“Encouraged by Lamentations, the pastor will have the strength to do far less in relation to suffering, and be far more. Pastors will not give in to the temptation to fix the sufferer and will engage in a ministry which honors the sufferer. Nothing, in the long run, does more to demean the person who suffers than to condescendingly busy oneself in fixing him or her up, and nothing can provide more meaning to suffering than a resolute and quiet faithfulness in taking the suffering seriously and offering a companionship through the time of waiting for the morning.”
(Eugene Peterson, in Five Smooth Stones for Pastoral Work, 114)
