Divine Love May Hurt, No Matter What

"I think the pain you have had in life has left scars but has driven you toward Aslan just as His claw marks on the back of the girl in "A Horse and His Boy" prompted her to ride her horse faster than she believed possible."

In a letter from a friend


If we live "just right" can we pretty much avoid trouble and pain? I thought so once. Or at least I assumed a corollary idea: if things aren't going well then somehow I must be at fault. And since it all comes back to me, if I can get to bottom of things and set them right, then God will make the trouble go away. Neat! But of course the problem of pain is more complicated.

For one thing, God speak to us "the truth in love" (Eph 4:15) and truth, however kindly shared, can fall like so many hammer blows upon our folly and pride. Is the hammer of a friend a bad thing? No. "Faithful are the wounds of a friend; profuse are the kisses of an enemy" (Prov 27:6). "Blows that wound cleanse away evil; strokes make clean the innermost parts" (Prov 20:30).

Truth often demands change and where there's change there's discomfort, even trauma. Such discomfort and trauma can even be the temporary effect of God's kindness, as when He calls us to repentance (which means a change of direction). "Or do you presume on the riches of his kindness and forbearance and patience, not knowing that God's kindness is meant to lead you to repentance?" (Rom 2:4).

A kind hand may be a rough hand and God's love may bring pain no matter how obedient we are. We might well imagine the healing hands of Jesus being warm and tender, but also firm on account of sawing and sanding and pounding at the carpenter's bench.


Sometimes God uses pain to get our attention. C.S. Lewis said, "Pain insists upon being attended to. God whispers to us in our pleasures, speaks in our consciences, but shouts in our pains. It is his megaphone to rouse a deaf world."

As a young Christian I came across a poem in J.I. Packer's Knowing God that I've always liked but always found, well, a bit jarring.

When God wants to drill a man,

And thrill a man,

And skill a man
When God wants to mold a man
To play the noblest part;
When He yearns with all His heart
To create so great and bold a man
That all the world shall be amazed,
Watch His methods, watch His ways!

How He ruthlessly perfects

Whom He royally elects!
How He hammers him and hurts him,
And with mighty blows converts him
Into trial shapes of clay which
Only God understands;
While his tortured heart is crying
And he lifts beseeching hands!
How He bends but never breaks
When his good He undertakes;
How He uses whom He chooses,
And with every purpose fuses him;
By every act induces him
To try His splendor out--
God knows what He's about.  -- Unknown

Hebrews 12 instructs us not to be weary when the Lord reproves us, "For the Lord disciplines the one he loves, and chastises every son whom he receives." Romans 5:3 says, "Suffering produces endurance, and endurance produces character, and character produces hope." Under the sovereign hand of a loving Heavenly Father, afflictions lead to greater godliness and wider service. Joseph understood this when he reflected upon the cruel treatment of his brothers and said to them, "As for you, you meant evil against me, but God meant it for good" (Genesis 50:20).

On the other hand, there is danger in thinking that every hard and painful thing that happens was designed by God simply to make us more godly. If we think like that, life will soon have the feel of a beauty pageant run by a God who seems willing to let any awful thing happen to us just so we will become more attractive to him. But God is not so cold and manipulative; his "steadfast love endures forever" and his "mercies never come to an end" (Lamentations 3:22-23). Really, if all God cares about is making us perfect, then why not take us to heaven now and be done with it? 

No, the cause of many of our troubles lies outside ourselves. The sufferings of Jesus were not due to any shortcoming of his; it was never because he needed moral improvement. His sufferings were entirely the consequence of Adam's sin--Adam's sin and ours. "He was wounded for our transgressions; he was crushed for our iniquities" (Isaiah 53:5).

Granted, the sufferings of Jesus were unique. His sufferings were an atoning sacrifice for sin; because he suffered and died for us, we have forgiveness and peace with God. "He himself bore our sins in his body on the tree, that we might die to sin and live to righteousness. By his wounds you have been healed" (I Peter 2:24).

