Ep. 119: This is How We Suffer

Isaac Dagneau:
When it comes to suffering, when Christians suffer, often many Christians struggle with this idea of a good and loving God, and their suffering, whether it’s spontaneous, shocking suffering or slow suffering, they can confuse, well, “How can God be good if I’m suffering?” So, how do you counsel people through that as pastors when someone comes up to you, explains their suffering and they’re struggling with that question of reconciling a good God with suffering?

John Neufeld:
I mean, first of all, I think whenever suffering happens to an individual, the first response, the pastoral response is not to respond, but simply to be there, to pray with, to assure the individual you’re not going to leave them in a lurch, that they’ll always be surrounded by people if they need them. If they need time to simply be alone, we want to listen carefully to their own response to their suffering and respond, rather than bring in an agenda.
So, to me the first question is never how do you answer their big question, the first is how does one simply be loving and gracious and stand with them as they suffer?

Isaac Dagneau:
Right. I think we were even talking earlier this morning about Job, and you said the best thing that his friends did was, the first week, where they just sat with them and didn’t say anything.

John Neufeld:
Yeah. I mean, if they never opened their mouths it might have been a good experience, but eventually, of course, what happens is Job says something that sets one of them off. So Bildad is very upset with what Job has said and then intervenes to correct him, and I think there’s something to be learned from that. Sometimes in the midst of suffering, people will say things, and the good and godly lover of the soul of the person who’s suffering may not intervene at that point in time and simply say, these are things that a person needs to say, there will be a time when we talk about that but maybe not in the immediate. I think that’s good counsel.

Clint Nelson:
I think, yeah, that context is key in all of that, you want to figure out where they’re coming from theologically, the nature of their loss, their grieving, their suffering and you want to then sensitively, yet truthfully and lovingly, engage them and be present with them.
I think of Lazarus and the friends and family there, weeping and grieving the loss of him, and Jesus doesn’t come and correct their theology immediately, he just comes, and he cries with them. I mean, he knows what’s in store and what will come, but he’s just present with them and he cries with them. That’s a Christian response and the immediate response, the first step, to suffering to loss is to grieve with those who grieve.

Isaac Dagneau:
I think as we were talking even before, John made the point where it’s not as though if suffering happens, it’s rather, suffering will happen as well.

John Neufeld:
I think that’s a part of basic Christian discipleship. As a pastor, both Clint and I, we’ve been in that pastoral ministry, we need to prepare people in advance that it’s not that they might suffer in some time, the point that I think we need to do is that every single human being will suffer, it is unavoidable, and somehow, we need to train people before they arrive there that this is indeed what they will face one day.

Clint Nelson:
I’m excited that we’re having this talk because many people do not like to talk about death, they don’t like to talk about suffering or grief, and yet a healthy, biblical understanding of suffering, it changes the way that you grieve. It changes the way that you process it and see it and walk through it. It’s dramatically different depending on what your theology is about the nature of suffering.

Isaac Dagneau:
John, when you think of how to grieve well, what comes to mind?

John Neufeld:
Well, I know that grieving as we experience it, there are certain markers for a believer that help us, I think, through the process. It’s not that we don’t grieve, I think we need to face our loss and deeply understand it. I mean, I think that’s just basic, but while we’re going through it I think there are certain things that we need to remember.
One of the things that makes sense to me at time of grief is that in my grieving, I am called upon, what Paul says, to fill up the sufferings of Christ. He talks about that in Philippians chapter 2, I think it … Oh, I’m sorry, it’s in Colossians. Now, I rejoice in my suffering for your sake, and in my flesh I am filling up what is lacking in Christ’s afflictions.
Now, there’s a number of ways to understand that, but one of the ways that I think we can understand it is that in his mercy, God is allowing us to experience suffering so that when we think of the sufferings of Christ, we’ll begin to understand them personally because unlike Christ, our suffering happens simply because we live in this broken and fallen world, Christ chose to suffer. When I think about that, now having experienced suffering myself, I begin to realize what he did on my behalf. So, in his mercy, God has allowed me to suffer so that I might understand the great love of God for me. That’s helpful for me to at least begin to say if this has some redemptive features in my life.

Isaac Dagneau:
So, I guess a healthy grief leads you closer to the gospel and Jesus, and an unhealthy grief would just lead you to anger, frustration, I guess, compared to leading you to Jesus.

