porch will always be a place where you are welcome exactly as you are, in whatever you are carrying today.
We see you. God sees you. And we are so glad you are here.
Lord, we bring You the ones who are suffering today in ways we cannot fully see or understand. The ones whose bodies are failing them. The ones whose minds will not give them rest. The ones who are so tired of hurting that they are considering options that break our hearts. Meet them right there. Let them feel You closer than their next breath. Give them one reason to hold on today. And tomorrow give them one more. Remind them that their life is written in Your hand and You are not finished with their story. Surround them with people who will sit with them in the dark and not run from it. In the precious name of Jesus, Amen.
If someone you love is struggling today, will you share this post with them? And if you are the one struggling, we are here. You are not alone.
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