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EDITORIAL
Suffering at human hands

Jim Coggins

In the New Testament book of 1 Peter, believers are repeatedly admonished to patiently endure suffering. These repeated warnings raise a number of questions about the whole matter of suffering at human hands and the will of God.

We are told to submit to God. At times, God also commands us to submit to suffering. There is a danger then of equating God and suffering, and to suggest that it is God who causes us to suffer.

In truth, however, God is never the author of suffering. Suffering is the result of our sin and the general fallenness of the world. God merely allows it – just as He has allowed the world to go on since Noah’s time without washing it clean again with a flood. Evil is always evil. God allows it to continue, but God is very active bringing good out of evil. That is a primary point that needs to be repeated again and again – God is not the author of suffering or evil (James 1:13-17, 1 John 1:5).

But that does not resolve all of the questions raised by 1 Peter. God does sometimes command us to endure suffering – just as He commanded Jesus to endure the cross. Jesus asked if there was any way out, but there was none if He was going to fulfil the purpose for which He had come to earth.

The same was true for the believers Peter was writing to. Their suffering was due to the fact that they were being persecuted by the Roman government for being Christians. There was a way for the Christians to bring the suffering to an end – they could renounce their Christian beliefs, and many church members did this. But God commanded His followers to remain faithful to Him, and hence to continue to suffer.

This does not mean that God always commands us to endure suffering silently. In the church, God specifically commanded Christians to seek reconciliation with each other, and the command goes both to the one suffering (Matthew 18:15) and to the one causing the suffering (Matthew 5:23-24). If something another Christian has done has caused you great pain, then you are commanded to go to him and talk about it. Ask for his help in solving your problem. In the Kingdom there is to be no pain (Revelation 21:4).

Sometimes, however, reconciliation does not occur. God does not then say, “Okay, now endure the suffering.” Instead, He offers two more steps to attempt reconciliation: bring another Christian, a mediator, into the matter (Matthew 18:16), and report it to the church, bring the weight of community pressure to bear on the problem (Matthew 18:17a).

When these fail, again Jesus does not command the sufferer to suffer. Instead, the one who causes the suffering is to be expelled from the church (Matthew 18:17b). There is to be no pain in the Kingdom, and if the one who causes pain does not repent, he removes himself from the Kingdom.

There is also suffering inflicted by outsiders, non-Christians, and often we are powerless to prevent this. Sometimes we can bring it to an end by moving away from trouble or by appealing to government, which was instituted by God to restrain evil (often by evil means) in an evil world. Jesus avoided the people of Nazareth when they tried to throw Him from a cliff (Luke 4:30). Paul appealed to the Roman government for protection from his enemies (Acts 23:12-18).

Sometimes, however, we may choose – and God may command us – to endure suffering, even when we could prevent it or avoid it. We can choose to suffer unjustly in order to offer mercy to the unjust, who may in fact be the very ones causing the suffering (Matthew 5:38-48, Romans 12:14, 17-21, 1 Corinthians 6:7). Jesus died on the cross to redeem all of sinful humanity, including those who were putting Him to death. We can suffer in order to demonstrate to sinful people that there is a way of love, to demonstrate that someone must sacrifice himself in order to redeem society. We can choose to suffer out of love for our enemy in order to prevent him from suffering, even from suffering the just penalty for his crime. There is no virtue in suffering for its own sake, but sometimes it should be endured for the sake of a greater good.

This is not always the best way. There may be a time when love demands that we stand up to evil, for the redemption of the evildoer – just as we confront the sin of a fellow Christian in order to bring about repentance and reconciliation. There is a great temptation here, for of course resisting the evildoer is precisely what we want to do. It takes great wisdom and discernment to know the times and the present means of God’s choosing.

There is one final warning I would like to make. Jean-Paul Sartre once suggested that we cannot make this a world in which children do not suffer and die, but that we can and should reduce the number who suffer. Ours is a world filled with pain, and we cannot prevent all of it, although that is what we work for. We live in an evil world, but we should never accommodate ourselves to evil, never accept it. We should never lose our sense of moral outrage at injustice, the type of outrage that compelled Jesus to cleanse the temple. We should never lose sight of the ideals of justice and holiness. Sometimes, often in fact, we cannot prevent injustice and we must endure it, but not before crying out, “This is evil – and God will ultimately punish it and end it.” Having done that, if we can do no more, we do well to endure suffering, cease to struggle and rest in God’s comfort.

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Last modified June 17, 2000.

© 2000 Mennonite Brethren Herald.
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