Why God Allows Suffering

The final truth that sheds light on why there is suffering is:

4) There is no comparison between our suffering and the good God has in store for those who love Him.

I don’t won’t to minimize anyone’s pain but it helps if we take a long term perspective on our sufferings. Paul said, “For our light and momentary troubles are achieving for us an eternal glory that far outweighs them all.” This said by a man who went through more suffering than most of us will ever know. He also said, “For I consider that our present sufferings are not worth comparing with the glory that will be revealed in us.” Paul had a long term perspective on pain, he looked at things from an eternal point of view and we need to get in the habit of doing that as well.

Look at it this way- Let’s say that on the first day of this year, you had the worst day of your life. You had a root canal and came home and found that your house had burned down and you lost everything. Then you discovered that your best friend betrayed your trust and was found guilty for burning your house. That’s a pretty bad first day of the year isn’t it? But imagine that the rest of 2006 turned out to be wonderful-you inherited 25 million dollars and bought a new house, you got a new car, you paid off all your debt and gave your family and friends money they needed. You gave much of your money to charity and helped many who were in need. You were named Person of the Year by Time magazine and rewarded with a free month long vacation in Hawaii. 2006 was a wonderful year for you. On the next new year’s day, someone asked how was last year for you? You say absolutely wonderful! But what about that first day? Wasn’t it a bad one? Yes, but compared with the other 364 days, there was no comparison and you hardly even remember that painful day.

And the same will be true for us in heaven, we may have suffered for 80 years on earth but when compared to the goodness and joy of eternity, we won’t even remember the pain we had on earth. One particular Christian, who lived a life full of pain said, “In light of heaven, the worst suffering on earth will be seen to be no more serious than one night in an inconvenient hotel.” Galvin Reid tells the story of a young man who had fallen down some stairs as an infant and had shattered his back. He had been in and out of hospitals his whole life with one surgery after another. But at 17 years of age, this young man made the comment that He thought God was more than fair with him. When Galvin Reid reminded him that he had practically lived his whole life in hospitals, he asked the young man, “How can you say that God is fair?” He smiled and said, “God has all of eternity to make it up to me.” In our sufferings, it helps to see things from an eternal point of view and know that our pain has no comparison with the joy and glory of living eternally with God.

Paul said in 1 Corinthians 2:9 “No eye has seen, no ear has heard, no mind has conceived, what God has prepared for those who love Him.”