“How can a good God who loves me allow me to feel so depressed and despairing? Why would He allow me to experience such terrible pain and suffering?
A Lay of the Land
Over that last several of months, we’ve been tackling this knotty question. We started by getting to the root of the question by challenging the faulty assumption that God’s love exempts me from pain and suffering. Then we laid out how the problem of pain gets personal but that there are some really good reasons to doubt our doubts about God’s goodness. We called these reasons theodicies and the argument of God’s inscrutability. Today, we are moving from talking about the theodicies to looking at the principle of God’s inscrutability.
Catch up on the other Blogs in this Series Here:
#1: Knowing Why Won’t Make You Feel Better
#2: When the Problem of Evil Gets Personal
#3: Pain is a Megaphone
#4: Suffering is Soul-building
#5: Suffering Reveals Who God Is
The Side of Suffering that We Can’t See
The principle of God’s inscrutability means that there is a side of suffering that we simply cannot see. We cannot see it because we are not God. We are limited and finite. Just because we can’t see it, doesn’t mean that it’s not there. Think about how the stories of Joseph and Job show us this principle of inscrutability. These stories illustrate that God has a purpose for suffering even though we may not know what the purpose is at the time.
Joseph’s Suffering Saved a Family, a Nation, and the World
Joseph is sold into slavery by his brothers and ends up in Egypt. Through a series of ups and downs Joseph comes to interpret the dreams of Pharaoh eventually ascending to be second in power over all Egypt. The series of sufferings that Joseph endures are precisely the means that God uses to bring about the salvation of the rest of Joseph’s family and even the rest of Egypt. The salvation that came through Joseph’s suffering protects the line that eventuates in the Messiah. That’s a massively complex set of goods that God was working towards over millennia! Joseph does eventually get to see how God was working through all the evil actions of others to bring about great goods. Joseph’s own commentary is recorded for us in Gen. 50:19-21.
But Joseph said to them, “Do not be afraid, for am I in God’s place? As for you, you meant evil against me, but God meant it for good in order to bring about this present result, to preserve many people alive. So therefore, do not be afraid; I will provide for you and your little ones.” So he comforted them and spoke kindly to them. —Genesis 50:19–21
Job’s Suffering Leaves an Enduring Legacy
In like manner, Job experiences immense pain. He loses his children, his wealth, and his health. But why? Job never knows. God never tells him. God confronts him with his own finitude and his own lack of understanding of the great complexity of His power and plans. On the other hand, we get the benefit of seeing the context of Job 1-2 and the purpose of Job’s sufferings. We know that some of the goods that God was after in the life of Job was the humiliation of Satan, the glory of God, and the encouragement of believers throughout history. And those are not even all the goods that God is after in the life of Job. The point is that we often don’t know what sort of reasons that God has for our pain and suffering, but that doesn’t mean that God doesn’t have any reasons. We simply are too finite and too limited to comprehend the vast complexity of what God is doing in the world. Perhaps one day we will be able to see them when we approach God in the glory of heaven. But for now, we often live in ignorance of the vast plans of God. However, time and distance often give us a small view into the ways that God was working in our lives. How often can we look back and say, “Wow, I never realized at that time all that God was doing!” So instead of doubting God’s goodness, God’s wisdom, God’s love, and God’s power, let us learn to doubt our doubts. What’s more likely? That God is wrong or that we are? Let us learn to say with Job,
Then Job answered the Lord and said,
“I know that You can do all things,
And that no purpose of Yours can be thwarted.
‘Who is this that hides counsel without knowledge?’
“Therefore I have declared that which I did not understand,
Things too wonderful for me, which I did not know.”
‘Hear, now, and I will speak;
I will ask You, and You instruct me.’
“I have heard of You by the hearing of the ear;
But now my eye sees You;
Therefore I retract,
And I repent in dust and ashes.” —Job 42:1–6
The Master Weaver’s Plan
There is an amazing poem by Corrie Ten Boom, author of The Hiding Place who was arrested and detained in a Nazi concertation camp, that beautifully captures the inscrutability of God and how we can respond to His amazing wisdom even in the hard times. She writes,
My life is but a weaving
Between my God and me.
I cannot choose the colors
He weaveth steadily.
Oft’ times He weaveth sorrow;
And I in foolish pride
Forget He sees the upper
And I the underside.
Not ’til the loom is silent
And the shuttles cease to fly
Will God unroll the canvas
And reveal the reason why.
The dark threads are as needful
In the weaver’s skillful hand
As the threads of gold and silver
In the pattern He has planned.
He knows, He loves, He cares;
Nothing this truth can dim.
He gives the very best to those
Who leave the choice to Him.
