Walking With a Hurting Friend

Sometimes, walking with a hurting friend demands a bit of a sacrifice. We all seem ready to take that journey in the beginning, but by and by weariness sets in. And worse, our once exuberant compassion grows cold. We can quickly find ourselves looking for an easy exit or longing for “the way it used to be”. Learning to journey with a friend in need provides great opportunity for personal growth and increased compassion for others.

An unusual friendship

I recently read the story of the unusual friendship between John Newton and William Cowper. Today their story speaks a testimony of God’s power through persevering friendship. A timeless story we all need to hear about walking with a hurting friend.

While both men achieved acclaim as writers, and had many other similarities, their personalities were quite different. John Newton, known for his exhuberance and love of people stood directly opposite of William Cowper’s reclusive, melancholic tendencies. The friendship of almost 40 years saw Newton stand by his friend in the darkest years of Cowper’s life.

They met in the summer of 1767, as William Cowper moved to Olney, the town where John Newton pastored since 1764. While we know today of William Cowper’s battle with depression, John Newton came to know his friend’s secret pain more slowly. Glimpses of Cowper’s tortured mind enlightened Newton to his friend’s struggle. As a result, he developed projects the two could work on together, including a book of hymns for their congregation.

Friendship in the fire

The initial six years of their friendship consisted of daily visits, and fellowship. It was said they were never apart for more than seven hours at a time while awake and at home! Cowper wrote later that those six years were among the happiest of his life. Yet the dawn of 1773 brought a darkness of depression so deep to Cowper, not even his dearest friend, Newton could shake it. The friendship begun six years prior was cast into a fire that burned 27 years until Cowper’s death.

During the early years of their friendship, Cowper suffered bouts of depression, but none as severe and long lasting as the darkness that descended on January 1, 1773. A troubled dream about God resulted in a failed suicide attempt. Cowper turned completely from God, church and prayer to a hopeless existence. Despite the difficult and trying circumstances, Newton maintained a constant, faithful presence in his friend’s life. He prayed, corresponded and visited. He sat quietly or engaged in conversation when bid. During the fourteen months that Cowper stayed in the home of Newton, he wrote:

“I make myself easy by reflecting that the Lord’s hand is concerned…The Lord has numbered the days in which I am appointed to wait upon him in this dark valley, and He has given is such a love to him both as a believer and as a friend, that I am not weary.” (Newton’s Song to Cowper)

A Modern Lesson For Hurting Friends

Truly, John Newton’s friendship with William Cowper modeled walking with a hurting friend. Their story offers much counsel and encouragement for us today. Our modern culture has little time for the patience and compassion required in such a friendship. While at the same time, the need for patience and compassion towards the hurting is huge.

walking with a hurting friend

We all know someone who is hurting, a friend, neighbor, co-worker or even family member. While truly desiring the best for them, and offering help, we can often cause more harm.

Too often we feel uncomfortable in the presence of a hurting friend. As a result, we shift into “fix it” mode and try to hurry them on to a “better place”. True lovingkindness focuses on the receiver, putting them and their needs first.

Consider the following tips for walking with a hurting friend, from a perspective of compassion, openness and understanding.

Affirmation

Offering words of love and support to someone hurting is the best help you can offer. John Newton reminded his friend William Cowper often that he loved him even in the dark times.

When someone is hurting, they know they cannot do everything as before, they know their disposition is not “cheerful”. But they feel powerless to change that; your affirmations of love and support take the pressure of performance off them allowing them to rest.

In Matthew 11:28-30, Jesus tells us to come to Him and “rest”, just as we are, without pretense on our part or expectation on HIs.

Grace Soothes the Hurting

Walking with a hurting friend or other loved one requires grace. A perspective of putting them “first”. (Philippians 2:3)Hurting people need huge amounts of grace from others because they don’t often offer it to themselves.

As mentioned above, a hurting person knows they can’t do everything as before, but they often feel like failures as a result. Instead of impatience when things aren’t as before, anticipate how you can lighten their load. If moods are heavy and conversation quiet, learn to sit with that. Offer to take a quiet walk or sit outside quietly with them without the pressure to “cheer them up”.

Don’t Make It About You

Often when we feel uncomfortable walking with a hurting friend, we can put subtle pressure on them to “get over it”. We can remind them of this or that “occasion” when we had a good time or they were happy.

Or worse, we can say we “miss” those times or the way they “used to be”. Those things sound good on the surface, but they reek of selfishness. Hurting people have no trouble remembering the good old days. But remembering can bring more pain because they feel pressure to be someone they can’t right now.

This can communicate we love them as they were not as they are now. Life deals some harsh realities that alter people. Hurting people need the knowledge that even if they can’t be their “old self”, they have your love.

Walking, Listening, and Asking

Walking with a hurting friend is like taking the difficult hiking trail. It’s mostly uphill, lots of rocks, a few holes and plenty of distractions. The difficult hiking trails often prove the longest.

Over the 27 years John Newton walked with William Cowper through his depression, he encountered many frustrations. But the thing Cowper noticed was Newton never complained about the journey. Newton had his own trials during that time, but still managed to retain his compassion for Cowper.

He demonstrated this by simply walking. He offered companionship, not preaching. He listened; with an ear to hear, not to correct.

Cowper lost faith in God, resulting in many delusions, Newton didn’t condone, but gently listened. Asking helpful questions showed another way he cared. Gentle questions that show we care can be very helpful.

Questions like, “How can I help you today?” or “What is the hardest thing you’re facing right now?”. These questions support and focus on the hurting person in a non-threatening way.

Hope For the Hurting

Unfortunately the words we think offer hope, conversely inflict pain. saying to someone after a miscarriage or still birth, “You can always try again or adopt” is like a knife to the heart.

Even similar comments about job loss, housing changes or financial setbacks display callousness rather hope.

Promises of “better days” may sound hopeful on the surface, but to a hurting person they invalidate the current pain. Trite platitudes or pushy expectations of recovery minimize the current reality of the sufferer.

Hurting people need the kind of hope that shines a light into their darkness. John Newton spoke hope into the life of William Cowper on many dark days.

He spoke the hope of God’s Word with gentleness, love and compassion. This hope is the future wrapped in the truth of God’s Steadfast Love in every circumstance. The light of that hope shines in the darkness, and the darkness cannot overcome it. (John 1:5).

walk in security of relationship

Walking with a hurting friend or loved one happens in the context of relationship. The reason John Newtown and William Cowper’s friendship lasted, exists in the identity of the relationship.

Their friendship existed outside of the depression, they saw each other as “friend”, not “patient” and “caregiver”. Hurting people need the security of relationship; not an identity based on their suffering.

Newton never saw Cowper as a “sufferer”, he saw him as “friend”. If we see hurting people as sufferers, we see only the problem, not the person. Viewing them through the relationship sees them as “friend” or “loved one”, not the problem.

Even after the complete darkness fell on Cowper, Newton chose not to focus discussion on the depression, but to reach for the threads of their relationship.

Learning to view hurting people through eyes of compassion, openness and relationship offers a comfort like no other. Newton’s Christlike example of love for Cowper regardless of the depression compels us to step into another’s pain. While at the same time embracing the beauty of the relationship that still shines in the darkness.

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