What’s the deal with suffering?
Last night I was at a Q&A with our Night community as a follow on from the Origins series. One of the questions I was asked to consider was how a good and all-powerful God can allow pain and suffering.
It’s such an important question because it affects us all. The things we go through and the conclusions we come to deeply affect our view of God. It’s also important because it can be a significant barrier for some people exploring faith.
What’s interesting is that from a philosophical point of view, the discussion has largely been settled. The alternatives are that God either wouldn’t have created us or would have created us as perfect puppets. Neither of those scenarios result in humanity in a loving relationship with God. Freewill was necessary to the extent that sin was possible.
Nevertheless, the discussion doesn’t feel settled. We don’t live on a philosophical level. When someone’s daughter has just been diagnosed with leukaemia, philosophy just doesn’t cut it. We have to meet people on a pastoral level. We have to make space to lament like David did so many times in the Psalms where he told God exactly how he felt and sought to bring his soul to a place of trust.
Ultimately, we have to come to Jesus. Tim Keller has said that while God doesn’t tell us why he has allowed suffering, he has shown us that it’s not because he doesn’t care. He chose eternally that there would be a moment when Jesus would enter the frailty of humanity to bear the cross for our sake. He cares so much about our pain and suffering that he chose to endure it to give us hope beyond it.
The gospel therefore provides an answer that is unique. For our secular culture, there is no objective basis to call anything evil. We’re told that suffering is what we’d expect from, as Richard Dawkins called it, a blind, pitiless, indifferent world. God, on the other hand, acknowledges that our pain and suffering is real, met us in the middle of it, and provides a way through and beyond it. There is no one like Jesus.
Much love,
Simon
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