My God, my God, why have you forsaken me? Why are
you so far from helping me, from the words of my groaning? O my
God, I cry by day, but you do not answer; and by night, but find
no rest. Psalm 22:1. My inward parts are in turmoil, and are never
still; days of affliction come to meet me. Job 30:27. My eye grows
dim through sorrow. Every day I call on you, O LORD; I spread
out my hands to you. Psalm 89:9.

He was despised and rejected by others; a man of
suffering and acquainted with infirmity; and as one from whom
others hide their faces he was despised, and we held him of no
account. Isaiah 53:3. And going a little farther, he threw himself
on the ground and prayed, ‘My Father, if it is possible, let this
cup pass from me; yet not what I want but what you want.’ Matthew
26:39.

If [we are] children, then heirs, heirs of God and
joint heirs with Christ – if, in fact, we suffer with him so that
we may also be glorified with him. Romans 8:17. Beloved, do not
be surprised at the fiery ordeal that is taking place among you
to test you, as though something strange were happening to you.
But rejoice insofar as you are sharing Christ’s sufferings, so
that you may also be glad and shout for joy when his glory is
revealed. 1 Peter 4:12. For he has graciously granted you the
privilege not only of believing in Christ, but of suffering for
him as well. Philippians 1:29. For this slight momentary affliction
is preparing us for an eternal weight of glory beyond all measure.
2 Corinthians 4:17. In this you rejoice, even if now for a little
while you have had to suffer various trials. 1 Peter 1:6. If you
do suffer for doing what is right, you are blessed. Do not fear
what they fear, and do not be intimidated. 1 Peter 3:14.

My child, do not despise the LORD’s discipline, or
be weary of his reproof, for the LORD reproves the one he loves,
as a father the son in whom he delights. Proverbs 3:11-12. We
know that all things work together for good for those who love
God. Romans 8:28. Many are the afflictions of the righteous, but
the LORD rescues them from them all. Psalm 34:19. The Lord is
near to the brokenhearted, and saves the crushed in spirit. Psalm
34:18.

Come to me, all you that are weary and are carrying
heavy burdens, and I will give you rest. Matthew 11:28. Who will
separate us from the love of Christ? Will hardship, or distress,
or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword? …No,
in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who
loved us. Romans 8:35, 37. This is my comfort in my distress,
that your promise gives me life. Psalm 119:50.

Remember those who are in prison, as though you were
in prison with them; those who are being tortured, as though you
yourselves were being tortured. Hebrews 13:3.

Do not fear what you are about to suffer. Beware,
the devil is about to throw some of you into prison so that you
may be tested… Be faithful until death, and I will give you
the crown of life. Revelation 2:10. He will wipe every tear from
their eyes. Death will be no more; mourning and crying and pain
will be no more. Revelation 21:4.

…..

The young boy had a refined and beautiful face, the
face of a ’sad angel’. He was silent as the German SS guard placed
his head in the noose. ‘Where is God? Where is He?’ someone asked.
After the boy’s chair was tipped over it took him an agonizing
half hour to die. Again the voice: ‘Where is God now?’ Elie Wiesel
heard a voice within answering: ‘Where is He? Here He is – He
is hanging here on this gallows…’ And ‘that night the soup tasted
of corpses’…

Where is God when children die of hunger in a world
of bounty? Where is God when a young mother suffers a slow, very
painful death from cancer – painful because she refuses painkilling
drugs so that she can be alert to say goodbye to her husband and
three children? Where is God when an eight year old girl – a good,
happy little girl – is abducted from her bed one night by a stranger,
then slowly tortured, raped, strangled, and left in a gutter?
Where is God when an earthquake kills three quarters of a million
people in China? When millions of Russians are killed by Stalin?
When Australian Aboriginal babies are buried alive with their
heads above the ground, and the British ‘civilizers’ have a competition
to see how far they can kick those heads – with the parents forced
to watch? Where is God when a young 33-year-old Galilean with
a passionate commitment to love and justice is hanging, nailed
to a cross?

