People ask the ancient question, “Why does God allow good people to suffer?” Atheists blame God for the suffering of the “innocent” and “good” people. Job’s “friends” blamed innocent Job for his suffering, saying he was a bad man who was justly punished. Theologians say, “No one is good, so we brought on our own suffering.” We know our sin nature brings pain and suffering, even when we do not directly deserve our suffering.
We also know suffering purifies us, like a refining fire. The more we suffer, the closer we can grow to God, if we let ourselves surrender to him (Isaiah 48:10 “I have refined you, but not with silver; I have chosen you in the furnace of affliction,” and 1Peter1:7 “That the trial of your faith, being much more precious than gold that perishes, though it be tried with fire, might be found unto praise and honor and glory at the appearing of Jesus Christ.”)
To my surprise, and through a mom and baby story, I discovered another reason God allows “good” people to suffer. As a woman’s baby grew, her fingers learned to grasp. She used her fingers to grip her mom’s hair and pull it. The mom grimaced and disentangled her hair from her baby’s weak, tiny grasp. The mom would say, “Ouch, stop that. That hurts.”
But this kept happening, and the mom assumed the baby did not understand what she was doing. As time drew by the mom realized her baby was developing some mental understanding. So the mom grabbed a tiny handful of the baby’s downy hair, and the mom lightly pulled, not enough to cause damage but enough to cause mild pain. The baby gasped and the mom let go of her baby’s hair and then pointed to her (the mom’s) own hair. She said, “Pull Mommy’s hair and hurt like you,” and she pointed to her baby’s hair.
The mom was right. Her daughter understood she was causing her mom pain, because of the pain her own scalp felt (though much less harsh than what the baby had done to her mom). The daughter never pulled her mom’s hair again.
I am sure atheists would hate this comparison, but honest Christians know we are infested with the sin nature. We are innately selfish. We hurt others (more often in word, though sometimes in deed) and we don’t see the bad impact we have on them. Or we think something another person suffers is not a big deal. We think they should toughen up and not cry or express pain. We think our lives are as hard as anyone else’s. So the Lord allows us to suffer. And how we sometimes suffer. We suffer emotional loss, financial loss, and more. We lose our sense of safety. We experience trauma, tragedy and pain we could not have imagined. Suddenly we feel the pain of others. We realize how hard their lives must be. Suddenly we have a compassion for them we could never have had, if we had not suffered like they did.
And God is not doing this to be cruel. We are the cruel ones. Our hearts are hard. They need to be softened. God told the Israelites they needed their hearts circumcised (Deut. 30:6 “the Lord your God will circumcise your heart and the heart of your descendants to love the Lord your God with all your heart and all your soul so you may live.”) He also told them they needed to replace hearts of stone for hearts of flesh (Ezek. 36:26). We have hard hearts which do not naturally grieve with others, at least not to the extent God wants us to grieve and sympathize.
That baby kept hurting her mom until the mom hurt the baby back, though not nearly as harshly. Some say this mother was wrong, but the baby, herself, proved the mother was right. Never, when the mom said, “Ouch,” or “Stop,” did the baby comprehend until she suffered the very pain she was inflicting on her mom. We do not understand the pain we inflict on our Lord until he allows us to suffer. We will never suffer the depth of pain we caused the Lord. He was fully innocent (more pure than the most pure baby), yet carried the horror of our sins. He had full communion with the father, yet he allowed himself to feel God’s wrath and then a separation from the father, for our sins. The small amount of suffering we feel never compares to what our Lord suffered for us. Yet it gives us a glimpse and helps us to better appreciate what we did to hurt him and gives us a greater spirit of thanks for what he did for us.
And our suffering helps us to better sympathize with others. Once we suffer deeply, we also grieve with others more deeply. We are more spurred to act on their behalf, whether to serve them, defend them, teach them or in other ways, come along side them.
I am the first to say my sin nature hates suffering. My lazy side hates suffering. Yet I am so thankful for the ways God has broken my ugly sin nature in my suffering, because I love people better today than I did when I knew less pain. I can help others more, understand them more and respect them better.
Atheists hate this reason, yet even they have to admit that those who suffered the most and used their suffering to help others are the most humble and effective in their ministry. Atheists may hate our words of truth, yet they crave our spirit of giving and compassion. Even the angry people need our love. They may not listen to our words, that we need to suffer, but they appreciate the fruit of a surrendered life that grows sweeter (not bitter) after suffering and then gives to others.
God is pleased with us too. He loved us when we were yet sinners (Rom. 5:8), but he is more pleased with us when we serve him from the depths of our hearts. You don’t need to ask God to bring you pain. It will come in this life. But ask God to use the pain you have experienced or will experienced to honor Him more and to better love, serve and understand others. The suffering is worth all the pain. I pray I have blessed you today with our post, and you will come back for more posts. We love you!