Empty Promises
Many things promise to fulfil and satisfy us, but there is only one thing that truly does, and he walked the earth 2000 years ago.
In the complex where I live, two people have taken their lives in the last month.
During this time, I was reading the novel White Nights written by the great Fyodor Dostoyevsky in 1848. I have also been reading the Bible. Both books have guided my thoughts on the tragedies above.
White Nights tells the story of a nameless man in Saint Petersburg, who suffers from loneliness and alienation. His only social interaction is with his cleaner, Matryona.
He walks through the streets and recognizes everyone, but doesn’t know anyone. When these people are happy, so is he, and when they are plaintive, so is he.
He says, “And so it is that when we are unhappy we more strongly feel the unhappiness of others; feeling is not shattered, but becomes concentrated…”1 The man is likely depressed, and definitely hopeless.
One night, he serendipitously saves a young women, Nastenka, from a drunkard.
The two start conversing about the lonely man’s life. He claims that there is nothing to say, because his life has been spent alone. He thinks he is a dreamer, which “is not a human being, but a creature of an intermediate sort.”2 Despite his questionable flirting skills, she agrees to see him the next morning.
At such time, they talk about her life, and she appears to also be lonely. Nastenka lives with her grandmother, who literally pinned the girl to her dress, so she could not go anywhere.
The lonely man begins to fall in love with the lonely girl.
Nastenka starts to speak of a past lover, whom she is expecting to return any day. She cruelly and openly speaks of her love for this man. But after days, he has still not arrived.
Our man can’t take it anymore, and confesses his love for her. She accepts his love, and reciprocates it. She speaks of the prospects of life together, and curses her previous lover for abandoning her. She vows that her love for our man is greater than for the other.
While making this tender speech, a man walks up to them. It is her previous lover, who has now returned. She immediately leaves our man and walks off into the night with the other, never to be seen again. He is once again lonely.
When he comes home, he thinks that Matryona looks older than he remembered.
The book ends with him saying, “Good Lord, only a moment of bliss? Isn't such a moment sufficient for the whole of a man's life?”3
Dostoyevsky’s protagonist is a common person today. People that know so many faces, but truly know so little people. People who suffer over the emotions of others, and who are lonely and feel alienated. People who have been deeply hurt by others, and as a result of all of this, feel hopeless.
For anyone who feels like this, and who is still with me, I have this to say to you.
Jesus Christ suffered loneliness and hopelessness. He cried out to his own father in agony, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?”4
Jesus’ best friend Judas betrayed him unto death.5
He’s been where you are, and He promises to be here right now.
We are told that, “The Lord is near to all who call on him, to all who call on him in truth. He fulfils the desires of those who fear him; he hears their cry and saves them. The Lord watches over all who love him.”6
Many things promise to love us in this world. People, money, alcohol, screens, you name it. But all of them run off into the night when we need them. None of them satisfy. They only give us “a moment of bliss.”
I think that one reason why we are seeing widespread depression is because people fall for these false promises, not knowing that they lead to heart break. They fall for Nastenka, every day. And she leaves them, every day.
Jesus also promises to love us, but I can tell you that he will never run away.
Let us rejoice that, because Christ rose from the dead and defeated death, we have the rights to an eternity of bliss.
“But whoever drinks the water I give them will never thirst. Indeed, the water I give them will become in them a spring of water welling up to eternal life.”7
Pray to him that you might taste this water. You won't look back.
Dostoyevsky, F., 1848. White Nights. In: White Nights . s.l.:Penguin, p. 58 .
Dostoyevsky, F., 1848. White Nights . In: White Nights . s.l.:Penguin, p. 23.
Dostoyevsky, F., 1848. White Nights . In: White Nights . s.l.:Penguin, p. 86.
Matthew 27:46
Mark 14:44-46
Psalm 145:18-20
John 4:14
Excellent blog. Needs more beer. Not mostly beer. Just more beer than you have now.