John Neufeld:
Yeah, I think that’s what I’m saying. I think that as I now think about the grief that Jesus felt, or when Paul talks about Epaphroditus and he didn’t die and then he writes in Philippians, “God prevented me from having sorrow upon sorrow,” so you get a sense of an already grieving apostle who was about to be hit with a grief that was more than he could bear, and then he thanks God that this grief wasn’t added upon the other that he already had. So, when I read that, I think I begin to identify with an apostle, who understood grief so well and so intimately.

Clint Nelson:
Part of understanding suffering in light of God is recognizing that God doesn’t like to allow suffering to happen, but there’s always that bigger aspect of life to the eternal component to suffering. I know lots of people ask me, they wonder, “There’s so many people praying for you and for your wife, why didn’t God heal her?” those kinds of questions, and my response is always, “Well, God’s got something bigger up his sleeve.” There’s something in this process that will come out of this, whether or not I ever understand that, whether I ever see that, I have no idea, only God knows that, and that’s where it comes to trusting in his character and his plans and his promises for us in the light of eternity. Just coming back to that.

Isaac Dagneau:
Yeah. I remember thinking, I think it was a year ago, and I just thought, okay, well, God cares more about my eternal destiny than he does about my immediate feelings. And thinking of that in all of your daily circumstances really helps because it’s like, I’m feeling bad, I’m suffering, I’m in pain, well, God’s working in me for my eternal destiny rather than right for this second.

Clint Nelson:
Exactly, and through your life and others’ lives as well. I mean, he wants to use your life to be a blessing to others, and so who knows how God will use our pain, our loss, to help others in and through.

John Neufeld:
One of my favourite verses has always benn Romans 8:28, God causes all things to work together for the good to those who love him, and for me this is how I understand when I suffer. I think to myself that a good and loving God would never have allowed me to walk through this were it not that he is interested in some eternal, long-term good for me.
Now, I don’t know in the immediate, and I think that’s why I … I really appreciated, Clint, what you just said, and that is you didn’t ask the question of why, you asked the question of how long- I think we do well to defer the question of why. There is a time in the future when we will know why, we just won’t know that now, but it does provide us some source of comfort to know that God is altogether sovereign, and this suffering that I’m going through is redemptive in the long-term. Just to cling to that, we don’t have to know why, we don’t have to know how it’s redemptive, we just need to believe that it is redemptive. That’s, I think, key for much suffering.

Isaac Dagneau:
Obviously, many listeners are suffering right now, but there’s also a lot of listeners as well that are not, but they have friends and family members who come to them with their sufferings, and I guess the next question that I think would be good to address is a very practical one in that … I mean, we’ve already kind of touched on, I guess, the meat of it, but how do we respond to someone who’s come to us and has shared their suffering, what is the best way that we can, I guess, bring them closer to Jesus, obviously, and help them grieve in a good way without minimizing the issue but bring them closer to Jesus?

Clint Nelson:
I think it helps to know that grief is natural. It’s a natural response in light of the condition that we are in as humanity in that there is the loss of something good, and that should grieve us, a grieve to God. He created all things good, he gives all good things and so there’s a loss of something that is good, and it’s natural to grieve. I think that’s why Jesus wept when he heard and saw the family of Lazarus weeping and struggling with the loss of their brother. That’s the same thing there- Because I think in my own natural, fleshly response to someone that’s grieving, I’m not in my nature, I am not a very pastoral person, I just think, okay, these are the facts, this is what happened, let’s move on, and yet it’s completely healthy, it’s completely good for us to recognize, hey, I’ve lost something that was good and I’m grieving the loss of something that was good. But then you also, like we’ve been talking about, you move onto the next thing, well, what do I do with this? Right, there’s even better news out there. There’s good news in store, and that is that God can redeem and will redeem the situation. That’s the good news, the silver lining to those dark days.

John Neufeld:
Isaac, I’d like to also bring something else up that we haven’t yet at this point in time, and that is there is an aspect of suffering that causes us to dis-attach ourselves from our love of this world. In the end, we will lose everything that this world has to offer, and so it is to arm ourselves that God has ultimately created us for eternity and for his presence and that what we’re going through at this point in time in our suffering will eventually break our attachment to all things.
We were talking about some of this before this began it, and you’ll remember, Isaac, that one of the conversations that we had is, I was explaining that the death of my own father, and as he was dying I’d come into his room and I’d say, “Dad, it’s raining outside today,” and I remember him saying, “John, that’s fine. I’ve lost my interest in all things in this world and I have my eye so on eternity at this moment.” I remember thinking about that perspective and what that would be, but he seemed to have grasped it so completely and utterly that he wasn’t anymore, although he had, but he had come now to the place where he was, not mourning the loss of all things in this world anymore, indeed, he had already given them up.
In the end, I think, when we stand before the precipice of eternity, each one of us will. That’s my prayer for myself, “Oh, God, give me such a love in the world to come and such a willingness to break all attachment here.” To me that is a part of the process.

