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Three Types Of Suffering
Contributed by John Bright on Feb 25, 2025 (message contributor)
“Wesley adopted a traditional Christian distinction between types of suffering: natural, moral, and penal. People suffer because of disease and natural disaster; people suffer because other people harm them; and people suffer because they are punished for wrongdoing.
(Natural Suffering) Wesley argued that God did in fact design a better universe, and that nature as it is now, which can be a source of great pain, became the way it is as a result of sin. Human sin dragged the entire created order down with it. As for moral suffering, it is not hard to see that sin, the result of which is self-centered human nature, gives rise to humans who seek their own good above the good of others, and do not mind causing pain along the way. As for penal suffering, it is also not hard to see that a just God would mete out punishment for sin (and as an encouragement to do better).”
https://www.patheos.com/library/methodist/beliefs/suffering-and-the-problem-of-evil
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