Suffering... has God abandon us?

[5] Thus says the Lord: 

“Cursed is the man who trusts in man and makes flesh his strength, whose heart turns away from the Lord. (i.e. "...who by their ⁴unrighteousness suppresses the truth..." - Rom 1:18) 

[6] He is like a shrub in the desert, and shall not see any good come. He shall dwell in the parched places of the wilderness, in an uninhabited salt land. 

[7] “Blessed is the man who trusts in the Lord, whose trust is the Lord. 

[8]  He is like a tree planted by water, that sends out its roots by the stream, and does not fear when heat comes, for its leaves remain green, and is not anxious in the year of drought, for it does not cease to bear fruit.” 

[9] The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately sick; who can understand it? - Jer 17:5-9 ESV 

Why do pain and suffering remain? 

Pain and suffering is the natural (organic) result of our ongoing disconnect from God. 

Our disconnect is due to our ongoing distrust of Him. 

God does not curse us. Our disconnect is our curse.

Pain reveals and exposes the depth of our rebellious distrust of God. It is the fruit of that distrust. 

Why does suffering remain? So we might see the need to have our distrust of God purged from our hearts and lives. 

Why? So we might turn back to God and find true life in Him and more fully partake of His love as He designed us to. 

We come into this world in a state of rebellious distrust and absent our original connection/union with ¹God we were designed for. God seeks to restore this connection so we might be in relationship with Him again.

God is love and therefore life itself - and we are in His image, i.e., created to receive and give love. His absence - due to our rebellious distrust - creates an emptiness we desperately seek to fill. We seek to fill it with anything other than Him who alone can fill us. We look to anything we have access to or can "get our hands on" to fill the void of God's absence. In short, we trust in ourselves to fill the void instead of God  - "...we make flesh our strength..." 

Pain is such a common part of life that we rarely consider it exists because of ²God's absence, much less because of our rebellious distrust of Him. So we slog along in our current rebellion in painful emptiness to try and make the best of things. 

We rarely consider how deeply we distrust God and how this impacts everything we do. ³We refuse to see that we - and everything else - depends on God our Creator for our very breath and existence. Suggesting this is our true condition is mocked and ridiculed. Accepting this is fiercely resisted and denied individually and collectively. 

Occasionally, our pain and suffering become so acute and our ability to handle it so inadequate that we see and finally acknowledge our true condition and turn back to Him in total trust. 

Life is an ongoing journey through the wilderness of this broken world to test whether we will continue to choose rebellious independence from God - as Adam and Eve did - or unconditional trust in God - as Christ displayed while on earth. 

Does suffering mean that God has abandoned us? Quite the opposite.

Suffering exists so that we might recognize we are not created to be our own God and return to Him—who is Love itself and the Source of love, life, and all things. Our struggles are the means by which we grow deep roots into Him. 

Every time we experience the loss of something we look to for life - whether that be wealth, fame, natural gifts or talents, our health, recreation, substance abuse, a loved one etc. - it's an opportunity for us to turn to Him who alone IS life. 

Christ asked what do we profit if we gain the whole world and loose our very souls. But the opposite is also true. If losing the world results in gaining our souls we profit infinitely. 

He sent Christ as proof of His desire to pour out His love on you. He did for you what you can not do - trust God without conditions - and offers to credit you with His righteousness. Will you trust Him?

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FOOTNOTES: 

¹in whose  image we were created 

²if we acknowledge God at all, it is to blame Him for our pain instead of acknowledging our rebellious distrust, which results in His absence. 

³I'm referring to our objective dependence, not a conscious (subjective) dependence. Everything that exists is because God brought it into existence. This is the objective reality of our world and our existence. Our subjective denial of this is our problem. 

⁴God does not curse us. Our rebellious distrust of him does. 

What is unrighteousness: ἀδικίᾳ (adikia)? - sometimes translated as wickedness. Where does it come from? It is the outward fruit of our inward rebellious distrust of God that results in... 

wickedness 

Strong's 93: 

Injustice, unrighteousness, hurt. 

From adikos; injustice; morally, wrongfulness.

There are two elements to unrighteousness. The outward manifestation - our conduct - of an inward disposition of distrust. One is the result of the other. 

All "sinful" conduct - no matter what outward *form it takes - springs forth  from distrust in God. Distrust is the energy, passion, and desire behind bad actions. At the heart of sinful behavior is distrust - unbelief i.e. distrust of God - unbelief - is the essence of all sinful behavior. 

*they are "...works of the flesh..."

Galatians 5:19-21 ESV

19 Now the works of the flesh are evident: 

sexual immorality, impurity, sensuality, 20 idolatry, sorcery, enmity, strife, jealousy, fits of anger, rivalries, dissensions, divisions, 21 envy, drunkenness, orgies, and things like these. 

I warn you, as I warned you before, that those who do such things will not inherit the kingdom of God. 

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