Isaac Dagneau:
Jake, what do you do when a young adult comes to you, and for those who don’t know, you are a young adult pastor as well. So, what do you do when a young adult comes to you and shares their grief?

Jake Lowell:
What’s really important, and like what those guys said and really started out with there, is a really, really important thing, and I think something that’s very simple is just to spend some time with them in that – in their grief and be there. Maybe that’s even just sitting with them in silence, maybe that’s as they weep, just being there and them knowing that you’re there. Because I think what can be really detrimental for them, more so in those times, is them coming to you and talking to you about something that’s probably pretty fresh and you saying something like, “Oh, it’s going to be okay,” and trying to convince them of that sort of stuff, instead of just going and being humble enough to go this person is hurting and it’s deep and it’s real, and I want them to understand that I don’t know what they’re going through at the moment, because that’s very specific to them, but “I understand that you are hurting and that also in a way hurts me too and I grieve alongside you.” Just be there for them.

Isaac Dagneau:
That’s really good. It makes me think of the time when my grandpa passed away, and it was a few years ago now, but at that moment when he passed away in the hospital I got the surge of … I grabbed his Bible, and my grandma was there, and my mom was there, and I just opened it and I start reading Revelation about the new heavens where there’d be no tears and all that kind of stuff. And I realized after that it sort of fell flat, and the reason why is because I tried to just be all spiritual, like, “It’s okay guys, we don’t need to grieve. This is where he’s at right now,” and it’s true, that is so true, but at the same time I think we just needed to all be in silence. So, I agree with what you say.

Jake Lowell:
Yeah. I think too, what’s important to understand is, yeah, that’s great to have that understanding, and maybe we’ll talk a little more about that, about heaven and new earth and all that sort of thing, that’s great and that’s encouraging, but that doesn’t mean that you can’t be sad, because in a sense someone has been lost and they’re not there with you in that moment in time and their presence isn’t really there that you can talk to them or hug them, or that sort of thing, and that’s okay. Even Jesus thought that was okay, because what does he do when Mary comes up to him and says that Lazarus is dead, and he sees how grief stricken she is, he weeps and he cries. This is the guy who’s literally told them beforehand that, no, it’s going to be okay, I understand, but he’s still there. He weeps because it’s sad because Lazarus, in some senses died, and he’s gone for that moment, and that’s hard for people and that’s okay.

Isaac Dagneau:
Yeah, that’s good. It’s interesting, a great verse is in 2 Corinthians 1:3-4, and really it’s … Pretty much, Paul, is saying praise to the God of all comfort who’s comforted me so that I can go now comfort others. I think it’s important too that when someone comes up and shares their grief with you, you have to be at a place … If you want to be a mature Christian, you have to be at a place where you have rested in the fact that you have been comforted by God. If you’re not comforted, if you feel like you’re suffering and you’re not able to give anything, the you won’t be able to give anything. You’re just going to give bad answers and all that kind of stuff.
But as you’re saying, the fact that you can just sort of be silent with them and just listen to them, that takes strength to do that, and I think that will be a lot easier when you recognize the comfort that God has given you, the Father has given you, so that you can now go and comfort others with that. So, recognize and rejoice in the comfort you received from the Father and then go and comfort others.
Romans 8:28, which John brings up, which is sort of the … I’ve heard it said that it is the “John 3:16” for Christians, it is said. It’s like the go-to verse, like “this is the best verse.” If you have not heard it, it is, “For we know that all,” this is sort of a paraphrase, but the idea is “we know that all things work together for good for those who love God and are called according to his purpose.” Really, that’s a bedrock truth when it comes to suffering and grief because after you get over that hump of sitting with people, or going through suffering yourself and just going through that grieving period, there has to come a time, whether it’s in an hour, a day, a week, a year, there has to come a time where you can actually rest in the fact that all things, including this event that happened that caused grief, is for the good of you from God.

