This is the fourth and final installment in a series examining suffering, earthly restoration, and the hope God has actually promised His people.
by Rev. Mark Creech
RevMarkCreech.org
The previous articles in this series argued that God has not promised every believer earthly restoration, that He uses suffering to conform His children to Christ, and that what He forms in them has eternal significance.
This raises a practical question: How should the Christian respond when suffering actually comes?
It is one thing to speak about suffering in the abstract. It is another to endure it when the cancer diagnosis is ours, the grave belongs to someone we love, the marriage is breaking, the child is wayward, the livelihood disappears, or the dream we so passionately pursued has collapsed.
In such moments, truths that seemed clear in calmer seasons can suddenly become difficult to hold with confidence. Pain narrows our vision. It can make one night feel endless, and one sorrow seem larger than every promise we have ever believed.
Yet if God uses suffering to form His children for Christlikeness and eternal glory, then the Christian must learn not merely to survive affliction, but to endure it faithfully.
That does not mean suffering without tears, questions, weakness, or discouragement. It means bringing all of these honestly before God while continuing to trust, obey, and hope in Him.
Be Honest About Your Pain and Bring It to God
Some religious teachings today suggest that acknowledging pain is an act of unbelief. Sufferers may be instructed not to speak of their illness, grief, fear, or disappointment because doing so amounts to a negative confession.
But biblical faith is not make-believe. It does not require us to deny reality. Instead, it teaches us to bring our pain to God.
Job did not pretend that his losses were painless. David filled the Psalms with cries of sorrow and bewilderment. The Apostle Paul spoke of being “pressed out of measure, above strength, insomuch that we despaired even of life” (2 Corinthians 1:8).
Even our Lord Jesus Christ wept at the tomb of Lazarus. In Gethsemane, He said, “My soul is exceeding sorrowful, even unto death” (Matthew 26:38).
A small child awakened by a violent thunderstorm does not lie in bed repeating, “There is no storm. There is no thunder. I am not frightened.” He runs to his father or mother precisely because the storm and his fear are real.
The child’s fear does not prove he lacks confidence in his parent. His running to them reveals exactly where his confidence lies.
Biblical lament is much the same. Lament is sorrow turned toward God. It is the cry of a soul that does not understand what God is doing but still believes He is the only One to whom the heart can ultimately appeal.
David cried, “How long wilt thou forget me, O Lord? for ever? how long wilt thou hide thy face from me?” (Psalm 13:1).
There is, however, a difference between bringing our complaint to God and lodging our complaint against God.
To bring our complaint to God is to say, “Lord, I do not understand what’s happening to me. I am wounded and confused, but I know you are my hope and help.”
To bring our complaint against God is to place ourselves in judgment over Him – to declare that He has acted unjustly, unwisely, or unfaithfully with us.
The first is lament. The second is rebellion.
Psalm 88 is especially striking because it contains no clear turn toward relief. It closes with the words, “lover and friend hast thou put far from me, and mine acquaintance into darkness” (v. 18).
Yet even that Psalm is a prayer. The sufferer is still reaching out to God.
There may be moments when faith consists of little more than continuing to address the Lord while in the darkness. The words may be few and the emotions confused, but the soul still turns toward God rather than away from Him.
But mark this: faith does not deny the darkness. Faith cries to God from within the darkness.
Pray for Deliverance, but Seek Faithfulness Above All
There is nothing unspiritual about asking God to change painful circumstances.
The sick may certainly pray for healing. The lonely may certainly pray for companionship. The estranged may certainly pray for reconciliation. The grieving may certainly ask for comfort, and the oppressed may cry for deliverance.
Our Lord Himself prayed in Gethsemane, “O my Father, if it be possible, let this cup pass from me” (Matthew 26:39).
Jesus did not romanticize suffering. Even He asked that the cup might pass from Him. But He continued, “Nevertheless not as I will, but as thou wilt” (Matthew 26:39).
There is the pattern for every suffering believer:
“Lord, remove this burden if it pleases you. But if the path you have appointed me leads through this valley, keep me faithful while I walk through it.”
We naturally ask, “When will this terrible burden end?” But God may be calling us to ask, “How may I honor Christ until it does?”
