Musings on Suffering

"God whispers in our pleasures, but shouts in our pains."  C. S. Lewis

When I am in pain I turn to several different writers.  First of all, the Bible and the Psalms are the greatest source of comfort. With that being said, this time around I have turned to Peter Kreeft, and also to C. S. Lewis, Tolkien, and listened to the sermons of Tim Keller, Pastor of Redeemer Presbyterian Church in New York,  on Job.  Reading Kreeft's wisdom on suffering has helped me tremendously.  Below are some of the most poignant quotes.  

Making Sense Out of Suffering:

"Modern man does not have an answer to the question of why we suffer.  Our society is the first one that simply does not give us any answer to the problem of suffering except a thousand means of avoiding it." 

  

"Our only qualification for God's grace is our emptiness, not our fullness; our undeservingness, not our deservingness."  

"Humankind cannot bear very much reality."  T. S. Eliot  Which in my opinion (LC) is only brought about by suffering, reality that is.

Kreeft quotes from Boethius's The Consolation of Philosophy:  

   "The argument from experience is that bad fortune is really just as good for you as good fortune is, in fact, it is better, because he says, bad fortune teaches, while good fortune deceives.  When the worldly toys in which we foolishly place our hope for happiness are taken away from us, our foolishness is also taken away, and this brings us closer to true happiness, which is not in worldly things but in wisdom.  Bad fortune wakes us from our deceptive dream, and thus is good for us-assuming, as assumed, that we need truth more than comfort, that we need not false happiness but true happiness."

Back to more of Lynn's Musings on Sufferings:

Without suffering we remain a child, trapped in an adult body.  Without the right response to suffering in our lives we continue to remain a child, immature, and having to repeat the lessons that God wanted us to learn in the first place.  Not that God is the maker or the creator of the suffering.  As Job tells us God permits the catastrophe's of Job, but Satan carries them out. In our suffering Satan is trumped, and his motives for bringing us pain, God turns around for good.  Satan badly wants us to believe that God is not good, and He doesn't really love us. God then turns the pain into good; Satan is defeated, and we believe even stronger in the love of God for us.  When we want our children to grow and mature we don't do it by giving them everything that they want when they want it.  We, as adult parents, know that what their immature mind or body wants is not always good for them.  God deals with us in the same way a Father deals with their children.  He never gives us more than we can handle, only what will help us to; run to, cling to, trust in completely, long for, desire above all else, the one thing that will make us happy, and that is Himself.  Don't be surprised when suffering out of the blue comes upon you, it is from the loving hand of our Heavenly Father pursuing you as a lover pursues the beloved.  It is proof that He will never let you go.  We know this because the Son was willing to suffer alone for us.  Let suffering have it's perfect way with you.  Hold on to the promises of Scripture just as you would hold on to a rope from the only boat in the midst of a stormy sea.  Tenaciously fight the fight of faith.  When the doubts scream at you, not just whisper, when they shout in your ear and demand to be heard, hold on to the truth.  When you have fought the battle you will begin to see wisdom and greater humility gain a much stronger hold on you than before.  It all begins with humility, "God gives grace to the humble." Of course everything is GRACE, everything!  If you do not, fight the fight, you remain a child trapped as an adult, being tossed to and fro from every corner.  

Job went through his suffering without knowing the plan.  Satan had taunted God concerning Job saying that the only reason Job loved Him was for the blessings.  God withheld the reasons for Job's pain in order for him to trust Him for who He was, the God of the Universe, maker of all, the only one to be worshiped.  At the end, Job had to place his hand over his mouth, because He saw the Lord of all, the one who even allowed his suffering for good.  For our good too.