Jake Lowell:
Yeah, and it’s important because I think there’s a healthy grief, like a good and natural, and then I think what they were saying too is that, but this grief can go on for so long and you can dwell in it and live in it that it becomes despair. And what happens with despair is that you’re stripped of hope and it starts affecting your lifestyle and it starts affecting your outlook on things, so I think it’s important to come back to that place, and I think that’s where Jesus was. He did grieve, but that he did also have that hope and it’s going to be okay because I’m going to raise him from the dead, he’s going to be lifted up, and I think we really need to stay focused on that, that there’s something more than this period of time, and it’s okay to be in this period of time but there’s something outside of this as well, something to move towards.

Isaac Dagneau:
So, how do you then, as a pastor, and this is really to anybody because we can all be pastoral in some ways, but how do you then … You notice someone in despair, how do you slowly begin to draw them out of that despair and into hope?

Jake Lowell:
I think you really just have to encourage them to be hopeful. I think the most incredible thing about this terrible tragedy with the Humboldt Broncos is, as we were talking about before Isaac, is that this was a team that was centered around Christ. Their coach talked to the team about Christ, they had this chaplain who spoke to them about Christ and hopefully, they knew him and accepted him, and as they did, that there’s a future for their parents as they, accept Christ themselves, that they will be reconciled to one another, that they will see them again, that is tough while they’re not here but that there’s something so much more, and that eternal weight of glory will just make this stuff just pale in comparison.
I don’t think you go towards this thing of trying to make them feel like this is nothing now, that’s not the point, but the point is not that, but how amazing it will be in the future and they’re not just gone but they’re with Christ in that time. It can be hard, I guess, at times, whether or not that person did have a relationship with Christ or not, but then I think you just sort of encourage them in that way too, that there’s something more for you as well than the suffering that you’re experiencing right now.

Isaac Dagneau:
I think that’s awesome. I think it’s in 2 Corinthians, Paul makes mention of this fact saying that though our outer lives are wasting away, our inner lives are being renewed day by day. And then he pretty much says, don’t focus completely on the momentary affliction that you are experiencing right now because there’s going to be this weighty …. Weighty … Weighty weight of glory?

Jake Lowell:
Yeah. I actually have it right here, I’ll pull it up.

Isaac Dagneau:
Yeah? You know what, I’m brutalizing it, so you say it.

Jake Lowell:
It’s 2 Corinthians 4:17-18, and it says, “For this light, momentary affliction is preparing us for an eternal weight of glory beyond all comparison. As we look not to things that are seen, but to the things that are unseen, for the things that are seen are transient, but the things that are unseen are eternal.”

Isaac Dagneau:
Yeah, so good. You said that way better than I did.

Jake Lowell:
Well, the Bible said it way better.

Isaac Dagneau:
That’s awesome. Something else too, thinking about the church in Thessalonica, when Paul writes to them, you sort of understand that there is this concern they had with those in their church or whatever who had died, and the way that Paul encourages them is really cool, he says this in 4:13, “But we do not want you to uninformed, brothers and sisters, about those who are asleep,” so that’s sort of saying people who have died, “that you may not grieve as others do who have no hope. For since we believe that Jesus died and rose again, even so, through Jesus, God will bring with him those who have fallen asleep.” And then he goes on to say that, those who are dead in Christ, when Jesus comes back, they’re going to rise first. So, there’s hope there.
At the very end of this section in 1 Thessalonians 18:4, it says, “Therefore encourage one another with these words,” and that’s such a straight command to be like when we are suffering, specifically when it comes to Christians who have passed away, who many of us here … One of the ways that we can encourage one another is to say, hey, they’re asleep. That’s kind of radical. That’s a radical way to think. They are asleep and when Christ comes back, they will be risen first, which is very hopeful.

Jake Lowell:
I think a really powerful thing, as we sort of end that, I heard Timothy Keller say one time is that this promise that we’ve been given through God of new life, it’s not a consolation prize. It’s not like “Here’s something for all the bad things that happened and now this is to make you feel better because you went through bad things.” He says “No, it’s a complete renewal, it’s reconciliation, it’s all these things, that in some way that all that stuff that has happened becomes,” he used the word, “untrue.” That they’re no longer dead, that that suffering no longer exists, that it’s not those things but it’s a new reality, and you’re taken from that into something new and it’s resurrected.

Isaac Dagneau:
That’s awesome. Thanks, Jake. I appreciate your time today for sure.