LIVING WATERS
For the proclamation of the Gospel and the edification of the Body of Christ
Why Do Christians Suffer?
Afflictions and sufferings make up a high percentage of man's life. It has rightly been said that human life is a "vale of tears". This is true not only for those who live far from God; it is also true for the children of God. For them there are also, as David says in Psalm 23, the valleys of the shadow of death.
Some years ago, a well-known Christian writer wrote a voluminous treatise attempting to unravel the causes of suffering in the children of God. Although the book succeeds in explaining some things, its strange title is misleading: "When what God does makes no sense". Does it really mean that there are times when what God does doesn't make sense? That suffering doesn't make sense?
Often the Christian, because of his blindness, does not find meaning in his suffering. But to say that the suffering of God's children is meaningless is to attribute to God a nonsense. If we, being bad parents, seek the good of our children and direct our actions towards them according to a noble end, how much more will our Father, who is holy, just and good, pursue a noble end with us, his beloved children?
All our suffering pursues a good end, because God uses it for our good, even if at the moment we are living it we do not understand it that way. "And we know that all things work together for good to them that love God..." (Rom. 8:28). The first thing necessary whenever suffering comes is, then, to ask the Lord what is the purpose of this pain. If he grants the grace to see it, the suffering will make sense and will be much more bearable. And above all, it will allow the Christian to adopt the right attitude, not of complaint, but of adoration and even praise.
To complain about God, to complain about suffering, or to imprecate in a desperate way about the reason for such affliction, is to dishonor the blessed name of Him who loved us so much that He gave His Son to redeem us from every curse and every anguish. All pain is fleeting, and all affliction is the least portion necessary for our own good.
The ultimate purpose of all sorrow is to produce in the Christian true contrition and humiliation of spirit. It pursues what some have called "the stripping or emptying of self", so that Christ may have the preeminence in his life and conduct. This is a necessarily painful process, because man loves himself too much, and because his heart is deceitful and quite unknown to him (Jer. 17:9-10; Deut. 8:2-5).
It is only through this long process that the heart is exposed in all its precariousness, while the character of Christ is unveiled to the eyes of the believer in its greatest attractiveness and splendor. Finally, self is stripped from its throne and Christ is enthroned! Then, his pleasing odor is felt through that poor broken vessel, that broken bottle (Mark 14:3). Then Christ is fully glorified in his servants!