Just one more week of classes, and then four days of exams. I think that if I can just get through this week, then I will be fine, and exams should be a cinch! I am so excited to come home and to see everyone!
On Monday of this week, as I was walking back to Mayfield after lunch, I began to notice how everyone's arms move when they walk. It's not a movement that they do voluntarily, but involuntarily. It just comes naturally. Another thing that I noticed was that whatever leg goes forward the opposite arm goes forward as well. I was just so mesmerized and amazed at this metronome-like motion. Our Creator is amazing!
I am in the process of writing a paper about suffering, so here is some of what I have written so far. Let me know what you think!
There is always one question in particular that comes up when people talk about why one’s mother is dying of cancer, even though she goes to church every Sunday and has been a “good” person all of her life. It is the same question that people ask when one’s daughter dies way before her proper time—because a drunk driver ran a red light. It is the question that Elie Wiesel dealt with while he was in concentration camps during the Holocaust. The age-old, difficult, mind-boggling question is: How are people supposed to reconcile a kind, loving, and just God with the suffering that is seen in the world? I myself have wrestled with this question time and time again. I have come up with different ways to answer the question, but, ultimately, I do not believe humans can ever know the full answer.
First of all, what is a Christian view of suffering? What does the Bible have to say about it? When God created the world and everything in it, nothing was wrong with it at first. It was perfect. After God created something, “[He] saw that it was good” (Genesis 1:9). If Adam and Eve had never sinned, then there would be no suffering in the world today. However, Adam and Eve disobeyed God and chose to eat the fruit from the tree that God commanded them not to eat from. Because of this, everything in creation fell. Beginning with Adam and Eve, humans began to have a sinful nature. Every human that has been born since then has had one. Future humans who are born will have one. When sin came into the world, so did suffering.
Fortunately, there is a third part to human history, known as redemption. This is when God sent His only son Jesus Christ to die on the cross for the sins of the world (people in the past, present, and future) because He wanted to have a deep, intimate relationship with them. When Jesus did this, He opened the way for people to know Him and to be filled with the Holy Spirit, the third person of the Trinity. Thus, people who want to have a relationship with Christ are filled with the Holy Spirit, but they also have the sinful nature that they had ever since they were conceived. These two natures are at “war” with each other. Paul describes quite well this battle within him:
I find this law at work: When I want to do good, evil is right there with me. For in my inner being I delight in God’s law; but I see another law at work in the members of my body, waging war against the law of my mind and making me a prisoner of the law of sin at work within my members (Romans 7:21-23).
Thus, even if someone has the Holy Spirit inside of them, that person can still do evil acts. That is why someone can read his Bible one minute and then lash out at his little sister in anger the next. It is also why some people choose to fill themselves with alcohol, which causes them to have a slower reaction time to stimuli, like red traffic lights.
The rest of creation—our physical bodies and the physical world—is still under the curse of sin as well. This is why humans contract illnesses. It is also why tornadoes, hurricanes, and other weather elements often destroy human life. Thus, the only thing that was restored when Christ died on the cross was mankind’s relationship with Him. Everything else has to wait to be made whole until God makes a new heaven and a new earth.
It is simple to explain the origin of suffering—it all comes down to the fact that sin entered the world when Adam and Eve disobeyed God. However, still humans ask the question, “Why?” Why did my child have to be born with spina bifida? Why did my infant die in his crib? Why do I have terminal cancer? The intellectual answer does not satisfy these questions. Instead, people want to know how a loving, kind God could “let suffering happen.” Some answer this question by declaring that all suffering comes from the devil, over whom God has no control. However, this denies the Sovereignty of God. God is Sovereign over everything that happens. He is omniscient, omnipresent, and all-powerful. If He was anything less, then He would not be God. Luke 1:37 says, “For nothing is impossible with God.” Rather, a more probably explanation of how God’s Sovereignty and suffering go together is this: God allows suffering to happen. The key word is allows. Often times, it is the devil that wants to afflict people. This is seen in the case of Job. The satan came to God one day and said,
Does Job fear God for nothing? Have you not put a hedge around him and his household and everything he has? You have blessed the work of his hands, so that his flocks and herds are spread throughout the land. But stretch out your hand and strike everything he has, and he will surely curse you to your face (Job 1:9-11).
God then allowed the satan to do what he wanted to do, for it says, “The Lord said to Satan, ‘Very well, then, everything he has is in your hands, but on the man himself do not lay a finger.’ (Job 1:12).
Since humans are made in God’s image, they have an idea of what is right and what is wrong. When they see a good woman suffering from the abuse of an alcoholic husband, they sympathize with her and have a twinge of the “this isn’t right” feeling. This is the justice of God being manifested in them. However, these people get angry and upset at the wrong thing. Instead, of getting upset at God over the suffering that is happening, they should feel sorrowful for the sin that was committed. The woman may not have done anything blatantly “wrong,” but her abusive husband has. He has chosen to please the desires of his sinful nature by over-indulging himself in alcohol instead of pleasing of God.
Yet, some may bring up the issue of natural disasters. When natural disasters happen, is it because all of the people in the town are horribly sinful? I think not. Rather, natural disasters serve to remind people of the first sin that Adam and Eve committed. It causes people to reflect on the frail state of humanity and realize their own need for God. This can be said not only of suffering caused by natural disasters, but also of any other type of suffering.
An important point must now be addressed: Some people think that God punishes people for their sin. It is quite understandable why they believe this, for Hebrews 12:5-6 says, “My son, do not make light of the Lord’s discipline, and do not lose heart when he rebukes you, because the Lord disciplines those he loves, and he punishes everyone he accepts as a son.” However, I do not believe that this verse intends to teach us that God is a punishing God. He is not sitting in heaven on His throne waiting for us to sin so that He can wag His finger at us and say, “Now, now, you know you aren’t supposed to do that. That will be five years of cancer for you.” Instead, the verse talks about holiness, rather than specific sins, for it is holiness that God is concerned with. It talks more about the process of being transformed into God’s image, rather than being disciplined for any specific sin. In a person’s heart, there may be selfishness present, which causes someone to steal what belongs to others and to speak harsh words to his mother. God is not worried about punishing the person for stealing, and He is not worried about punishing him for speaking harsh words to his mother. These are just manifestations of what is in his heart, which is what God actually cares about. Thus, bit by bit, God soon works in the man’s life to weed out of his heart the selfishness that he has. In other words, God does not punish; rather, He sanctifies.
Even with all of this head knowledge about suffering, it is still quite difficult to understand it from the heart, especially while one is facing it. However, one can be assured that God has a perfect plan and that He does everything for His glory, including the allowance of suffering. Just consider the cross: Jesus endured great suffering and death, and, as a result, God has been glorified by it. Many people now confess Jesus as Lord and Savior. Isaiah 48:11 says, “For my own sake, for my own sake, I do this. How can I let myself be defamed? I will not yield my glory to another.” It may be difficult to understand, but God is somehow glorified through suffering.
Have a blessed week!
P.S. Please pray that I will find a job for this summer.
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