Shouting In Our Suffering.

In the narrative of Jesus’ birth {Matt. 1 and Lk. 2}, we see the story of One who was born to suffer, born to suffer on our behalf, in fact, One whose Life would be coloured by ridicule and rejection {Isa. 52:13-53:12}.  “For the Son of Man came to seek and to save what was lost” {Lk. 19:10}... and lost beyond lost is exactly what we are without Him.

Apart from Jesus we have no comprehension of why suffering even exists, we misinterpret the phenomenal acts of evil taking place in our world, and we doubt  {oh how we doubt, question and dismiss} the goodness of our Father’s heart.  Christian author and Oxford professor C.S. Lewis once said, “God whispers to us in our pleasures, speaks to us in our conscience, but shouts in our pain.  It is His megaphone to rouse a deaf world.”  I want to ask you a crucial question; I want you to think about it, then answer.  Did Lewis say, “God is the cause of all pain”… or that “God is the source of all suffering”?  No, he didn’t; he didn’t even hint at it.  Nor does he anywhere else in his vast library of writings infused with his Christian beliefs.  What he said was God uses pain “to rouse a deaf,” dying, and sin-darkened “world.”  I.e., regardless of the source, no matter where the suffering originated itself, God can use it for our good and His glory— to rouse the rebellious, to awaken the willful, to shake the angry and apathetic to the core of their souls.

Suffering is a tremendous tool, when wielded by the hand of the Master.  And it does unbelievable damage when we embrace it as something to make us bitter and not better.  The key to understanding a painful path, and to reaping the full harvest in situations of suffering, is the willingness to trust in two hopes, two absolute assurances.  That [1] there is an enormous lesson to learn right here in the midst of it {one that more often has to do with the internals of our souls than the externals of our situation}; and [2] there is a beautiful life to be lived beyond it.

Suffering is not meant to last forever.  Suffering, pain, and sorrow, by their very nature— as results of the Fall and related to futility… the “futility” of Creation in its present state {Rom. 8:19-22}— cannot go on endlessly.  And that is a declaration of hope.  You, my friend, are meant to live with confident expectation of the perfect world to come {and the freedom you will find there}, in courageous anticipation of the beauty, the intimacy, and the Adventure of that glorious Life with God on the Other Side.


Ric Webb

Shepherd
Heart's Journey Community

www.hjcommunity.org