Suffering Is Not a Better Teacher than Love

"For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life.” John 3:16 (NKJV)

by Alexandra Copeland

James 1:12 (NLT) tells us, “God blesses those who patiently endure testing and temptation. Afterward they will receive the crown of life that God has promised to those who love him.”  When many people read this verse, their minds automatically process it to mean that God will bless, test, and tempt His people. Some of us have been programmed to think that He causes the harshness and severity of our circumstances to test our faith. This is so seared upon some of our psyches that we cannot begin to see otherwise. We believe that God is oppressing us to mold us into what He would have us to be, and that we cannot be this person if we do not continue to suffer.

In order to accept this line of thought, we have to believe that #1 God is limited in His knowledge of who we are and what we will do and #2, that suffering is a better teacher than love. Neither of these assumptions can be true. The Apostle James made sure that we have no questions in our minds regarding the source of temptations; they come from the devil, and so that we would not be confused on the subject, he said in James 1:13(NKJV), “Let no one say when he is tempted, “I am tempted by God”; for God cannot be tempted by evil, nor does He Himself tempt anyone.”

When human beings become convinced that there is no end to their suffering, and that they will not experience a higher level of life beyond their current conditions, it is a sure sign that death and darkness are hovering. Something tragic almost always results. The environments that give birth to and perpetuate this kind of hell are those where Heavenly Father is seen as a mean, oppressive God that will not let up. People feel uninspired and trapped, unable to move themselves out of what they’ve come to accept as life on the bottom rail.

In order for a person to transition out of this kind of hell, there must be an infusion of light so bright, that it snaps them out of slumber and awakens them to rays of hope. It turns their thoughts of impossibility into thoughts of possibility. Only our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ can come into a place so dark and illuminate it with supernatural and transformative love.

I’ve been very honest and open about my own suffering at various points of my life. I never knew that emotional pain could impact a person so severely that it would seemingly suck the life right out of them. With this kind of pain, you truly don’t believe that there is any remedy on earth that will aid it. I knew God. I had been in a loving Christian community all of my life. I lived as much of God’s Word as I thought I knew, but I couldn’t shake misery. It seemed to follow me like a shadow, and I felt hopeless.

I thought that God had caused my predicament as a way to groom me for a really big blessing; many Christians that comforted me did so with those exact words. But after my troubling circumstances continued with no ease, I told the Lord that He could just skip the blessing part. I’d rather be without it than to continue in the state I was in. I felt this way because I did not know any better.

God was not punishing me. I was punished by my own ignorance. I thought I knew all that I needed to know, and I didn’t realize that my lack of knowledge about God and His Word was destroying me. Often those who knew of my plight encouraged me by saying that God had singled me out for something so good that it would make the suffering worthwhile. This didn’t comfort me much. Even at my young age back then, I understood that trouble could be a vicious negative cycle. So I couldn’t understand what would be served by vexing me with overwhelming circumstances, blessing me, only to endure trouble again in the not so distant future. I wanted to get off the hamster wheel, and I started to suspect that there had to be a better way.

I began to search the scriptures, and I didn’t have to search for long. One day, I came across 2 Corinthians 5:17(KJV) and the words seemed to magnify on the page. This verse says, “Therefore if any man be in Christ, he is a new creature: old things are passed away; behold, all things are become new.” I knew my old life backwards and forwards, and it had been one problem after the other. I contrasted the old life with the one of which I had dreamed; one was filled with darkness and doubt, the other filled with peace and confidence.

In my immaturity, I made a bargain with God. I told Him that I would give it a month and test whether 2Corinthians 5:17 was the bridge to a life better than I had imagined. I wanted to know if I was setting myself up for disappointment by envisioning a life protected and covered by a supremely loving God; or if everyone else in my circle was right, and that God was causing my suffering to teach me to be a better Christian. I told the Lord, “If I have a shot at finally living with peace and happiness, I’ll relinquish all my problems into Your hands, and You’ll fix things. If 2Corinthians 5:17 doesn’t apply to me, and I have to continue suffering until You’re ready to release me from this oppression, then nothing will happen in my life.” 
 
During that month, God did many wonderful things for me. They may not have been huge by the standards of others, but for me, they meant everything. He showed me beyond a shadow of doubt that His love had never left me, and that I could totally depend and lean upon Him. The old things passed away. I released them and did not pick them up again. I surrendered my allegiance to remaining ignorant to the ways of God, and made a commitment to continue learning by gobbling up all the Word that I could.

God’s methodology for teaching His children is one of love. 1John 4:19 (KJV) tells us, “We love him, because he first loved us.” Jesus Christ told us in John 3:16 (NKJV), “For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life.” Accepting God’s love into our hearts and minds transforms us into the people He desires us to be.

The new creature that it talks about in 2Corinthians 5:17 is our spirit. We have the same mind, the same heart, and the same body, but the spiritual part of us is new after the new birth experience. From this moment on, God is expecting something new from us. He expects that we will put off the things that have caused us so much stress and strife in life. The old and bad memories, the fear of those things happening to us again, and the old patterns that aided the situations; all of these things must go. It won’t happen overnight, but you’re not alone. The indwelling Holy Spirit will help you every step of the way as you expand your mind and heart to soak in more of God’s love and become renewed from the inside out.

Scripture taken from the New King James Version. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson, Inc. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

Scripture quotations marked (NLT) are taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Inc., Wheaton, Illinois 60189. All rights reserved.