Where is God when it hurts?

Much of the suffering on our planet has come about because of 2 principles that God has built into creation: a physical world that runs according to consistent natural laws, and human freedom. By committing himself to these 2 principles, both good principles in themselves, God allowed for the possibility of abuse. As a result of our freedom, human beings introduced something new to the planet-- a rebellion against the original design.

Man is the only wild animal. Man is wild because he alone, on this speck of molten rock called earth, stands up, shakes his fist, and says to God," I do what i want to do because i want to do it. As a result, a huge gulf separates us and this planet, from God.

Any discussion of the unfairness of suffering must begin with the fact that God is not pleased with the condition of the planet either. The story of the bible, from Genesis to Revelation is the story of God's plan to restore his creation to the original state of perfection.

God whispers to us in our pleasures, speaks in our conscience

but shouts in our pains- it is his megaphone to rouse a deaf world. ~ C.S Lewis

God wants us to choose to love him freely, even when that choice invloves pain, because we are committed to him, not to our own good feelings and rewards. Job clung to God's justice when he was the best example in history of God's apparent injustice. He did not seek the Giver because of his gifts; when all gifts were removed he still sought the Giver.

Faith like Job's cannot be shaken because it is the result of having been shaken.

~Rabbi Abraham Heschel

For whatever reason God chose to make man as he is- limited and suffering and subject to sorrows and death-- He had the honesty and courage to take his own medicine. Whatever game He is playing with His creation, He has kept His own rules and played fair. He can exact nothing from man that He has not exacted from Himself. He has Himself gone through the whole of human experience, form the trivial irritations of family life and the cramping restrictions of hard work and lack of money to the worst horrors of pain and humiliation, defeat, despair, and death. When He was a man, He played the man. He was born in poverty and died in disgrace and thought it well worthwhile.

The fact that Jesus came to earth where he suffered and died does not remove the pain from our lives. But is does show that God did not sit idly by and watch us suffer in isolation. He became one of us. He wept with us.

Where is God when it hurts?

He has been there from the beginning, designing a pain system that, even in the midst of a fallen world, still bears the stamp of His genius and equips us for life on this planet.

He transforms pain, using it to teach and strengthen us, if we allow it to turn us towards him. With great restraint, he watches this rebellious planet live on, in mercy allowing the human project to continue in its self-guided way.

He lets us cry out, like Job, in loud fits of anger against him, blaming him for a world we spoiled.

He allies himself with the poor and suffering, founding a kingdom tilted in their favor. He stoops to conquer.

He promises supernatural help to nourish the spirit, even if our physical suffering goes unrelieved.

He has joined us. He has hurt and bled and cried and suffered. He has dignified for all time those who suffer, by sharing their pain.

He is with us now, ministering to us through his Spirit and through members of his body who are commissioned to bear us up and relieve our suffering for the sake of the head.

He is waiting, gathering the armies of good. One day he will unleash them, and the world will see one last terrifying moment of suffering before the full victory is ushered in. Then, God will create for us a new incredible world. And pain shall be no more.