If we did not believe in a good (and powerful) God,
there would hardly be a problem. All the great religions, C. S.
Lewis notes in The Problem of Pain, came into being before chloroform.

Some suffering results from our own stupidity. If
we inflict physical or mental pain upon ourselves we will suffer.
If the only way to prevent criminals doing harm to the innocent
is to punish them – well, we can live with the idea of pain that
is ‘deserved’.

But in a world of Holocausts, Hiroshimas, State-sponsored
torture, and half a billion humans starving, the questions are
very complex indeed. Simple answers are not only wrong, they’re
callous.

All we can do here is provide some time-honoured
ideas which have helped sufferers through the ages. I hope they
help you too:

(1) Suffering is inevitable. In pain we are born,
in pain we mostly die, and we experience pain in between. Western
expectations of a trouble-free existence, and Eastern notions
of fatalism are both inadequate responses to this reality. God
does not promise us a rose garden. ‘We have no right to happiness,’
wrote C.S. Lewis in his last published article. Malcolm Muggeridge
called the phrase ‘the pursuit of happiness’ in the American Declaration
of Independence not one of the fundamental rights of humans but
‘one of the silliest and shallowest sentences I have ever seen.’

(2) Most suffering – not all – happens because humans
are ‘free’ to do good or evil to themselves or others. We, not
God, manage torture chambers, the arms trade, and the hoarding
or distribution of food surpluses. God apparently thought creating
humans with a free-will was a risk worth taking. Love for God
and others is only love when it is freely given and received.
The alternative – a world of human robots – is a horrible thought!

(3) Pain is ‘good’ when it alerts us to a physical,
psychological or social problem that needs fixing. I’ve met people
with leprosy who have lost limbs because they couldn’t feel pain.
Surgeons, magistrates, parents and teachers are sometimes authorised
to inflict pain to cure, punish, help or discipline us. If the
sickness or evil persisted, there might be more pain for ourselves
and others.

(4) But pain is ‘evil’ when it makes no sense, when
it seems to produce harm not good. This is a problem for those
who believe in a good God, and those who don’t. Life for either
seems awefully futile sometimes. Richard Rubenstein, in After
Auschwitz, says that after one learns about Hitler’s death camps,
to continue to believe in a God of love who acts for the good
of God’s people is ridiculous. However, a follower of Jesus affirms
that ultimately the power of good over evil is greater than the
power of evil over good. God somehow can write straight with crooked
lines: he may allow pain, but never ultimate evil; and he is capable
of using any evil to produce good.

(5) The religion of the Bible puts human suffering
into a cosmic context: the battle of good and evil, God and Satan.
The Old Testament has the story of Job, who suffered the loss
of family, health, and possessions, and never found out ‘why’.
Job’s suffering was part of a larger drama: his salvation came
in trusting a good God even when he had no answers. In the New
Testament, Paul suffered from a mysterious ailment. He wanted
it removed, but the Lord gave him ‘grace’ which otherwise he might
not have experienced without his ‘thorn in the flesh’. There is
mystery here: the ‘earth is the Lord’s’ (Psalm 24:1), but it’s
been hijacked, and ‘the whole world lies in the power of the evil
one’ (1 John 5:19) and we humans are caught in the cross-fire.
However – and this is important – any particular suffering is
not necessarily related to any particular sin we have committed
(though it may be).

(6) God, however, is the ultimate victor. The cross
on which Jesus died is the sign and proof of God’s identification
with our suffering. God’s answer is ‘incarnational’, not philosophical.
Where there’s suffering, another’s presence is always more compassionate
than ‘answers’. God suffers for us and with us. That’s awesome,
when you think about it.

