Jesus and Suffering

All of the leaders are reading a book called Praying like Monks, Living Like Fools, and in one of the chapters there is a story about Jenna and Helen. They are sisters-in-law. Jenna was unable to have children, and Helen was given a cervical cancer diagnosis. The doctors told her that it was treatable, but that she would never be able to have children. Still, Jenna felt certain that God would grant Helen a child. It was found out later that Helen was pregnant, and then soon Jenna was found to be pregnant too. Both of them had their children, with Helen having a little boy named Henry. However, the story doesn’t stop there.

You see, Helen found out a bit after Henry was born that her cancer was back, and she now had an inoperable tumor in her body. After months or radiation, Jenna visited Helen and knew that she wasn’t going to come back from this. She held her hand, and told her it was ok to go. She died a few weeks before Henry’s first birthday.

When I read that story, I grieve. I grieve for Helen, who never got to see Henry grow up. I grieve for her husband, who lost his partner in life and parenting. I grieve for Henry, who will never know his mom. But in all of this suffering, there is a question: Where is God in this suffering?

We’ve all encountered suffering before. Maybe we lost a family member or a friend or a pet. Maybe we’ve dealt with or are dealing with parents splitting up, or feeling like we’re garbage or just not worth being alive.

And so, we must ask, “What does God do in our suffering?

John 11:1-36.

There’s a couple of things that we should know before we get any further.

When Jesus arrived in Bethany, Lazarus was already dead. Based on the geography given, it’s safe to assume that Lazarus actually died the day that the messengers left Bethany to tell Jesus. It probably took a day to get to Jesus, Jesus waited for two days, and then it probably took them about a day to get back. Meaning, Lazarus was dead before Jesus even heard about it.

Martha, Mary, and Lazarus are all clearly important to Jesus. It seems like they were almost like a second family to Jesus.

17-27 and 28-36 start with the same statement but by two different women.

The both say, “Lord, if you had been there, my brother would not have died.”

But, Jesus answers there suffering very differently.

So, how does Jesus answer our suffering?

Jesus answers our suffering with truth.

With Martha, Jesus answers her suffering with truth.

It doesn’t seem like she’s doubting who Jesus is, but she’s just beaten down.

She lost her brother, she’s in the midst of immense agony.

So, Jesus tells her the truth: “Your brother will rise again (23)

She then answers with good theology, but He draws her in deeper.

I AM the resurrection.

Here comes that phrase again!

Jesus is saying here that He is the source of new life and eternity because He’s God!

He then asks the question, “Do you believe?

Jesus answered with truth because truth was needed

Martha needed to know that!

And there will be times when you need to know the truth

When someone dies, sometimes you need to know about eternity.

Sometimes you need to know that if they believe in Jesus, that they have eternal life with God.

When you hate yourself, sometimes what you need is to know what God thinks of you.

Truth can be a massive support in suffering.

But then, Jesus employs a different strategy with Mary.

Jesus answers our suffering by entering in.

Mary asks the same question, but Jesus answers it in a very different way.

You see, Mary didn’t have an intellectual problem. She wasn’t like Martha who was processing her grief by looking for truth, she was in the depths of despair. She falls at the feet of Jesus and weeps because of the loss of her brother. They’re surrounded by people who loved Lazarus and are grieving with her.

She’s not looking for an answer, she’s not questioning the goodness of God, she’s despairing the loss of someone she loves.

And so what does Jesus do?

Jesus doesn’t say anything!

He doesn’t give her some statement that’s supposed to make her feel better or tell her to stop crying because he’ll fix it because that isn’t what she needed!

He is “deeply moved”

That word in Greek doesn’t mean what you think it means.

It’s not a word used to describe sadness, it’s normally used to describe anger

He’s clearly not angry at Martha or Mary or the Jews, it seems like He’s angry at death! He’s upset that the world is so broken that His friend would die and that other friends would suffer.

Finally, He goes to the burial site, where it says that He wept.

I think (I don’t know, I wasn’t there) but I think that He wept because His friend died. Sure, He knew that He would heal him and that everything would turn out alright, but He still knew that Lazarus had to suffer immensely before this healing!

Jesus entered in to Mary’s suffering by experiencing what she was experiencing

She was upset, so He got upset

She wept, and so He wept with her.

Jesus enters into our suffering with us.

Sometimes, you don’t need truth to make everything right, sometimes, you need to be with God and not try to fix it.

When someone dies or leaves or a relationship is broken, sometimes what you need is to sit with God and let Him sit with you.

Sometimes, when the weight of your choices is bringing you to your knees, you need to let God shoulder the burden that you can’t

That’s what He does in the Gospel.

God knew our suffering. God knew our torment. He knew that sin had pulled us further and further away from Him and that there was nothing that we could do to be made whole again, and so in that He entered into creation, into our suffering, and chose to suffer and die for us!

Jesus suffered more than we ever could because He wanted to be with you!

He entered into our suffering by taking our suffering on to Him.

So, you aren’t alone in suffering! You don’t have to feel like you’ve been left out or that no one can understand you because on that cross Jesus suffered more intensely than any suffering you or I have ever or will ever experience. And so when you cry out to God and say that your pain is too much, He can step alongside you and take it from you.

But now, I want to give a couple of tips about not just when you’re suffering, but when other people are suffering.

What can we do?

We should seek to be like Jesus when we’re talking to someone who is suffering.

Pray

We’re not Jesus, so we need to ask Jesus to give us the wisdom and the strength to do what is right.

Tell the truth, but don’t abuse the truth

We are people of truth, and so we should be able to accurately tell people about the love of Christ and His beautiful plan for creation.

However, Christians are far too good about using the truth as a weapon to solve problems, which isn’t what Jesus did.

He only used truth with Martha because she needed that, He didn’t do it with Mary.

So, if you’re just trying to tell someone doctrine just because you think that they don’t get it or that they just need to understand something and then they’ll “get over it,” don’t say anything.

We don’t want to push people further away from Jesus because we’re too focused on forcing truth and not focused on loving well.

Enter in to their suffering

Do your best to understand what they need.

Maybe someone who is suffering needs someone to sit and listen to them, or a shoulder to cry on, or a friend to laugh with, or to just sit in silence and not say anything.

Be willing to be that person.

The point of entering in to suffering is not to solve, but to sit.

You won’t solve any of their stuff, because that’s not your job, it’s God’s, but you can do your best to love them well.

When we enter in to suffering, we are being like Jesus.

Questions:

If you had to change your name, what would you change it to?

Read vs. 9-10. Why do you think Jesus says that?

Which of the two sisters (Mary and Martha) do you most associate with? Why?

How can truth help our suffering? How can entering in?