Dear Sister,
I have a dear friend who recently gave birth to a precious little boy who is not perfect in the world’s eyes. In the last couple months this Mama and Daddy have spent day after day after day in a hospital with their son while their other children keenly feel their absence at home, though well- cared for by other family and church members. Their little guy has already undergone three surgeries and his myriad of doctors anticipate multiple others. Exhaustion, frustration, fear, concern, worry, being overwhelmed are probably their new normal.
It is understandable that the natural mind would ask how a loving God could possibly exist considering all the evil and sadness in our world. This past week seventeen lives were snuffed out in a school shooting. Every day babies are massacred through abortion, husbands leave wives and their little ones, loved ones die of dread diseases, we ourselves are diagnosed with the unthinkable. And if there is a God, the claims of His goodness and compassion are severely overrated—as well as the claims of His omnipotence. After all, if these attributes were true, would He not put a stop to these hardships, sorrows, and sufferings? Where is justice?
Do we, as true Christians, ever have such thoughts, no matter how fleeting? We are familiar with the attributes of God. Some we seem to love more than others. We cherish His love and faithfulness when they bring our desired outcome. When they don’t conform to our image of them because they result in difficulty and discomfort, we tend to grumble and question God’s wisdom, His justice, and His heart.
Compassion is one of His attributes. But where is compassion when troubles overwhelm, suffocate, and sap every ounce of energy? Maybe our thoughts turn this way because we think of compassion in merely human terms, failing to understand this quality from God’s perspective. In our humanity we think of compassion as feeling deeply for someone, putting our arms around them, even trying to remove the source of their suffering because we hurt for them. We want to make it all better.
A book in my possession lists many of God’s attributes and defines His compassion in this way: “God cares for His children and acts on their behalf.” That sounds wonderful. And if He is also omnipotent in that working on my behalf He will remove the source of my discomfort, won’t He? But this is where our thinking can get skewed.
Working on our behalf does not mean making everything better in the here and now. The promise is that He will make all things right when we see Him face-to-face. His care on our behalf in this life is to comfort in the sorrow, to shelter us under His wings, to be sure, but to use the trial to make us more like Jesus, thus bringing glory to Him. Removal of difficulties is not His goal.
According to Scripture, Jesus is the God of all comfort and compassion as we walk this unknown and often tedious and rocky pilgrimage. He walked it before us thousands of years ago in His incarnation. He strode dusty streets, felt the pain and anguish and exhaustion of the sick, the anxious, the grieving, and the downtrodden. He was tempted to sin just as we are, but through it all He honored and obeyed the Father, never yielding to His flesh. He suffered, bled, and died in our place, taking the filth of our sin upon Himself. “Surely He has borne our griefs and carried our sorrows,” old Isaiah prophesied. And John told us that “Jesus wept.” But, He rose again following that excruciating death, having endured the fullness of His Father’s wrath, promising that His children would never experience that judgment but would rise again in like manner, with all their tears wiped away, being glorified forever and ever. Perfect justice mixed with sweet mercy. Our sins on Him. His righteousness in us. That wonderful exchange.
May we be reminded of these precious truths when our minds tend to deceive us into thinking this present suffering is all there is—that it will suffocate and render us incapacitated. Our compassionate God has great purpose in our suffering, purifying us for our heavenly homeland where all will be made right. If He never let us suffer we would never learn to trust Him or be like Him. This is true compassion. This is how He cares for us and works on our behalf.
Clinging to the Savior with you,
Cherry