On Sunday 23 January 1983, Dr. William Sloane Coffin
began his sermon: ‘A week ago last Monday night, driving in a
terrible storm, my son Alexander – who to his friends was a real
day-brightener, and to his family “fair as a star when only
one is shining in the sky” – my 24- year-old Alexander, who
enjoyed beating his old man at every game and every race, beat
his father to the grave… My consolation lies in knowing… that
when the waves closed over Alex’s car, God’s heart was the first
of all our hearts to break… So I shall seek – so let us all
seek – consolation in that love which never dies…’

That kind of faith lets God be God, rather than demanding
God be God on our terms. The idea that only good things happen
to good people was put to rest when Jesus died on the cross. God’s
love carries no promises about good or bad, save the promise that
God will not allow anything worse to happen to us than what happened
to his own Son.

(7) Does God allow or sometimes even ’send’ suffering?
God is all- loving and all-powerful, so the answer is yes and
yes. Often in the biblical drama God ’sends’ drought, plagues
or armies; occasionally he permits Satan to afflict the righteous.
But his goodness ensures that all suffering is ultimately redemptive.
Hell – here or hereafter – cannot be the final word, otherwise
God’s triumph over evil would be incomplete. What ‘good’ is suffering,
you ask? C.S. Lewis has a point when he says pain may be ‘God’s
megaphone’ to rouse a deaf world: without suffering we could be
careless about ultimate realities, deaf to God’s loving plea to
seek him and find life. Then, many of his best saints (including
Jesus) were ‘perfected through suffering’.

An American asked a Chinese: ‘Why, if God loves us,
does he let the church in China suffer so much?’ The Chinese Christian’s
response: ‘Why, if God loves us, does he let the church in the
West suffer so little?’ Lev Timofeyev, imprisoned by the Soviet
KGB, wrote, ‘The most vivid prayers of my life were in my prison
cell, which is the closest place to God.’ One of the saints said,
‘The cross is the gift God gives to his friends.’

(8) So it’s not our suffering that matters most,
painful as it is, but our response to it. Perhaps the best question
is not ‘Why?’ (there may be no answer) but ‘How?’ Are we allowed
to question God or even be angry with him? Yes, the Bible is full
of laments – there’s an integrity about its humanness which is
absent from many other ‘holy’ books.

Suffering is the ultimate test of character. Tolstoy
in his Confessions says people respond to tragedy four ways. Some
are scared and mentally fly from it, perhaps soaking in drink
to forget. Some despair and commit suicide (or want to). Some
are grimly stoical: their heads are ‘bloody but unbowed’. Finally,
there are those who meet it bravely, believing there is sense
in it somewhere. Christianity goes a step further, and asserts
that suffering can be used: many works of social justice have
followed a tragic event or experience.

Joni Earickson was paralyzed from the neck down after
a diving accident at the age of seventeen, and after years of
frustration and courage this fun-loving woman communicates triumph
rather than despair (and learns to paint holding the brush between
her teeth).

Our best and most authentic response to suffering
is patience and worship. ‘Whatever happens, Lord, I will trust
you.’ ‘Your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven.’ As you
pass through trouble, he will preserve you (Psalm 138:7). We are
joint-heirs with Christ, provided we suffer with him (Romans 8:17).
‘Never let anything so fill you with sorrow as to make you forget
the joy of Christ risen’ (Mother Teresa).

And never forget: ‘No testing has overtaken you that
is not common to everyone. God is faithful, and he will not let
you be tested beyond your strength, but with the testing he will
also provide the way out so that you may be able to endure it’
(1 Corinthians 10:13).

…..

* God is all-powerful. * God is all-good. * Terrible
things happen.

You can reconcile any two of these propositions with
each other, but you can’t reconcile all three. The problem of
evil is perhaps the greatest single problem for religious faith.

There have been numerous theological and philosophical
attempts to solve it, but when it comes down to the reality of
evil itself they are none of them worth much. When a child is
raped and murdered, the parents are not apt to take much comfort
from the explanation (better than most) that since God wants us
to love him, we must be free to love or not to love and thus free
to rape and murder a child if we take a notion to…

Christianity… ultimately offers no theoretical
solution at all. It merely points to the cross and says that,
practically speaking, there is no evil so dark and so obscene
– not even this – but that God can turn it to good.

