Learning Empathy Through Our Trials

Empathy is an invaluable attribute that we form during difficulties and trials. Here’s what I’m learning about empathy during a trial I’m currently facing. 

After we found out that our not-yet-born daughter’s heart is currently abnormal, a friend asked me a question that completely caught me off guard. He asked, “What positives have you found from the situation?”

My first reaction was to think: This might be the most ridiculous question I’ve ever heard.

We don’t know if our daughter—who we plan to name Eden—will ever have a strong heart. Right now, she only has one ventricle when there should be two.

We’re still hoping for a miracle. 

But unless something changes, we’ll need to temporarily relocate to Cincinnati, Ohio, for an unknown period of time. The children’s hospital there is significantly better equipped for Eden’s condition. And there will be many other challenges. Right now, we’re told she will need, at a minimum, two open-heart surgeries. 

I’ve cried more in the past month than in all the years before. What positives could there possibly be in this situation?

But then I thought about it a bit more, and I found my answer.

I told my friend, “I’ve seen more kindness and love from others than I ever imagined.”

Weep with those who weep

We’re told to “rejoice with those who rejoice, and weep with those who weep” (Romans 12:15). So many people, especially Church members, have reached out to us. Some cried with us. Some were simply there. We’ve seen firsthand how when one member suffers, all suffer. 

All of us can show compassion and sympathy. Sympathy is feeling sorrow for someone’s hardship; compassion is feeling that sorrow—and then doing something to help ease his or her suffering. These qualities often motivate us to mail a card, send an encouraging text or buy someone dinner.

Peter wrote, “Finally, all of you be of one mind, having compassion for one another; love as brothers, be tenderhearted” (1 Peter 3:8). These are beautiful qualities, and we should keep working to grow in them.

Empathy—when you’ve lived through something yourself

Let’s look at another dimension of caring for others: empathy.

Empathy takes compassion a step further. It’s not just feeling sorry for others—it’s having walked in their shoes and experienced what they are experiencing. You can sympathize with a friend’s loss even if you haven’t experienced it yourself, but you can only truly empathize when you’ve lived through something similar.

A man can sympathize with a woman in childbirth, but he cannot fully empathize with her pain. Someone who has never been divorced may sympathize with a friend who is, but only someone who has lived through a divorce can say, “I’ve been there.”

Sympathy and compassion are invaluable. They stir us to pray, encourage and help. Empathy, however, often brings a deeper drive to serve. It’s not just concern—it’s conviction. Not just care—but the courage to step into someone else’s struggle.

I teach at a nursing college. I’ve noticed that about a third of my students pursue nursing because of a personal experience with a loved one. That experience motivated them to want to help others.

Examples of empathy

Until recently, we weren’t sure if the doctors thought our daughter would survive at all. Encouragingly, several Church members reached out to us. Some shared inspiring stories of God working miracles in their children. Others opened up to us about having lost their child at birth—and said that if the unthinkable happens to us, we could talk to them anytime.

That’s empathy—walking alongside someone with the same burdens, struggles and scars.

Jesus Christ can truly empathize with us

Hebrews 4:15 says, “For we do not have a High Priest who cannot sympathize with our weaknesses . . .”

The New King James Version and many translations use the word sympathize. The New International Version uses empathize, which perhaps is more fitting. The Greek word is sumpatheō.

Vincent’s Word Studies says about this word: “This is more than knowledge of human infirmity. It is feeling it by reason of a common experience with men”(emphasis original).

The point is clear: Jesus Christ feels what we feel. Isn’t that what empathy is?

The rest of Hebrews 4:15 reads: “but was in all points tempted as we are, yet without sin.”

Jesus doesn’t just observe our struggles from a distance. He has lived with them. He experienced hunger, thirst, exhaustion, betrayal, rejection, deep sorrow and even death. He was “a Man of sorrows and acquainted with grief” (Isaiah 53:3).

He knows what it’s like to be neglected, slandered, misunderstood and falsely accused. He faced every temptation we do, but never sinned.

Because of His empathy toward us, we don’t carry our burdens alone. We can bring our deepest struggles to God in prayer, knowing that Jesus Christ understands. He has walked where we walk. He feels what we feel. That kind of understanding offers comfort and peace we won’t find anywhere else.

What is the testing producing?

James wrote, “My brethren, count it all joy when you fall into various trials” (James 1:2).

That’s a hard verse to swallow at first. How many people rejoice when they get a $12,000 roof estimate? Or when a loved one receives a terminal diagnosis? Or when an unborn child is facing a serious physical defect? 

Consider Hebrews 12:11: “Now no chastening seems to be joyful for the present, but painful; nevertheless, afterward it yields the peaceable fruit of righteousness to those who have been trained by it.”

In the middle of pain, it rarely makes sense. Trust that God sees the whole picture. He is training us.

Let’s read more of James 1: “My brethren, count it all joy when you fall into various trials, knowing that the testing of your faith produces patience” (verses 2-3).

That word for patience can also mean endurance or perseverance. God doesn’t waste trials—they always produce something in us: stronger faith, deeper character and greater understanding and tenderness toward the struggles of others.

We don’t thank God for the pain, but we can thank Him for what the pain produces. When the storm clears, we may find we’re more compassionate, more understanding and more eager to act.

Here’s the million-dollar question: What have you been through?

Now ask yourself: What fruits did I gain from this trial that I can share with my brethren?

What can you empathize with?

Have you experienced a discouraging health diagnosis? The loss of a loved one? The stress of relocating? The joy of marriage? The miracle of a child?

If you’ve lost your job for keeping the Sabbath, suffered rejection or walked through grief, you can use that experience to empathize with others enduring something similar. This knowledge may not remove the hardship of the trial, but it can give it a comforting sense of purpose.

God is training us to be priests and kings, to rule and serve in His Kingdom. Part of that training is experience. When we reign with Christ over a war-torn and traumatized world, we’ll be able to say to those we serve: “I know what that’s like.” It won’t be theoretical, but real. That’s what empathy prepares us for.

So, what do we do in the present?

We remember that every joy and trial is part of our training. We open ourselves to others. We truly listen and try to understand, without just responding in clichés. We visit, we pray, we text, we comfort. If we’ve been through the same thing, we might say, “Here’s what helped me.”

And most of all, we follow the example of Jesus Christ, our High Priest, who empathizes with our every weakness. We do not serve a distant or detached God.  

Let’s follow Christ and learn to walk in someone else’s shoes.