Why does God allow suffering? Part 2

The first step, I believe, is to consider what the question actually means to the person.  The answer, "Because God has given us free-will," whilst correct, is so simplistic/trivial and academic that it's of no use.

So let's consider it:
Person: "Why does God allow suffering?"
 
By which they mean: "Why does a God of love allow suffering?" (because of course if they believed God was evil the answer would be obvious)

If the person is asking genuinely, this probably actually means:

"If God loved me, why did He allow me to suffer as I did?"

implying that:
"If I had God's power, I wouldn't let innocent people suffer."

and maybe in their case:
"If I had God's power, I would defend the children in this world from abuse."


To be continued... !

Forgiveness - I don't like that word!

I don't use the word forgiveness at the moment; it reminds me too much of my childhood understanding of it: "I'm sure he didn't mean it", "he'll know better one day", "it was just an accident", just pretend you're OK and carry on the friendship/relationship with the person.

But of course you can't carry on in the same relationship until they repent to you!

My understanding of forgiveness now is 'releasing them from what they morally owe you'. Now they only owe God.

I pray something like this nowadays (very useful I've found for dealing with childhood hurts):

"Lord, what you suffered on the cross is sufficient punishment for what they have done to me; I am satisfied that their sin against me has been paid by you. So, I release them from what they owe me, they now only owe you for what they have done to me."


I think this is what God means when He tells us to forgive people.

Why Does God Allow Suffering? Pt 1 (of a life-long pursuit of better answers)

Had a sudden thought during my last Dance meditation group:

"Jesus still regarded God as being a God of love even when He was being tortured to death by flogging and the cross."

I was thinking about when a child gets hit, for whatever reason, it can produce a feeling of rejection; "This pain means I'm not loved."

God does allow suffering. (Obviously, we've all suffered.)  But does this mean God isn't Love?  Christ was the person who trusted God and knew God closer than anyone in history.  He still believed God was a God of love even when suffering the cross.

(I don't mean we should now feel condemned and rubbish because we're not like Him.  It's just another place to start from when trying to answer this question to ourselves.)

Don't say "Go away!", instead walk yourself away

The harder you try to let go of something, the more bound you become to it.

"Go away, go away, grrr really GO AWAY..."

To let go of something, just walk away from it.  Let it be what it is, without trying to change or destroy it, and just walk away from it. (Don't go back to see how it's getting on.)

Rather than commanding the 'thing' to go away, as if you have some authority over it.  Exercise the authority you actually have, i.e. the authority you have to remove yourself from the thing.
(won't work it cases where the thing can follow you of couse - perseverance and/or authority required for that.)

Intuitive sense

"Whenever I try to follow my intuitive sense of what to do, I become self-conscious of what I'm doing and so lose touch with my intuition."

Most notice this when dancing.  Sometimes I can feel how the dance should move next, and I start doing it. But I then get overwhelmed with consciousness of what my body is automatically doing that I'm then back to being in conscious control again.



 AARRGGGHH!  most annoying...

I use to get this problem when learning to touch-type.  Looking at the screen, not the keys I would suddenly realise, "I'M DOING IT! This is amazing!" and then it would suddenly stop - because I'd become conscious of it again.

I think I was brought up to not trust intuition; if you can't be in control of it, it must be a bad thing.

God designed our intuitive brain, so surely we should allow ourselves to develop it as fully as possible.

Christ's Loneliness

Jesus was aquainted with loneliness of a sort:

Luke 9:57  As they were walking along the road, someone said to him, “I will follow you wherever you go.” 9:58 Jesus said to him, “Foxes have dens and the birds in the sky have nests, but the Son of Man has no place to lay his head.”

The NET translation notes add:  Jesus’ reply is simply this: Does the man understand the rejection he will be facing? Jesus has no home in the world (the Son of Man has no place to lay his head).

Many times Jesus would try and explain something to the disciples and they couldn't understand. And during the crucifixion his friends didn't stay awake with Him in Gethsemane and most left him at the cross.

So, I think in following Christ we can expect to be alone in different ways, as others don't understand what God has called us to do or what we go through is too hard for them to cope with.

If you've ever been left alone whilst going through something because the people around you couldn't handle it, then Christ knows what that is like and went through the same. We don't have to deny or hide such loneliness, we can allow ourselves to connect with Christ and allow His presence with us in our pain. (Which doesn't necessarily take the pain away, but it does mean we don't have to be alone with it.)

Is 53:3  "He was despised and rejected by men, a man of sorrows, and familiar with suffering. Like one from whom men hide their faces he was despised, and we esteemed him not."

Practical Predestination

A. There are verses in the Bible that indicate that it is God who chooses us, that only the 'elect' are saved, it appears to not be up to us.
B. There are verses which indicate that we have a choice on how to live. That "anyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved" and that we are responsible for obeying God's commands.

A. Everytime you thank God for saving you, you are saying it was His choice; you don't deserve any credit for finding faith in Him. So, every time we do this we are practically believing in some form of predestination.
B. Everytime I repent of my sin, I'm saying it was my choice and not down to God, so I'm practically believing in free-will.

I think that this is something we humans are incapable of fully understanding. The expanations we come up with never totally cover everything.

So, what I do practically is:

1. Accept and thank God that He chose me and others (the elect). Rejoice in the confidence that this gives me that His acceptance of me as I am right now, full of sin and hurt, is therefore not dependant on my performance. And in evangelism, I'm not responsible for saving others as if it were down to my persuasive abilities. (The practical results of a predestination belief.)

2. Live as if I am responsible for everything I do. Take the attitude that all who call on Him will be saved and so never allow predestination ideas to stop me telling others about Christ. Never assume that what has happened is just God's will - it might be down to my failure or someone else's - fight injustice. (As if it were all free-will).

In others words, we can't get a middle ground understanding that explains everything. I think God did this intentionally so that we have to stay dependant on Him. We can't get our theology all exactly correct and go off and do Christian life by ourselves.

So, in our minds we hold these two extremes in tension, and so have to look to God Himself afresh in each thing that comes up in our lives.