Frederick Buechner, Wishful Thinking, London: Collins,
1973, p.24.

Some years ago our twenty-one-year-old daughter and
the lad to whom she would some day have been married were both
drowned in a yachting accident. God did not stop that accident
at sea, but he did still the storm in my own heart, so that somehow
my wife and I came through that terrible time still on our own
two feet… There came an anonymous letter from Northern Ireland:
`Dear Dr Barclay, I know now why God killed your daughter; it
was to save her from being corrupted by your heresies’… The
accidental destruction of the beautiful and the good – the will
of God! If I had had that writer’s address, I would have written
back, not in anger – the inevitable blaze of anger was over in
a flash – but in pity, and I would have said to him, as John Wesley
said to someone: `Your God is my devil’. The day my daughter was
lost at sea there was sorrow in the heart of God.

When things like that happen, there are just three
things to be said. First, to understand them is impossible. Second,
Jesus does not offer us solutions to them. What he does offer
us is his strength and help somehow to accept what we cannot understand.
Third, the one fatal reaction is the bitter resentment which for
ever after meets life with a chip on the shoulder and a grudge
against God. The one saving reaction is simply to go on living,
to go on working, and to find in the presence of Jesus Christ
the strength and courage to meet life with steady eyes, and to
know the comfort that God too is afflicted in my affliction.

William Barclay, Testament of Faith, Oxford: Mowbrays,
1977, pp. 45-46.

The riddle and insight of biblical faith is the awareness
that only anguish leads to life, only grieving leads to joy, and
only embraced endings permit new beginnings…

I used to think it curious that when having to quote
Scripture on demand someone would inevitably say, `Jesus wept’.
But now I understand. Jesus knew what we numb ones must always
learn again: (a) that weeping must be real because endings are
real and (b) that weeping permits newness. His weeping permits
the kingdom to come…

Jesus in his solidarity with the marginal ones is
moved to compassion. Compassion [means] that the hurt is to be
taken seriously, that the hurt is not to be accepted as normal
and natural but is an abnormal and unacceptable condition for
humanness… Thus the compassion of Jesus is to be understood
not simply as a personal emotional reaction but as a public criticism
in which he dares to act upon his concern against the entire numbness
of his social context… Jesus enters into the hurt and finally
comes to embody it.

Walter Brueggemann, The Prophetic Imagination, Philadelphia,
Fortress Press, 1985, pp. 60-61, 85-86.

Not only must we be able to express our anger at
the system, the world, and all the evil we find surrounding us,
we must also be able to express that anger toward God. It is part
of the life of faith to be able to rebel, to quarrel, to get mad
at God.

The notion will strike many Christians as blasphemous.
Who are we to challenge the ways of the Almighty? What pretension!

But perhaps it is more than pretension. Perhaps it
is a sign of how much we care, that we dare to express our outrage
even toward the One who created us. This is a lesson Christians
need to learn from Jews, who have a long history of questioning
the ways of God – and not at all surprising, since of all God’s
creature, Jews are the ones with most reason to question both
God’s love and God’s justice. (My sister, pained by a tragedy
in her own life, said in more than half-jest to a Jewish friend,
`If I ever make it to heaven, I’m going to line up at the throne
of God and ask, `Why did you arrange it so that things like this
could happen?’ `Hattie’, was his instantaneous response, `it’s
a very long line…’).

Robert McAfee Brown, Creative Dislocation – the Movement
of Grace, Nashville: Abingdon, 1980, pp. 89-90.

Rushing through the ecstasies of ambition, we only
awake when plunged into dread or grief. In darkness, then, we
grope for solace, for meaning, for prayer.

John Garvey (Ed), Modern Spirituality, an Anthology,
London: Darton, Longman and Todd, 1985, p.9.

