Suffering Revisited

SUFFERING

If you read through the Bible with the concept of suffering in mind, you will notice that suffering is everywhere from Genesis 3 to Revelation 20. The message of the Bible is given to us in the context of suffering. Both its commands and its promises are spoken in the context of suffering. It explains when suffering originated and why suffering is here. And this on-going context of suffering is where God bids us believe in him, to trust him.

God is not untouched by our suffering. He is not immune from pain. He feels our grief. He agonizes with us in our agony. He weeps with those who weep. His heart of compassion goes out to those who are suffering. He intervenes to limit or reverse individual suffering. Jesus, the Son of God, showed us that.

But he also showed us something else. When Jesus, the eternal Son of God, came to earth as one of us, he actually experienced our suffering. He is called ‘a man of sorrows, and familiar with suffering’.

He knows what it feels like to be despised and rejected.
He knows what it feels like to be oppressed and afflicted.
He knows what it feels like to be accused and condemned.
He knows what it feels like to be tired and hungry and poor.
He knows what it feels like to be homeless.
He knows what it feels like to be hurt by the people he loves.

And, over and above all of this, he knows what it feels like to be rejected by God. So great is his compassion for us, so great is his love for us, that even while we were his enemies, even when we were sinners, he put himself in our place. He himself bore the full judgement of God deserved by us. All of our sin and guilt, and all of God’s wrath, condemnation and punishment, was laid upon him. So that we, who believe in him, are set free forever from sin, guilt and condemnation.

Yes. God knows what it feels like to suffer.

Jesus also showed us that God has the power and authority to end human suffering. His miracles were a micro demonstration of that, and assure us that God could at any time, break into human history and end the suffering. And one day he will. That is his promise. What holds him back? Why does he not stop the suffering now?

Only because of his grace.

Because of his great mercy and grace, he delays that day, because that day is also the day of the final judgement, beyond which there is no salvation. God delays ending the suffering because he is giving us time to repent and believe in him. In his great patience and love he lets us live on in this suffering world, allowing himself to be maligned as powerless and unloving, because he wants us also to be saved.

Beyond the suffering, after the day of judgement, after everything that entered the world in Genesis 3 is terminated, all things will be made new. No more death. No more pain. No more crying. No more sin.

Only immeasurable joy. Only indescribable glory. God and humans together, forever. At peace.

These studies expand and replace the previous studies on Suffering.