How do we test the claim that the gospel offers better resources to cope with suffering than those offered by secular culture? Try comparing some diaries.
In 1899, a former soldier named Adam Tervit, age 30, served as regiment evangelist (similar to a chaplain) to British troops during the Second Boer War. His inspirational diaries were edited, published, and sold to fund the ministry. This happened for more than a year without his knowledge. Tervit’s my ancestor, and I have in my possession (probably) the only surviving copies.
In 2004, Colby Buzzell, age 28, started anonymously posting online about his experiences serving as an infantryman for the U.S. Army in the Iraq War. These candid and colourful diary entries quickly gained a following. In 2005, they were edited and published as My War: Killing Time in Iraq.
There are obvious similarities between their experiences. Both men left behind loved ones. Both witnessed the horrors of war––mangled corpses, senseless tragedies, human depravity. Both lost comrades. Both used the name Jesus Christ in their accounts (but in different ways; Buzzell’s language is colorful throughout, to say the least). Both are involved in conflicts that started with widespread support but later became highly controversial (the Second Boer War is infamous for featuring some of the world’s first concentration camps).
Yet the two men employed different coping strategies for the horrors. One strategy grew out of the soil of a culture infused with the gospel, the other out of modern secularism. Comparing their sources of joy, their understanding of the enemy, and their sense of meaning in suffering suggests that secular narratives, while not charmless, are achingly hollow set beside the brightness of gospel-driven endurance.
Humor Versus Worship
Each soldier’s account contains some light—Buzzell’s is full of dry wit, while Tervit’s is full of joyful praise. At one point, Buzzell is asked to write a “death letter” home addressed to his loved ones in case he’s killed in action. He wrote,
Dear Mom and Dad,
You’re right.
I should have gone to college instead.
Love,
Colby.
This kind of wit makes the book an excellent read. Yet I couldn’t help but feel it was, at times, a fragile resource to assist Buzzell with the genuine horrors he was experiencing.
Secular narratives, while not charmless, are achingly hollow set beside the brightness of gospel-driven endurance.
Tervit certainly has a sense of humor, but unlike for Buzzell, it doesn’t appear to be one of his major coping strategies. Despite the horrendous conditions, Tervit gathered many of the soldiers for mini church meetings most evenings. Tervit talked frequently of enjoying God’s presence and being refreshed at these meetings. He wrote, “God’s presence very real,” and spoke of Jesus as “precious,” “beautiful,” and “sweet.” This is vibrant, heartfelt, Christ-exalting Christianity. He said that Jesus is “the best company [he has] got.”
Others in Tervit’s regiment found joy in the hardship. One night, Adam came across three Christian soldiers praising the Lord in a storm without any coats or coverings. They were drenched in worship even as they got soaked.
Different Enemies
For Buzzell, the “enemy” was the Iraqi insurgents he pointed a gun at. But he came to see boredom as an enemy as well: “War, thus far, for me, was quite possibly the dullest, most anti-climactic experience I’d ever been through in my entire life, and the only thing I was really combating in Iraq was boredom.” Near the end of his account, Buzzell exclaimed “It’s all a bunch of lies” to students being recruited by the army at a university campus.
Despite the horrendous conditions, Adam gathered many of the soldiers for mini church meetings most evenings.
For Tervit, the “enemy” was never the people, as soldiers on both sides of the conflict were “precious in God’s eyes.” Instead, his account is peppered with references to the enemies of temptation and the Devil. One day, when they were attacked, he and a comrade both ducked for cover for hours as the bullets whizzed above them. Tervit wrote, “Yesterday, amid the hail of bullets, Jesus was with me . . . but I need Him today just the same. Dangers and pitfalls are none the less real, temptations are more real, yes, and stronger.”
Tervit came to see that there was an Enemy more dangerous than bullets. Secular people may roll their eyes at talk of the Devil, but we shouldn’t underestimate how recognizing our spiritual Adversary enables people to love in the darkest of places.
Different Meanings
Buzzell described his reason for joining the army like this:
I joined because, like they say in the old recruiting commercials, I wanted to “Be all that you can be” and more importantly, “it’s not a job it’s an adventure” I was sick of living my life in oblivion where every f—— day was the same f—— thing as the day before, and the same f—— routine. Eat, S—, Work, Sleep, Repeat.
By the end of his account, he expressed more of a settled nihilism: “I stopped expecting it to make sense.”
While Tervit became highly cynical about whether the war is just, he never lost his sense of hope and purpose. I was stunned to read the sorts of things Tervit would say, even on a bad day:
My path is at present full of perplexities and pain, toil and weariness, but God has some wise end in all His leadings, He will guide me by a right way. Let me trust Him, if I cannot trace Him. . . . It is good to go through the furnace with Jesus . . . one becomes richer in the things of God.
Reading Tervit’s diaries, I was repeatedly confronted with joy that even the darkest horrors of war couldn’t extinguish. Tervit lived to age 88 and remained a committed believer. A family friend of ours, when he was a child, heard Tervit speak and said he was the most inspirational speaker he’d heard as a young person.
Maybe it’s unfair to make these comparisons. Tervit and Buzzell came from different times and contexts. Or perhaps the past has something to teach us—that despite great advances in health care, education, and equality, secular culture hasn’t become better at finding joy. Especially when shots are fired.