Suffering is a proof not only of the God-forsakenness
of creation but of the depths of being. If there were no suffering
in a fallen and sinful world, it would be finally severed from
being; the depth of being shows itself in it as suffering. The
mystery of existence is revealed in suffering… Suffering is
a consequence of sin, a sign of sin, and at the same time redemption
from sin and liberation from it. This is the meaning of Christ’s
suffering on the cross. This is implied in all ideas of a suffering
God. Consequently, our attitude to suffering is complex.

Nicholas, Berdyaev, The Destiny of Man, New York:
Harper & Row, 1960. p. 193

Clearly, pain does tend to rob us of the ability
to rejoice and to praise God. The Living Bible translates Psalm
142 in a very realistic way: ‘Hear my cry, for I am very low.
Rescue me from my persecutors, for they are too strong for me.
Bring me out of prison so that I can thank you’ (vv. 6-7). It’s
as if the Psalmist were saying, ‘How can I thank you the way I
am? Free me, so that I will have something to thank you for.’

The whole purpose of pain and suffering in nature
is good; it’s to call our attention to something that is wrong
with us, so that we can do something about it and get rid of it.
When I’m sick, the pain concentrates my attention on my body or
emotions until I do something to get rid of the sickness. The
suffering and pain are good in that they center my efforts on
getting rid of the sickness which is evil and is harming me.

Francis MacNutt, The Power to Heal, Indiana: Ave
Maria Press, 1977, P. 149

God, who loves us with a love beyond words, leaves
us free to make a radical choice: free to love but also to refuse
love and to reject God; free to spread through the world a leaven
of reconciliation or a ferment of injustice; free to love or to
hate; free to shine with radiant communion in Christ, but also
to tear ourselves away from it and even to destroy in other people
their thirst for the living God. He leaves us free, even to rebel
against him.

But although God leaves us free, he does not look
on passively at our distress. He suffers along with us. He visits
us, even in the wilderness of our hearts, through Christ who is
in agony for each and every human being on this earth.

Brother Roger of Taize, The Wonder of a Love, London:  Mowbray, 1981, p. 93.

There is an old adage in nautical circles to the
effect that ‘no sailor ever distinguished himself on a smooth
sea’. This is a way of saying that it seems to take difficulty
and hardship to produce human greatness. For some reason our full
potential never comes to the surface amid ease and comfort. It
was said of our Lord that he was made perfect, not in spite of
the things that he suffered, but because of the things that he
suffered. And thus, although the child within us would very much
like to have it otherwise, it appears that challenge is the matrix
of human excellence.

John R Claypool, Remembering who we are: David, an
unpublished sermon, January 13, 1974.

Suffering is a part of life, pointing out to us the
evil that is part of life… There are lessons to be learned that
can only be learned along the road of affliction, hardship, and
pain.

There’s no getting around it, pain and suffering
are inevitable. Our parents did not escape it, you and I will
not escape it, and neither will our children. According to Philippians
1:29, suffering is here to stay: ‘For to you it has been granted
for Christ’s sake, not only to believe in him, but also to suffer
for his sake.’

There are some who say, ‘All suffering is wrong.
All who suffer are out of the will of God. If you suffer, you
are in sin. And since you are in sin, if you will deal correctly
and sufficiently with your sin, your suffering will go away.’

That is simply not the truth. Scripture does not
support such teaching! To be sure, all suffering is rooted in
the fact that sin has entered the human race; however, not only
has it been granted that we believe in Christ, but it has also
been planned that we suffer (1 Peter 4:12-13).

Charles R Swindoll, Stress Fractures, Portland, Oregon:
Multnomah Press, 1990, pp. 55,56,57

…..

Almighty and eternal God, you created mankind so
that all might long to find you and have peace when you are found.
Grant that, in spite of the hurtful things that stand in their
way they may all recognise in the lives of Christians the tokens
of your love and mercy, and gladly acknowledge you as the one
true God and Father of us all.

Daily Mass Book, Lent 1991-1992 Brisbane, The Liturgical
Commission, p.123.

