Suffering

I started reading "Inside Out" by Larry Crabb. As I was reading the introduction, I was struck by how the author was suggesting that the answer to suffering is not "get more Christ" or "Know that my grace is sufficient for you"...but rather to look at the suffering for what it is, painful.

The experience of groaning is precisely what modern Christianity so often helps us try to escape...In those moments, retreat into denial does not seem cowardly, it seems necessary and smart. Just keep going, get your act together, stop feeling sorry for yourself, renew your commitment to trust God, get more serious about obedience. Things really aren't as bad as you sense they are. You've simply lost your perspective and must regain it through more time in the Word and increased moral effort.

Perhaps it is our nature to want to avoid suffering at all costs. But as I go through these trials of life, as I struggle to make it day by day, as the pain forces me to ponder what I believe and why, I've found that the answer is not to deny the suffering, but rather to embrace it.

Now that's not to say that we should be martyrs, crying out "Oh woe is me!", but neither should we try to ignore the pain, or pretend it doesn't exist. To often in my struggles I've turned to Christians who suggest that either I do not put enough faith in God (because after all, His grace is sufficient, right?) or that my suffering is the result of my not letting go of a problem (turn it over to God, quit beating yourself up, etc.) Job had that very experience with his friends, who suggested that his suffering was the result of a hidden sin he needed to confess. Instead, we learned that God was simply using the trails to demonstrate Job's faithfulness to Satan (and since it's now recorded, to us as well).

And what of Job's suffering? Most of the book is the debate amongst the friends. Job did not pretend his suffering didn't exist. He did not try to find "more God". After all, he proclaims that his suffering is the direct result of God, not for malicious reasons, but for reasons unknown to him. Rather he just wanted to know why. A pretty human, if not flawed, response. And perhaps in knowing why, we seek not to justify, but to endure patiently. If I'm torn between A & B, and I have no idea which direction to wait, knowing which one is to come will help me wait more patiently. It does not diminish my faith or trust in the LORD, but rather strengthens it, and comforts me as I patiently endure heartache.

Yet often we don't know whether it's A or B. Sometimes the situation seems hopeless, yet something deep inside us carries on hope. We long for B, when reality suggests A is the only outcome. Do we then give up on B? By no means! For that very struggle, that very conflict is what leads to joy and hope! The only time God has told someone to stop praying for something, it was by special divine revelation. Most of the time, God never answers us that way. In fact, we are commended by the LORD himself to continue to pray (parable of the persistent widow). Granted, we may never get B. Yet there is a hope and a trust there in the sovereignty of God, of his power to overcome the forgone conclusion of A and make B a reality. So when we suffer, when we struggle the answer is not to say "give up on B and rest in A, because God's grace is sufficient", but rather to encourage one another, point out that because we still pray for B, that we recognize that God is sovereign, that God can work it out, and that we are demonstrating faith rather than opposing it.

After all, in Job's pleas, he recognized that his fate was in the hands of God. And in many ways, that's all God wants us to realize.