Why Suffering God? Why? – Part 2

In part 1 we began to explore the topic of suffering and we saw that the Bible is clear that in this earthly life we are not going to understand God’s ways. “How unsearchable are his judgments and how inscrutable his ways!” states the Apostle Paul in the Book of Romans. Yet we also know that God desires to have a personal relationship with us and through the scriptures we can know Him and can learn much about Him and His ways. I think it is of vital importance that we take hold of God’s Word and extract every nugget of gold within the goldmine of revelation we call the Bible.  Again I implore each and every one of you to open the Bible and personally seek His Word but as a start from this writing I pray these thoughts will encourage you to want to know Him even more.

What can we know about God?

First of all we can know He is eternal as we read in Revelation 1:8, "I am the Alpha and the Omega," says the Lord God, "who is and who was and who is to come, the Almighty."

We can also know that He never changes. God declares this Himself in Malachi 3:6 saying, "For I, the LORD, do not change; therefore you, O sons of Jacob, are not consumed.”  James 1:17 expands on this reminding us that “Every good thing given and every perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of lights, with whom there is no variation or shifting shadow.”

That God is eternal and that even in eternity He does not change is good news and helps us to deal with suffering even when we do not understand why. Before we can even begin to explore the why, we must first learn more about our wonderful God.

God is also true which means He can be trusted. God is not capable of lying. Unlike all men who are liars, God keeps His word. Let’s look at a few scriptures that verify this.

Numbers 23:19
 "God is not a man, that He should lie, Nor a son of man, that He should repent; Has He said, and will He not do it? Or has He spoken, and will He not make it good?

Romans 3:3-4
 What then? If some did not believe, their unbelief will not nullify the faithfulness of God, will it?  May it never be! Rather, let God be found true, though every man be found a liar, as it is written…”

Titus 1:2
“…in the hope of eternal life, which God, who cannot lie…”

What this means is that God can be trusted. When God speaks, we can believe Him.

Another important attribute to grasp about God is that He is holy. Again lets view some scriptures.

Leviticus 11:44
“For I am the LORD your God. Consecrate yourselves therefore, and be holy, for I am holy.”

Isaiah 57:15
“For thus says the high and exalted One Who lives forever, whose name is Holy, "I dwell on a high and holy place…”

Psalm 11:7
 For the LORD is righteous, He loves righteousness; The upright will behold His face.

And the final attribute of God that we need to know of is that God is love.

1 John 4:8
“The one who does not love does not know God, for God is love.”

Then we also must remember that scriptures teach us the other more commonly known attributes of God such as His omniscience, omnipotence, omnipresence, and His sovereignty. God rules the universe and has the power to accomplish anything His will desires. God reminded Jeremiah of this fact in Jeremiah 32:26-27, “Then the word of the LORD came to Jeremiah, saying,  "Behold, I am the LORD, the God of all flesh; is anything too difficult for Me?"

So what does all this mean in terms of suffering and Christians? Let’s add it all up.

God is eternal. God is true, literally God is the truth and He cannot lie. God is also holy and righteous. And finally God is love. Add all those together with His sovereign nature and power over all things and what you get is a sure hope in Him that no matter what happens in life we can rest in Him.

Certainly many men will argue over theology such as God’s sovereign power. But the correct teachings of scripture are that God has the power to stop anything He chooses to and if He allows it to happen then because He is true and holy and because He is righteous and love, then what He allows to occur in our lives is also, in some way we may not understand, going to result in good. If you deny these truths then you really are denying God.

So at this point we have a decision to make. Do we believe God and His Word? If we do then the answer to suffering may not be solved, but it can be endured and with peace. We can know that God is doing something in the pain and suffering that we are enduring that is of a holy and righteous purpose even if we cannot see it. This is where we must introduce a new word into the equation of life; faith. The life of a Christian must be built upon faith. And what is faith?

Hebrews 11:1
“Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.”

The topic of faith is a topic of depth we shall not digress into at this time, but each Christian must devote a lifetime of diligent study to become a great person of faith.

I will end part 2 of this look at suffering with a scripture. If we believe this verse then suffering becomes more than tolerable, it can be turned into joy.

Romans 8:28
“And we know that all things work together for good to them that love God, to them who are the called according to his purpose.”

Do you believe that? It’s easy in the good times. But we must come to a place of faith that the things we just looked at that describe the character of God allow us to believe that God is doing things, even in our horrible trials and troubles, that are good. So by faith we bear them.

Next time we will explore some of the reasons that God allows us to go through the fire.