Trip Lee suffers from a Chronic Illness and JBo and he discussed how to respond to people who believe that having more faith can lead to healing.
Trip Lee shares that while he believes God is willing and able to heal, there may be other factors at play that he does not understand. And on top of that, we gotta figure out how to talk about all this with non-believers who might be struggling to make sense of their own suffering. It’s a lot to think about, but Trip’s got some wisdom for us on this one.
View this video with Trip Lee, and other interviews with BOOST artists videos on the BOOST Radio YouTube Channel.
Transcription of “Trip Lee Responds to Comments About His Chronic Illness”:
JBo:
Have you ever felt like sometimes people may have said, “Oh, if you have enough faith, then you’ll be healed”?
Trip Lee:
Oh yeah.
JBo:
That’s my first question. How do you deal with those incidents when people come up to you and they may tell you, “Oh, you need to pray more or read more or…”?
Trip Lee:
And I had someone say very specifically one time, “Oh, I knew somebody who had a similar thing and they were wrestling with unforgiveness with their father.” They was like, “You just need to forgive your father and you’ll be healed.” I’m like…
JBo:
What? Me and my daddy are cool.
Trip Lee:
Right.
JBo:
What?
Trip Lee:
At the time I was like, “Yeah, me and my father have a good relationship. I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
But yeah, people say stuff like that all the time, and it’s misunderstandings that they have. I wouldn’t even say it’s about whether or not God is willing, because what we see in scripture is when it is for our good, He’s more than willing and able. I mean, it’s how scripture argues. Like, oh, God would give His own son how much more? You know what I’m saying?
JBo:
Yeah.
Trip Lee:
It’s like there’s nothing He would hold back from us. He gave Jesus.
JBo:
Amen. Yeah.
Trip Lee:
So if He’s willing and He’s able and He doesn’t, it must be because in His wisdom, He sees something that I don’t see. And what’s actually best for me and for His glory is for me to go through this during the season. And that takes an incredible amount of trust, which is hard to do.
JBo:
Yeah.
Trip Lee:
And the things that build our trust in people is reminding ourselves what they’re like, looking at their track record. You know what I’m saying?
JBo:
Yep.
Trip Lee:
If I tell someone, “I got you,” and every time I say that I don’t come through-
JBo:
They’re not going to believe you.
Trip Lee:
…you don’t trust me.
JBo:
No facts.
Trip Lee:
But if it’s like, oh, literally every single time you’ve said something, you’ve done exactly that. And it’s been even greater than we imagined it would be when you did it, then I have to trust you. And yeah, it’s a fight to trust. Sometimes we say stuff like that and it can make us feel bad when we hear it because they’re like, “Man, I don’t know if I got faith like that.”
JBo:
Yeah.
Trip Lee:
It’s not easy. It’s a fight to keep trusting in God.
JBo:
Yes, yes. Every single day.
Trip Lee:
Yeah.
JBo:
Yeah.
Trip Lee:
That’s right. But there’s no… I mean, scripture’s super clear. I mean, that illness is not a direct result of disobedience.
JBo:
Right.
Trip Lee:
It could be but-
JBo:
But it’s not.
Trip Lee:
Scripture tells us that they asked Jesus, “Jesus, who sinned? Him or his parents. That He’s blind. And Jesus is like, “Neither of them. What are you talking about? What are these assumptions? Where’d you get that from?”
JBo:
Yeah, what? Right, right. Who said that?
So when it’s a non-believer, when somebody who doesn’t believe in God or Jesus, and they’re wondering, “Well, if God is good and I’m a good person, and then why is this happening to me?” How do you talk to that person?
Trip Lee:
Yeah. I mean, it depends what’s really behind that. If it’s someone who’s sincerely asking that, they’re really wondering that.
JBo:
Yeah. Because sometimes, I don’t mean to cut you-
Trip Lee:
No, we good.
JBo:
…sometimes we as Christians sometimes could just be like, “Oh, just trust God.” And it’s like, well-
Trip Lee:
Absolutely.
JBo:
…you can’t. That person doesn’t even believe in God.
Trip Lee:
Yeah. And what I want to remind people is that that’s not how the Bible argues. The Bible does not talk as if, if you do the right thing, everything will go your way. That’s just not in the Bible. Scripture let’s talk about that being good fruit of obedience. There are some things where if you do the right thing, good things come from them. Like, I don’t know, raise up a child and the way they should go. There’s ways that the world generally works, but there’s no promises from God that when you do the right thing, always good things will come to you. The book of Ecclesiastes is one of the clearest examples where…
It’s like, yeah, life is hard. This world is broken. You can stack up all the wisdom you want, stack up all the riches you want, stack up all the whatever it is. We live in a broken world. And that’s a reality. And I think one of the dangers of people thinking, “If I do the right thing, then always what I want will happen is…” When it doesn’t go that way, people feel like God lied to them. So I like to, from the jump, be like, “God did not promise us that.” It’s good for us to know that. Yeah, and to have a more nuanced view of those things. We live in a broken world. But the good news is this, there will be a day when all things will be made right. So there is a day we’re looking forward to. But as of right now, we live in a broken world. And we shouldn’t be confused by that because scripture’s told us this is what it will be like.
