Suffering from a Christian perspective (part 1)

Foreword

Among the many things I’ve been doing this semester, one of these has been pursuing a Master’s degree in Theological Studies. The workload is not what I expected. There’s a lot to read and a lot more to write. But, aside from keeping me busy, it has helped make me more organized; and I’ve also learned a lot these past months. As a final paper for one of my classes, I had to write about suffering. This was an interesting assignment because at the time, my personal emotional situations were not the best. So, it seemed like I just had to write a paper on how I felt. I was obviously wrong; but the writing process was a fun and productive experience in which I managed to learn from my mistakes. So, about the paper...

The topic was “suffering”. I decided to look at it from a Christian perspective. Although originally I though an appropriate title would’ve been “Suffering from a religious perspective”, I understood that the different schools of religious thought have different approaches to the concept of suffering. I wanted to rule out divine punishment, penance for atonement, or other understandable but out of context reasons for suffering, since then I’d have to dive in to superficially describing the nature of the different gods in question (even within the different Christian denominations and sects). The purpose of the paper was to attempt to explain why a loving God allows us to suffer. This topic has been explored hundreds of times (if not more), and you can read many great books about it (my favorite author on this topic is C.S. Lewis, which I will reference a lot in this article). From the start I say that I do not pretend to have the correct or the best answer to this question; but I did use Biblical and extra-biblical references in an attempt to at least provide a possible answer to it. I will post my paper in different parts. Each one will be short (several hundred words). I hope you, as a reader, enjoy my post, and that you may find answers to your questions on this topic.

NOTE: Before you begin to read, note that this article looks at suffering from a Christian perspective. Therefore, most of the references for understanding the Christian God will be either Biblical or written by Christian authors (who, in turn, also used Biblical references).

NOTE: This paper was modified from the original submission for my class. Some grammatical mistakes were corrected, as well as sections edited, removed or rearranged to improve the overall flow of the text.

Part 1: Introduction

Suffering is a real aspect of a person’s life. It can be defined as the sense of undergoing pain, distress, or hardship. From a distant perspective, suffering as a Christian can be seen as less painful than suffering as a non-Christian, because Christians will always have someone to look up to, someone who will be with them and ultimately have the transcendental view that in the end, there will be no more suffering. But this thought is far from true. If there in fact is someone who is always looking out for Christians (and the world in general), and if this someone is all-powerful and loving, then why does He allow His followers to suffer? It is understood that He is present with Christians when they suffer, based on the words and experiences heard in many testimonies. But the fact that He is there does not account for the fact the He allows this to happen. So, is there a purpose to this suffering?

Many people can give general reasons as to why they suffer, such as to mature, to learn how to overcome tough times and to grow spiritually or emotionally. But are these answers enough to justify the pain one endures? This post will attempt to answer these questions, looking at the following points:

• If there is an all-powerful God watching out for His children, then He has the ability to prevent suffering. If an all-powerful God loves His children, then he will not want for them to suffer. Since his children suffer, then he either isn’t preventing the suffering for lack of love or for lack of power.
• Christians believe in an all-powerful God who has a purpose for even the smallest of events. This purpose is revealed through His word or people’s experiences. What is the purpose of human suffering? Is it unique for every different individual? Is there even a purpose involved?
• Christians understand that God is present during their suffering. How exactly is He present? Aside from helping one endure the pain and eventually overcome it, is there any other reason that might point to a loving God watching out for His children?

Part 2 coming soon