The Apostle Paul pleaded three times for the removal of his thorn in the flesh. God did not remove it. Instead, He answered, “My grace is sufficient for thee: for my strength is made perfect in weakness” (2 Corinthians 12:9).
Sometimes God displays His greatness by removing the trial. At other times, He displays His greatness by sustaining His child within it.
The deeper prayer, therefore, is not merely, “Lord, bring me out,” but, “Lord, bring me through without allowing my soul to be poisoned along the way.”
That prayer is necessary because suffering does not automatically make a person holy. The same heat that melts butter hardens clay. The difference is not in the heat, but in what receives it. So too, suffering may soften one heart toward God while hardening another in bitterness and unbelief. What matters is whether the wounded heart resists the Lord or yields to His grace.
Bitterness is especially dangerous. It offers the wounded person a false sense of protection, whispering that an angry, guarded heart cannot be hurt again. But bitterness does not protect the soul. It imprisons it.
The writer of Hebrews warns, “lest any root of bitterness springing up trouble you, and thereby many be defiled” (Hebrews 12:15).
The suffering Christian must therefore ask:
What is this pain producing in me?
Am I becoming bitter or meek? Hard or tender? Am I drawing nearer to Christ, or allowing sorrow to draw me away?
These questions are not meant to condemn the sufferer. They are an invitation to place the wounded heart beneath the healing and sanctifying work of the Holy Spirit.
Keep Obeying God and Receive the Help He Provides
Faithful endurance is often less dramatic than people imagine. Sometimes it consists simply of doing the next right thing.
When the future is uncertain, we may become so preoccupied with discerning God’s larger plan that we neglect the duties already before us. We want an explanation for the entire journey, but God usually gives us only enough light for the next faithful step.
Like a traveler moving through a thick fog with a lantern, the believer is seldom able to see far ahead down the road. God’s Word is “a lamp unto my feet, and a light unto my path” (Psalm 119:105) because it ordinarily gives just enough illumination for the next step, not an explanation of the entire journey.
So pray when prayer feels difficult. Stay in the Scriptures. Continue attending church as much as you are able. Fulfill your present duties. Resist the temptation to seek sinful relief.
Do not wait until you feel strong enough to obey God. Sometimes strength comes through obedience rather than before it.
In Matthew 12, we read of a man whose hand was withered. Jesus commanded him, “Stretch forth thine hand” (Matthew 12:13). Think of it. What a seemingly preposterous command to give a man with a withered hand. How could he possibly do what his infirmity had made him powerless to do?
Yet the man obeyed Christ in faith. He stretched forth his hand, “and it was restored whole, like as the other.”
The man did not wait until he felt strength returning before attempting to obey. He acted upon the word of Christ and discovered, in obeying, that the Savior supplied the power His command required.
And so it may be in our suffering. God may call us to pray when we feel unable to pray, to forgive when the wound still aches, to worship when the heart is heavy, or simply to take the next step when we feel too weak to move. His commands may sometimes seem beyond our strength, but He never calls us to obey without also offering the grace necessary to do so.
There will be days when faithfulness means accomplishing very little by ordinary standards. It may mean just getting out of bed, praying a few broken sentences, attending to one necessary responsibility, and refusing to surrender to despair.
God is not measuring His wounded children by the productivity of their strongest days.
The prayer whispered through tears may cost more than the prayer shouted in victory. The forgiveness granted while the wound still aches may display the grace of Christ more clearly than a hundred words spoken about forgiveness.
We may not be able to control what suffering takes from us. But by the grace of God, we can refuse to let it take our obedience.
Neither should we walk through suffering alone.
God often ministers to His children through pastors, friends, family members, physicians, counselors, and the fellowship of the church. There is no special spiritual virtue in refusing legitimate help.
The Scriptures command, “Bear ye one another’s burdens, and so fulfil the law of Christ” (Galatians 6:2). For another person to help bear the burden, the sufferer must be willing to share it.
The Apostle Paul wrote that God “comforteth those that are cast down,” and then explained that God had comforted him “by the coming of Titus” (2 Corinthians 7:6).
God comforted Paul, but He did so through a person.
There are burdens we must carry, but this does not mean we must carry them without the loving assistance of others. Accepting help may itself be an act of humility and faith.
