The Theology Of Suffering-God's Purpose in Pain-Part Two

"God has appointed who shall suffer. Suffering comes not by chance, or by the will of man, but by the will and appointment of God."
-John Bunyan, quoted in The Hidden Smile of God, by John Piper.

"God permits what He hates to accomplish that which He loves."

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Oft times it happens suddenly; the phone call in the middle of the night, the truck crossing the median, the dive into shallow water. Immediately you are thrust into a difficult period of life, a season of struggle, a short or long period of trial.

Somewhere along the way, I got the idea that life should be easy. Difficult experiences were the rarity, the intruders, and the abnormal freakish events. Historically and biblically I’ve had it all backward.

In thirty years, I’d never had a call from my friends’ mother, then, one night it came, “John didn’t want me to call until he was certain he’d live…” In short, a truck had crossed over the median and straight into his car, all family inside. John had to be extricated from the car with the “jaws of life.” All four of limbs shattered, both eyes blinded by battery acid. His wife suffered spinal injuries, one child a small concussion, the other fine. Three years later John has made great progress, but struggles daily with the damage done to him in the accident.

One of the best-known, present day stories of struggle is that of Joni Eareckson Tada, who, “26 years ago, was lying on a hospital bed in suicidal despair, depressed, discouraged, after the hot July afternoon when I took that dive into shallow water, a dive which resulted in a severe spinal cord injury, which left me paralyzed from the shoulders down, without use of my hands and my legs.”

Since God is for us, and since,
“All the inhabitants of the earth are accounted as nothing, But He does according to His will in the host of heaven” ---Why trials? Like the climber with his piton (a piton acts as an anchor to protect the climber against the consequences of a fall), I need fixed concepts for my mind to hold onto. So I wrestle with trials, to grasp their purpose, to gain solid hold in a slippery chasm.

Joni lays out three key reasons for trials in our lives.

1) They are like a sheepdog leading us to God. Nobody is naturally drawn to the cross.

2) People suffering great conflict always have something to say to those who are handling lesser conflict. As Paul says in Corinthians, “Blessed be the Father of mercies and God of all comfort who comforts us in all our affliction so that we will be able to comfort …with the comfort with which we ourselves are comforted by God.”

3) They increase our capacity for God.

As I wrestle with the ‘why’ and ‘how’ of each difficulty that comes across my path, the pitons holding me up are rooted not in the possible answers to the why questions, but in the ultimate purpose of a God that has love, mercy and goodness as key components of His character.

Make time to watch or listen to the video, because, as Joni shows, “People with disability are gods’ best audio-visual aids to how we should handle trials.”

Pondering God's Purpose in Pain-Part 1

"It is better to go to a house of mourning than to go to a house of feasting, for death is the destiny of every man; the living should take this to heart."

This post comes out of my recent readings and experiences, coupled with the events of my mom's quick slide into death last week. If you've been alive for any length of time, you've wrestled with this question, posed by my sister. "When a dog is near death, we give it a pink fluid to drink, which kills it quickly. Shouldn't we be able to do that now?"

Seems a reasonable question, by human standards. My mom was weak with no chance for recovery; quickly her breathing grew strained, and the agony was apparent. My purpose here isn't to discuss morality or slippery slopes. My purpose is to think through this whole issue, in light of my mom's recent death, and my own inevitable mortality.

So, how does our finite, narrow perspective possibly square with the perspective of an eternal God that holds the entire universe-Earth, Milky Way and all-in the palm of His hand?

In light of the initial quote from Ecclesiastes, one purpose is to force us to come face to face with the fact that we all will die. I will die. You will die. Not likely to escape it. As my mom went from hospital, to nursing facility, to hospice, I thought through how I would respond. I even told my daughter that I wanted a room that has a window that you could look out of; and I'd want access to a laptop. Watching others struggle through sickness and death forces us to confront them head on.

In my own experience, pain and prolonged suffering force me to cry out to God, in hope for a time, or place where I am free of them. Ultimately, it is a cry for salvation, for God to deliver, and even, to bring us to the satisfaction of our hope-eternity in Heaven, in Christ's glorious presence.

Finally, one would hope that pain would be a window to cry out on behalf, not only of ourself, but for others who also are in pain. Potentially, it can bring us into a broad place where we pray for others who are themselves in hardship, brokeness and pain.

In the final analysis then, I understand the longing for the Pink Drink. Our momentary pain and longing however, "is producing for us an eternal weight of glory far beyond all comparison, while we look not at the things which are seen, but at the things which are not seen; for the things which are seen are temporal, but the things which are not seen are eternal."