I want my world back God. Why did you let them take
it away? My world was large and colourful, I know it so well.
My world was filled with family and friends, house and garden,
shops and church; there were trees to see and flowers to smell,
there were wide blue skies and black rain clouds; there were the
pictures on the walls of my home; dog-hairs on the carpets, clothes
in my wardrobe and washing on the line. Where has it all gone
Lord? Please can I have it back?

Pain came and they said I had to leave my world for
a while. My world was large and colourful, then: a ride in an
ambulance, a red-brick building, a long corridor, and my world
shrank to a large cream room and a world of beds and strangers.

Lying on my back I can’t see the flowers or the trees
only a glimpse of sky if I turn my head. There aren’t any pictures
on the walls and I don’t suppose they have a dog here either.
Lord, I don’t want a world where I can’t see my friends when I
want to, where I can’t hold hands with my family or complain about
the ironing; I feel trapped in this smaller world. Lord, when
will you let me out?

I used to walk in the garden now I am not allowed
to walk at all not even among these strangers, each one trapped,
like me, in a shrinking world of pain and pills.

He wants to open my eyes to open me to help me to
see again to feel again to reach out and touch the lives of others.
Lord, I understand now: my world is not smaller but larger because
you have extended it.

Thank you Lord for this opportunity to laugh and
cry and hold the hands of strangers.

‘I Want my World Back’ by Corrine Bailey, Gordon
Bailey (compiler), 100 Christian Contemporary Poets, England:
Lion Publishing, 1983, pp. 16-17

Lord, I am not alone. For this I give thanks. There
are times when joy is an uncontainable cup-running-over – too
delicate to share, too sweeping to bear. And I am not alone. There
are times when troubles overwhelm – too nameless to share, too
trying to bear. But I am not alone. \There are times when sorrow
engulfs me – too deeply personal to share, too devastating to
bear. But I am not alone, for thou art with me.

Sometimes I forget, and feel alone. You know how
I have ached with appalling loneliness within a crowd, or with
the unbearable isolation of four walls, knowing it is not walls
which isolate – panicky, cowering, whimpering inside, and feeling
alone.

The fault was mine, for you were there. Always have
been. Always will be.

I am not alone. There is no situation, no circumstance,
no place, no time, no experience which is apart from thee. For
thou art with me . . . and within me.

May I remember, always, that I am not alone. Amen.

Jo Carr & Imogene Sorley, Bless this mess and
other prayers, Nashville: Abingdon Press, 1969, p. 89

Dear Lord, he must have been a godly man to have
been able to pray so.

‘I am no longer my own, but Thine; Put me to what
thou wilt: Rank me with whom Thou wilt; Put me to doing; put me
to suffering; Let me be employed for Thee, or laid aside for Thee;
Exalted for Thee, or brought low for Thee; Let me be full; let
me be empty; Let me have all things: let me have nothing. I freely
and heartily yield all things to Thy pleasure and disposal; And
now; O Glorious and Blessed God; Father Son, and Holy Spirit;
Thou art mine; and I am Thine And the covenant which I have made
on earth be ratified in Heaven.’*

Amen. O Lord, Amen.

* John Wesley

Jo Carr & Imogene Sorley, Bless this Mess and
other Prayers, Nashville, Abingdon Press, 1969, p. 83

…..

A Benediction

And as you go into this day or this night, and into
the future, remember:

The light of God surrounds you, The love of God enfolds
you, The power of God protects you.

Wherever you are, God is: behind you, before you,
within you, above you, around you, ahead of you.

You are blessed, and you are loved. May you truly
know that, and may the joy of his delight in you make you whole.
Amen.

And after you have suffered for a little while, the
God of all grace, who has called you to his eternal glory in Christ,
will himself restore, support, strengthen, and establish you.
To him be the power forever and ever. Amen. 1 Peter 5:10,11.

By Rowland Croucher

(Originally published in my book Live!: More Meditations and Prayers for New Christians)