King David Teaches Hemingway a Lesson

I remember being semi-shocked to learn than Ernest Hemingway died via committing suicide.  I was in high school and as I studied Hemingway's life it read like an absolute adventure novel.  He survived two world wars, he survived being attacked by virtually every kind of creature Africa has to offer, he survived 2 plane crashes, he survived relationships with many varied Parisian vixens, he seemed invincible.  It didn't make any sort of sense to my young mind that after all that he would end it himself.

One anecdote in particular showed the kind of mettle he had.

In the summer of 1944 Hemingway was in London covering WWII as a war corespondent. (There he is on the right, with another journalist on the left, their army driver in the center)  One night the air sirens went off while Hemingway was being driven through the streets in a limo.  As was custom at the sound of the sirens the entire city went dark, including the street lights.  Hemingway's driver (not the one in the pic) ended up crashing the limo and the resulting head injury netted Ernest 57 stitches to the head.  A British doctor told him he needed to cancel his plans to ride along in a landing craft on D-Day (Ernest asked for special permission to be in one of the landing crafts).  He rode in the craft anyway, stitches and all.  Once his boat hit the sand the men in the boat proceeded to hold down the 45 year old writer with head stitches, who was straining to run out on the beach.  The men were told before hand to treat him as precious cargo.

If you've ever been in any 5th grade English class you've probably learned every story has conflict, but there are essentially only three kinds of conflict.

1. Person vs Person

2. Person vs Nature

3. Person vs Self

Hemingway's depression certainly contributed to his suicide, still there's a sort of objective irony to his life.  A man who was so powerful and lionized regarding conflicts 1 and 2, only to be felled by conflict 3, perhaps the most dangerous and perplexing of them all.

A person versus themselves.

I've found, from my varied and short existence, that conflict 3 is the most oft ignored, yet also the most critical to our lives, it is also the one that most requires a relationship with God.

Now the best Biblical comparison for Ernest Hemingway, as far as I can tell, is easily King David.

Another warrior poet, bold in battle and a weakness for women, who also had some pretty intense mental issues.

Unlike Ernest Hemingway, David was not an atheist.  His moments of mental anguish seemed to result in some of the most heartfelt Psalms you'll ever read.  In Psalms 6 he says things like "my bones are in agony" and "I'm exhausted from all my groaning."  In Psalms 77 he says "you have kept my eyes from closing" and "I am too troubled to speak."  David's moments of depression didn't stop him from talking to God.  He actually told God all about it, at times even blaming God.

"you have kept my eyes from closing"

David knows a profound truth, namely that God wants to hear all that stuff.

If it's on your heart, God wants to know, even if it's messy, angry, sad, and even the moments when your anger seems to be turned toward him.  We tend to turn toward God in the rough moments don't we?  However, it's usually to ask for salvation, to ask for relief, to ask for help.

When really what we need to be doing is expressing how we're feeling, less "help me" and more "I'm hurting."

"Help me" stinks of a one-sided relationship, one where you're interested in what you can get out of it.

"I'm hurting" is different.  It shows you're feeding your emotions into the relationship.

Tell God when your exhausted from your groaning.  Tell him when he's kept your eyes from closing, and then plead for salvation.

Hemingway used to joke that he was the one exception to the old adage "there are no atheists in foxholes."

Of course, that also meant in the most horrible of moments he had no one to talk to.

In many of the Psalms you can see David, being expressively happy about the fact that he worships a God who hears.  Psalms 5,10,17,38,61, and 65 all have direct lines about God listening. 

The act of telling God your troubles is more for you than it is for God.  And the fact is hearing your own problems expressed through your own words does more for you than you probably notice.  So the next time you find yourself asking for help with a problem, try spending some time first telling God about the problem its self.  Because there is quite simply nothing like a God who listens.