"GOD AND HUMAN SUFFERING"


Have you heard the question, "If God is all-loving and all-powerful, why would God allow suffering at all?" One famous author, who suffered through his own son's death, has concluded that God is all-loving, but not necessarily all-powerful. Knowing his pain, I see his dilemma. But as a Christian, an all-loving but not all-powerful God is a departure from Biblical faith. If God was not all-powerful that would make Him a liar for He has declared to us that power.

The incarnation and the cross open up alternatives to the supposition that the only possible response by an all-powerful and all-loving God, to suffering, must be to prevent it. God came among us and suffered with us through Jesus Christ, entering fully and deeply into our human situation. "Seeing then that we have a great High Priest who has passed through the heavens, Jesus the Son of God, let us hold fast our confession. For we do not have a High Priest who cannot sympathize with our weaknesses, but was in all points tempted as we are, yet without sin." (Hebrews 4:14-15) Our Lord understands every suffering of the human life.

The cross of Jesus represents more to us and symbolizes more than most of us will ever live long enough to fully comprehend.

A wise teacher once said, "If God had designed this world to bring about perfect happiness and total joy, we would have to conclude that he had failed miserably. But what if God's purpose in creating the world the way it is was to cause us to seek God, to rely upon God, to be thrust upon God by our need? In that case, we would have to conclude that this world was perfectly made to do just that." Paul told the Greek philosophers in Athens that God made them in the manner in which He did in order that "they should seek the Lord, in the hope that they might grope for Him and find Him, though He is not far from each one of us…" (Acts 17:27)

I trust in a gracious and powerful God who works through the power of suffering love.

In Christian Love,        



 

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