JBo:
That’s facts.
Trip Lee:
So God didn’t lie to you. People did. Yeah.
JBo:
What? Say that. I would say drop mic, but this mic is kind of expensive. But as a believer, I understand that. And then I have a friend who might be battling with something and-
Trip Lee:
Yeah, yeah.
JBo:
…and they’re not a believer. And it’s like, of course the first thing I want to do is, “Hey, you got to trust in God and He’s going to get you through and…”
Trip Lee:
Yeah.
JBo:
But how do I approach them when they’re battling with an illness or they feel like, “Man, I had all these plans for my life and you’re telling me to trust in God. I’m sick.”
Trip Lee:
Yeah, yeah. I mean, well I would say, I would make sure they understood this isn’t God going back on His word. God has not promised this life won’t be hard. We do live in a broken world. And I would say that these things are the result of our world being broken. And there is a day when God will make everything right, though that’s not right now. And I would also say we shouldn’t look at God as if Him allowing us to endure suffering is Him just looking up there not caring about us because He Himself put on human flesh and endured suffering on our behalf in a way that we never, never would. I mean, this is who He is. He’s like, “Because I want to pull y’all out of this suffering, I’m going to submit myself to these human limitations and take the suffering on myself.”
Yeah. And for me, often I’m like, it’s helpful to start at the fact that Jesus got up from the grave and we can work back from there. Jesus got up from the grave. He appeared to 500 people. The people who were following Him when He got killed, all got killed for preaching Jesus as Lord. It’s because they saw Him get up from the grave. They wrote these letters saying, “Jesus is the Son of God.” And got up from the grave during the time that people could have been like, “No, He didn’t. I was there.” it’s like, no, He did. People… You know what I’m saying? And if I can start there and see, then we can start to take steps back. But it’s okay for there to be things we don’t fully understand. Nobody has ever reached a point where they understand there are things that we just can’t fully understand.
And so I encourage people when we come across something we understand, don’t then just throw it out or throw everything out. Just say, “Okay, this part is unclear to me. And let me ask myself first, do I rock with Jesus? Do I follow Him? And then if He is who He said He is, then let me be patient to try to figure these other things out and how they fit in.” But if you’re expecting to get to a place where everything always makes sense, every decision God has ever made, it’s like, “Oh, I see exactly why,” that’s good. We’re setting ourselves up for failure.
JBo:
Yeah. I appreciate that, bro. I really do. That hits because I think when someone is ill, they can think that God no longer has a plan for their life. When you first were diagnosed with chronic fatigue syndrome, young cat, you still are a young cat.
Trip Lee:
Yeah, yeah.
JBo:
You know what I’m saying?
Trip Lee:
Yeah.
JBo:
Was there a moment where you’re like, “Yo, God, I thought the plan that you had for me was to be out here rapping and doing all these things and…”? Because you-
Trip Lee:
Oh, I still wrestle with this. Yeah, yeah.
JBo:
Yeah. You say you still wrestle with this.
Trip Lee:
Yeah.
JBo:
Because you’re a pastor as well. So what do you tell someone, or even what have you told yourself when you felt like God’s plan for your life was no longer existent because of an illness?
Trip Lee:
Yeah. Well this is part of one of the themes of my album [inaudible 00:07:44]. I think we write these very detailed stories of our lives and then when they don’t work, we feel like God went back on His word. But what He was planning to do didn’t change. It was just a story that we had written for ourselves. Yeah. I mean, I wrestle with it all the time, but the things I desire to do, I think are good things I go after and they don’t work out. And they can just see, be like, “Dang, what am I supposed to do?” And that’s an ongoing wrestle, an ongoing fight. But yeah, it’s reminding myself that, yeah. It’s one, trying not to compare myself to others too much.
JBo:
Say that.
Trip Lee:
Because other people have a normal amount of energy and I don’t. So I can be like, “Oh man, I’d be doing that if I had the energy.” You know what I’m saying? But it’s like, but I don’t. And it’s, with each year, maybe I get better at spending less time being frustrated, the energy I don’t have and trying to do better on focusing on how to glorify God the best with what I do have. And trying to find how to navigate stuff in different seasons. But it’s a constant fight. It’s not as if, oh, I’ve wrestled with this and now I that’s wrestled with for the rest of my life. It’s like, no, it’s a continuous, me trying to fight to trust God.
JBo:
And you-
Trip Lee:
And this is something really hard.
JBo:
And you fighting that doesn’t mean you have a lack of faith.
Trip Lee:
That’s right.
JBo:
Yeah.
Trip Lee:
Yeah, that’s right.
JBo:
You don’t got lack of faith.
Trip Lee:
Yeah.
JBo:
Well, bro, I appreciate you. Hey, JBo with BOOST Radio, Trip Lee. We out.