Faithfulness means taking the next obedient step with whatever strength God supplies, often through the people He places beside us.
Keep Eternity in View by Looking to the Suffering Savior
An eternal perspective does not make present pain unreal.
The Christian does not look at a fresh grave and pretend that death is beautiful. Death is an enemy. Nor do we call disease, betrayal, abuse, loneliness, or injustice good.
Christian hope does not minimize sorrow. It places sorrow within a larger story.
Paul wrote, “For I reckon that the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory which shall be revealed in us” (Romans 8:18).
He did not say present suffering was insignificant. He said future glory is incomparable.
Hope does not say, “This does not hurt.”
Hope says, “This will not last forever.”
Hope says, “From an eternal perspective, the best is yet to come.”
So much of what happened at Calvary shows us this.
Had someone stood near the cross on Friday afternoon without knowing what would happen on Sunday, everything would have appeared to be a catastrophic defeat.
The innocent Christ had been condemned. His disciples had scattered. His enemies rejoiced. Darkness covered the land, and His lifeless body was sealed away in a tomb.
Every visible circumstance seemed to declare that evil had triumphed and hope had died.
But Friday was not the end of the story.
On Sunday morning, the tomb was empty. What had appeared to be the greatest triumph of evil was revealed as the means of the world’s redemption. What looked like the downfall of God’s purpose was, in fact, the accomplishment of His saving work.
Calvary teaches us never to judge the whole by the darkness of one terrible day.
We may be living through what feels like Friday. Our prayers seem unanswered. The loss appears final. The future looks buried behind a stone far too heavy to move. But the cross and resurrection declare that sin, suffering, evil, and death will not have the final word.
The Christian’s strength in suffering is therefore not found merely in a principle or method. It is found in a Person, Jesus Christ.
Jesus is not a distant observer of human pain. He entered it. He identified with it, meaning that He knew weariness, rejection, betrayal, false accusation, loneliness, agony, and death by experience.
“He is despised and rejected of men; a man of sorrows, and acquainted with grief,” said the prophet Isaiah.
The Son of God did not save us from afar. He personally came into this fallen world, bore our sins, and suffered in our place. We do not suffer before a God who cannot understand, for “we have not an high priest which cannot be touched with the feeling of our infirmities” (Hebrews 4:15).
Christ knows our pains, not just in theory, but having gone through the same Himself. And the Bible says that Christ has conquered.
The hands that hold us are scarred hands. The voice that calls us to endure is the voice of One who endured the cross. The King who asks us to follow Him through suffering has already traveled the road Himself and risen triumphantly from the grave.
Begin By Coming to Christ
None of this can be properly understood apart from a saving knowledge of Jesus Christ.
Our greatest problem is not pain, disease, loss, loneliness, or death. Our greatest problem is sin, which separates us from God.
If you have never trusted Christ for the forgiveness of your sins and the gift of eternal life, that is the first and most important step you can take in facing your suffering.
God does not promise that trusting Him will immediately remove every burden. He does promise never to leave nor forsake those who belong to Him. He gives peace with God, strength for the journey, meaning in the trial, and hope beyond the grave.
Without Christ, suffering may only wound and diminish us. In Christ, suffering can be redeemed, sanctified, and made to serve an eternal purpose.
The question is not whether suffering will enter our lives. In a fallen world, it surely will. The real question is what we will do when it comes.
Will suffering drive us from God or deeper into His presence? Will it harden us or make us more like Christ? Will we seek escape at any cost, or continue in faithful obedience?
There may be days when we do this poorly. There may be moments when our faith trembles, our prayers falter, and hope seems faint.
But trembling faith is still faith when it rests upon a mighty Savior.
The Christian’s confidence is not that he will always hold firmly to Christ, but that Christ will always hold firmly to him.
The God who has not promised that every earthly sorrow will be reversed has promised something infinitely greater: that nothing shall separate His children from His love, that His grace will be sufficient, and that the sufferings of this present time will one day give way to a glory beyond all comparison.
Until that day, may He grant us grace not merely to suffer, but to suffer faithfully.
If you missed the first three installments of these articles about suffering, you can find the previous ones here:
