The Goodness of Suffering

In my last post, I brought the objection some have about God based on the reality of human suffering in the world. As I said in that post, if we hold that perspective, we endanger ourselves of bitterness that will keep us from ever finding God, because to find him we must acknowledge our sin and that we don’t actually deserve salvation. In this post, I want to elaborate on why I believe that suffering is actually an act of God’s mercy towards us.

Suffering confronts us with eternal truths –

When life is easy, we tend to focus on trivial things. The old adage of the only two sure things in life being death and taxes ought to make us ponder the reality of our ultimate destiny – the grave. But truthfully, without reminders of our fragility and temporal condition, many put that reality out of their mind. But then come occasions like this incident that the disciples asked Jesus about in Luke 13:1-5 – “There were some present at that very time who told him about the Galileans whose blood Pilate had mingled with their sacrifices. ² And he answered them, “Do you think that these Galileans were worse sinners than all the other Galileans, because they suffered in this way? ³ No, I tell you; but unless you repent, you will all likewise perish. ⁴ Or those eighteen on whom the tower in Siloam fell and killed them: do you think that they were worse offenders than all the others who lived in Jerusalem? ⁵ No, I tell you; but unless you repent, you will all likewise perish.” ESV

The suffering brought up a question in observers about the cause of the suffering. Jesus’ reply is that sin is the ultimate cause of the world’s fractured condition. So, suffering can rightfully make people aware of their personal need to deal with sin thus leading them to repentance that ease in life rarely does. Naaman would not have met Elisha without first becoming a leper. The blind man in John 9 would not have been healed and believed in Jesus without first being born blind and living in that condition for many years. The widow of Zarephath would not have received her son back from the dead without him first dying. I can attest in my life that without great pain, I would have wandered aimlessly away from God. So, as I reflect on past sufferings, I count them all as tallies in the lengthy column of God’s mercies to me. Experience teaches us that often pleasure can be meaningless, while pain is purposeful.

Suffering grows us –

As a physical fitness enthusiast, I’m well educated on what it takes to improve strength and conditioning in my personal health. It takes pain. I remember learning in 6^th grade biology about the body’s desire to maintain homeostasis, which essentially describes how the body wants to maintain balance and regularity in its processes. In simpler terms, the body wants to stay in its comfort zone. If you don’t push your body out of these comfort levels when you exercise, you will not become any stronger than when you began. These are perfect spiritual illustrations. No one likes to endure pain. Trials are difficult. But the Bible tells us we ought to look at them in this way – James 1:2-4 “² Count it all joy, my brothers, when you meet trials of various kinds, ³ for you know that the testing of your faith produces steadfastness. ⁴ And let steadfastness have its full effect, that you may be perfect and complete, lacking in nothing. ESV

The Greek word translated as steadfastness or patience (depending on your English translation) is ὑπομονή hypomonḗ and it means endurance, constancy, and patient continuance. These are characteristics essential to mature Christian living, but they don’t become part of us without any experience of trial. You can’t tell whether a person is patient until you observe them having to wait, and a person is not patient until they’ve been made to wait and learned to do so without becoming frustrated. Faith grows through tests of trust. Love grows through wounds from enemies. Without these opportunities to prove these qualities, we would never be more than what we are before we endured them.

There is reward for suffering –

Matthew 5:11-12

¹¹ “Blessed are you when others revile you and persecute you and utter all kinds of evil against you falsely on my account. ¹² Rejoice and be glad, for your reward is great in heaven, for so they persecuted the prophets who were before you.” ESV

God promises that the suffering we endure for his sake does not go unnoticed. The sacrifices we make, the wounds we receive, the hardships we endure will each have their own reward when we have finished the race God has set before us.

Suffering prepares us to comfort others –

My wife and I have been trying to have more children, but her last two pregnancies have ended in miscarriage. We have received comfort from people who have passed through the same experience, and we in turn have been made ready to encourage others who experience this type of grief. I just received word of a little boy around the age of 2 who died of cancer. We had been praying for him to recover and for his family. We know what it’s like to watch a child die of cancer. We lost a son in our ministry named Reagan to a long fight with cancer in 2018. We know the heartache, we know the pain, we know the long hours of prayer and efforts to comfort the suffering person’s pain. But most importantly, we know the hope of our eventual reunion with Reagan when we reach heaven as well, because as he trusted Christ as savior, so do we. Paul speaks about this use of suffering in 2 Corinthians 1:3-7

³ “Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of mercies and God of all comfort, ⁴ who comforts us in all our affliction, so that we may be able to comfort those who are in any affliction, with the comfort with which we ourselves are comforted by God. ⁵ For as we share abundantly in Christ’s sufferings, so through Christ we share abundantly in comfort too. ⁶ If we are afflicted, it is for your comfort and salvation; and if we are comforted, it is for your comfort, which you experience when you patiently endure the same sufferings that we suffer. ⁷ Our hope for you is unshaken, for we know that as you share in our sufferings, you will also share in our comfort.” ESV

God always brings comfort with suffering. There is always a brother or sister who comes alongside and shares the pain, speaks a word to stir you back to life, while the Holy Spirit gives you grace to keep going. Without suffering, you would never experience this grace.

Suffering is the only way to truly know Jesus –

⁸”Indeed, I count everything as loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord. For his sake I have suffered the loss of all things and count them as rubbish, in order that I may gain Christ ⁹ and be found in him, not having a righteousness of my own that comes from the law, but that which comes through faith in Christ, the righteousness from God that depends on faith— ¹⁰ that I may know him and the power of his resurrection, and may share his sufferings, becoming like him in his death, ¹¹ that by any means possible I may attain the resurrection from the dead.” ESV

“Don’t judge a man until you’ve walked a mile in his shoes.” You can’t fully appreciate a person until you’ve passed through similar experiences that they have. The Apostle Paul had a consuming desire to know Jesus and be like him. He wanted not just to experience the benefits and joy of salvation, but to experience the price it cost to obtain those things for us. Jesus endured that cost alone. He suffered when others forsook him and fled. He lived a life of sacrifice. Until we engage in the same conflict he had, we won’t know true depths in worship, power, love, or faith. Only suffering brings this deeper intimacy. Without it, we might even find we doubt whether we belong to God’s family at all. As the old hymn goes –

”Shall I be carried to the skies on flowery beds of ease?
While others fought to win the prize and sailed through bloody seas?”