Our sufferings, on the other hand, do not and cannot atone for a single sin. Yet, like Jesus, we do in various ways suffer because of the sins of others--ultimately because of Adam's sin by which suffering and death entered into world--but also because of the sins of people we grew up with, the sins of those we live with and work with and worship with.

It is inherent in the human condition that we will oftentimes find ourselves burdened or deprived or neglected or badly treated, not because of what we ourselves have done or failed to do, but because of the sins of others. That is why we must constantly stay poised to forgive. "Forgiveness," writes Neil Anderson, "is agreeing to live with the consequences of another person's sin."

Finally, we should always remember that behind all the world's pain and suffering slithers the malevolent being and activity of Satan. He is the god of this world and he is set to do us harm. Jesus said he is a murderer and a thief who comes only to steal and kill and destroy (John 10:10). "Be sober-minded; be watchful. Your adversary the devil prowls around like a roaring lion, seeking someone to devour. Resist him, firm in your faith, knowing that the same kinds of suffering are being experienced by your brotherhood throughout the world" (I Pet 5:8-9). 

"By every act induces him to try His splendor out." In pain and hardship God invites us to lift up our eyes and see his transcendent glory. "Show me Thy glory"--that is how Moses prayed when things turned ugly in the wilderness (Exodus 33:18). And at the end of the day, that is the best thing we can pray when times are dark and difficult: "Lord, show me Your glory."

If God Weeps, Shouldn't We?

For most of my adult life I've carried in my wallet a short poem on sorrow by a Scottish missionary named Geoffrey Bull.

    O Lord, I have not learnt to cry,

Perhaps I laugh too oft for true conformity

To Thee and Thy rough Cross, or try

To love Thee without sorrowing—

Talk but touch not, thus they heed not.

What heart, O Lord, moved through the garden?

I too have slept, but wake me, Lord,

E’en though it be to love with tears.

It can't but sober us to picture Jesus weeping over Jerusalem (Luke 19:41), and crying with his friends near Lazarus' tomb (John 11:28-36), and agonizing in prayer in the Garden of Gethsemane. "And being in an agony he prayed more earnestly; and his sweat became like great drops of blood falling down to the ground" (Luke 22:44).


The thought of Jesus' tears assures us that in our times of sorrow we have a Lord who sympathizes with us in the deepest of ways. Grief was so much a part of his life that Scripture gives him title Man of Sorrows. "He was despised and rejected by men; a man of sorrows, and acquainted with grief" (Isaiah 53:3).

The Lord's tears also remind us that heartache is the price of loving others in a fallen world. If we would love like Jesus, we must learn to weep like Jesus.

"I am speaking the truth in Christ--I am not lying; my conscience bears me witness in the Holy Spirit--that I have great sorrow and unceasing anguish in my heart. For I could wish that I myself were accursed and cut off from Christ for the sake of my brothers, my kinsmen according to the flesh" (Romans 9:1-3). 

You Never Walk Alone

As a child I sometimes watched a religious broadcast on our black and white TV called “You Never Walk Alone.” Whatever the topic of the day, the Rev. Reuben K. Youngdahl always returned at the show's conclusion to the theme of God’s abiding presence, saying in a deep reassuring tone, “Remember, you never walk alone.”

Sometimes it is enough just to know we are not alone. “Emmanuel“ is the name for Jesus that means “God with us.” To be with us means God is present where we are. It means He is on our side. It means He is for us. “If God is for us, who can be against us? He who did not spare his own Son but gave him up for us all, how will he not also with him graciously give us all things” (Romans 8:31-32).

