I don’t know how to respond to this article about suffering other than to say that the people involved seem to be enamored with themselves.  Christianity doesn’t have simple answers for all things, but the things the people in this article are saying make me want to hurl.  Their attitude towards pain and suffering indicates that they have not read their Bibles, they haven’t evaluated the afterlife, and that they don’t understand the full potential of pain and suffering that could take place.  I once heard a teacher discussing this very issue bring up a good point: what if God was halving suffering from what it could be?  What if we, on this earth, were only suffering one one-hundredth of what we could be suffering?  Would we care?  Would we be thankful towards God for preserving us and letting us suffer so little?

I have written before about a former elder at our church who simply taught about trials and suffering and went over the need for the Christian to understand God’s use of trials and suffering in their life.  Hal actually suffered a lot as he died of cancer, but that cancer was not a trial he couldn’t fathom, he spent much time rejoicing that the Lord used it to bring people into his life that he could share the gospel of Jesus Christ with.  Hal saw that the trials and suffering were a beautiful gift that was only temporary.  He saw eternity with God as a clear and powerful goal that made the suffering less of a distraction.  Yes, he hurt.  Yes, his family and our whole church cried when he died, but we all know where he’s going and we all wept with joy as we came together to share stories of love, compassion and awesome counseling that were all part of Hal’s life.

The article linked to above doesn’t offer answers and hope, it offers hopelessness and really nothing worth keeping track of.