Don't be surprised by suffering

If God is good, why does He allow evil (pain and suffering)? This is the age-old question and the reason many give for why they don't trust God.

But could it be that God allows and seeks to use our pain to humble us so ¹we might see that life can not and does not work without Him? Could the reason for pain and suffering be this simple and come with such loving intentions?

What most do not consider is pain and suffering are the eventual outcomes and natural consequences of ²arrogant independence i.e. the belief that ¹we can make life work without acknowledging the Creator of it; that we can extract what we need from creation that which we long for most.

But pain can also become the ³means by which God humbles us, if we let it. Evil itself is bad but humility and whatever is needed to humble ¹us and draw us closer to God is good, not bad (though often unpleasant). A seeming contradiction?

Our inability to find true and lasting life and love outside of God - a very painful and humbling realization - can direct us back to Him. But only if we turn from our arrogant and stubborn belief that we can obtain these without Him. If we persist in our unbelief, the painful consequences of this rebellious distrust of God - i.e. the evil and harm it brings on us and others - are not His fault, but our choice. 

We rarely grasp the far-reaching significance or impact of our rebellious distrust of God - i.e. how harmful and destructive it truly is to ourselves and others - until we experience the pain this distrust causes. And even then, we rarely recognize the true reason we experience it. 

The fact that we are surprised, put off, offended or upset with God by pain and suffering (evil) is proof of how little we understand the far-reaching impact and severe consequences of our distrust of God.

The suffering caused by evil should not surprise us. It is the natural outcome of believing we can make life work without God when all the pain it causes tells us otherwise. 

Believing we can make life work without God is a lie. Life only works as God intends when we are in perfect alignment and union with God our Creator - the source of life, love, and all things - in whose image we were created. If we truly understood how essential He is, we would not be surprised at all by the pain ¹we experience by not being aligned and in tune with the very Source of life.

We all have the capacity to see far more than we now see about God, ourselves, and life (such as how much pain and suffering our unbelief causes). The only thing blocking us from seeing more clearly is our lack of humility - refusing to acknowledge our need for and dependence on God for all we have and are. 

For a further discussion of how God uses evil for our good click here...and here.

The greater the evil the greater the opportunity for healing/grace click here.

For a discussion on the key lesson from the book of Job, click here.

For a discussion on the value of paradox, click here.

For a discussion of how big God is click here

For a discussion on the necessity of humility, click here.

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Footnotes:

¹I'm not saying that our individual pain and suffering is necessarily because of anything specific we haven't or have done. I'm referring to the pain and suffering the world experiences in general. Certainly, there often are negative consequences for our individual poor choices, but humanity in general suffers from being in a broken world because of the world's collective rebellion toward God. And even if our suffering is a direct result of individual poor choices, the remedy is not guilt and shame but humility i.e. increased recognition of our dependence on God. That we can't get from life what we ultimately need apart from Him. 

There is no condemnation for those who are in Christ. All things work for the good of those who love God. 

 

²Even suicide is an act of arrogant distrust of God. Someone ends their life because they believe it is not worth living. Yet they don't consider the foundational reason they are in despair is the absence of God i.e. their lack of trust in God and His wisdom and love in allowing pain (the organic and rightful consequences of unbelief) to continue.

³God is so wise, powerful, and good, that he even uses evil for good - even though evil is still bad. Only He can. But we will never see or understand this if we do not trust Him. 

"Oh, the depth of the riches and wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable are his judgments and how inscrutable his ways! 

“For who has known the mind of the Lord, or who has been his counselor?” “Or who has given a gift to him that he might be repaid?” For from him and through him and to him are all things. To him be glory forever. Amen." Rom.11.33-36

For a more in-depth look at Rom 11:33-36, click here.