Ambushing Satan With a Song

“And when they began to sing and praise, the Lord set an ambush against the men of Ammon, Moab, and Mount Seir, who had come against Judah, so that they were routed.” 2 Chronicles 20:22

Martin Luther was convinced that Christian music holds a power for confronting the spiritual forces of evil. “Music is a gift and grace of God, not an invention of man. Thus it drives out the devil and makes people cheerful. Then one forgets all wrath, impurity and other devices.” And again, “The Devil, the originator of sorrowful anxieties and restless troubles, flees before the sound of music almost as much as before the Word of God.”

One of my first memories of spiritual warfare is of standing by a cemetery singing a hymn. Doesn't sound like much but it was a big deal. As an unsaved teenager I had often biked—no, flew--past this cemetery after spending time with friends. The road wound through a little-trafficked ravine past a row of houses and streets lights and into a dark and wooded area until it came to the cemetery, deserted except for gravestones and long shadows. It was creepy. It gave me cold tingles up and down the spine. But now as a young Christian in my early twenties I lived close to the cemetery and had come upon its iron gates during a night walk. This time, however, I did not flee in a visceral terror. I stood my ground, full of faith in my Savior, and allowed my gaze to roam across the cemetery as I sang “A Mighty Fortress is Our God.”

This old hymn is a great confidence builder and may well drive out the devil, as Luther said.

A Mighty Fortress is Our God

A mighty fortress is our God, a bulwark never failing;
Our helper He, amid the flood of mortal ills prevailing:

For still our ancient foe doth seek to work us woe;
His craft and pow’r are great, and, armed with cruel hate,
On earth is not his equal.

Did we in our own strength confide, our striving would be losing,

Were not the right Man on our side, the Man of God’s own choosing:
Dost ask who that may be? Christ Jesus, it is He;
Lord Sabaoth, His Name, from age to age the same,
And He must win the battle.

And though this world, with devils filled, should threaten to undo us,

We will not fear, for God hath willed His truth to triumph through us;
The Prince of Darkness grim, we tremble not for him;
His rage we can endure, for lo, his doom is sure,
One little word shall fell him.

That word above all earthly pow’rs, no thanks to them, abideth;

The Spirit and the gifts are ours through Him Who with us sideth;
Let goods and kindred go, this mortal life also;
The body they may kill: God’s truth abideth still,
His kingdom is forever.

"Submit yourselves therefore to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you" (James 4:7).

The Sustaining Thought of God

"The people who know their God shall stand firm and take action" (Daniel 11:32).

I reread Maurice Robert's The Thought of God last month and found so much encouragement I bought several copies and gave them to friends for Christmas. Early on Roberts talks about how the thought of God strengthens His people in difficult circumstances.

To have God in his mind and thought is the believer's constant source of strength. The martyr languishes in the flames but his mind flies upward to God his Saviour and looks forward blissfully to the glory that awaits him even as his body sinks to ashes. The imprisoned Christian forgets the harsh regime of the camp, the daily grind and gruelling labour, as his mind soars upward on the wings of hope to remember God. The weary missionary, struggling with unfamiliar syllables and convoluted grammar in his appointed sphere of service sees beyond the frustrations of the hour as he remembers God, his 'exceeding great reward' (Gen 15:1). The faithful pastor of the congregation in his study and confronted with an impossible daily agenda of duties, brightens in his heart and feels his pulse quicken as he remembers his Master above. The thought of God enlivens all action.

That the infinite God loves us individually and perfectly is a thought that often relieves sorrow.

[W]hat an infinity there is in the thought of God! Nothing can approach in beauty to the idea of the true and living God. That there exists a Being who is infinite in power, knowledge and goodness, that that Being cares for me with a perfect love as though I were the only man in existence, that he loved me before I was born and created me to enjoy him eternally and that he sent his Son to suffer the agony of the cross to secure my eternal happiness--that, surely, must be a thought to end all sorrow. It ought to be and often it is.

What lies ahead in 2012? What trials, what blessings, what challenges, what changes, what loses, what gains, what setbacks, what improvements, what surprises? Whatever is coming, we will find the strength we need if we lean into God and fix our thoughts on the face of the Lord Jesus Christ. “I have set the Lord always before me; because he is at my right hand, I shall not be shaken” (Psalm 16:8).

