The Suffering God

We might as well get used to it: as long as we are here, in this world,

we are going to suffer. As fallen creatures, it is our fate. Nothing in the

Bible promises us anything different. On the contrary:

What do the following texts have to tell us about the topic at hand? Acts

14:22, Phil. 1:29, 2 Tim. 3:12.

Yet, in the midst of our suffering, we should keep two things in mind.

First, Christ, our Lord, has suffered more than any of us ever could.

At the cross, He “has borne our griefs and carried our sorrows” (Isa.

53:4, NKJV); what we know only as individuals, He suffered for us all

corporately. He who was sinless became “sin for us” (2 Cor. 5:21), suf-

fering in a way that we, as sinful creatures, couldn’t begin to imagine.

But second, as we suffer, we should remember the results of Christ’s

suffering; that is, what we have been promised through what Christ has

done for us.

Read John 10:28, Romans 6:23, Titus 1:2, and 1 John 2:25. What are

we promised?

Whatever our sufferings here, thanks to Jesus, thanks to His bearing

in Himself the punishment of our sin, thanks to the great provision

of the gospel—that through faith we can stand perfect in Jesus right

now—we have the promise of eternal life. We have the promise that

because of what Christ has done, because of the fullness and complete-

ness of His perfect life and perfect sacrifice, our existence here, full of

pain, disappointment, and loss, is no more than an instant, a flash, here

and gone, in contrast to the eternity that awaits us, an eternity in a new

heaven and a new earth, one without sin, suffering, and death. And all

this is promised to us and made certain for us only because of Christ

and the crucible He went into so that one day, coming soon, He will see

“the travail of his soul, and shall be satisfied” (Isa. 53:11).