Gallup Finds Most Americans Claim Christianity

Gallup has a new poll out based on 327,244 interviews that shows 78% of all Americans self-identify with "some form of Christianity." Of those claiming any religion at all, 95% claim Christianity. That's a LOT of folks claiming to be Christians! We should show respect for all people and their professions of faith. But not all professors are possessors. What percent of Pharisees in Jesus' day would have self-identified as loyal followers of Jehovah?

Christianity Remains Dominant Religion in the United States

Why it is good to rejoice in the Lord

“Rejoice in the Lord always” (Phil 4:4). Rejoicing in the Lord is good for us and brings glory to God. Jonathan Edwards: “The happiness of the creature consists in rejoicing in God, by which also God is magnified and exalted.”

A Christian can be joyful even in times of sorrow. Paul described himself as "sorrowful yet always rejoicing" (2 Cor 6:10). John Piper: “I think Paul was always crying and always happy. How could he not be crying? He was so beat up. His back must have looked like a hunk of jelly most of the time because he had these five-times-thirty-nine lashes beat over his back and then healed in all kinds of gnarly ways. So this man lived with a thorn in his flesh, probably in his back, in his eyes, in his mind. And he had enemies all around him. And he said, "Rejoice in the Lord always, and again I say rejoice!"

Charles Spurgeon: “Why should Christians be such a happy people? 1) It is good for our God; it gives him honor among men when we are glad. 2) It is good for us; it makes us strong. 'The joy of the Lord is your strength' (Neh 8:10). 3) It is good for the ungodly; when they see Christians glad, they long to be believers themselves. 4) It is good for our fellow Christians; it comforts them and tends to cheer them.” 

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Is Christopher Hitchens in Heaven?

Christopher Hitchens, author and essayist, died Thursday night at age 62 after a long battle with esophageal cancer. A militant atheist, Hitchens understood Christianity better than many so-called Christians. From a January 2010 conversation with a liberal minister reported in the Portland Monthly:

Sewell: The religion you cite in your book is a generally fundamentalist faith of various kinds. I’m a liberal Christian, and I don’t take the stories from the scripture literally. I don’t believe in the doctrine of atonement (that Jesus died for our sins, for example). Do you make any distinction between fundamentalist faith and liberal religion?

Hitchens: I would say that if you don’t believe that Jesus of Nazareth was the Christ and Messiah, and that he rose again from the dead and by his sacrifice our sins are forgiven, you’re really not in any meaningful sense a Christian.


An audio recording from Hitchen's conversation with Sewell.
Hitchens-Sewell


December 20 Update
I tracked with Hitchens somewhat more after he began writing about his cancer and the painful treatments. He described excrutiating burning and pain and he knew death was imminent; that, along with his spending a good deal of time with Christian leaders debating the merits of Christianity during his book tour, seemed like the kinds of experiences the God of all grace might use to humble and draw an atheist to himself. Hitchens was far beyond my grade intellectually but I considered him no more a sinner than myself, and Christ has saved me. He saved Paul, who until his conversion was a fire-breathing persecutor of Christians. He saved C.S. Lewis, another British intellectual who espoused atheism before turning to Christ. I knew people around the world were praying for his conversion, and that was another reason why I anticipated his turning to Christ. I thought he might in some way become another C.S. Lewis. But we did not see that happen. I linked elsewhere to an article about deathbed conversions; while rare, the thief on the cross turning to Christ at the last possible moment is a memorable proof that it can happen. My earnest hope is that at the last Hitchens found forgiveness and salvation. But given his avowed atheism and in the absence of any evidence of repentance and faith, the probability of his being in torment now is high. That has sobered me. And it has put an edge on my concern about other people I've been praying for with similar anticipation of a conversion.

Is Christopher Hitchens in Heaven now? That's the question I think many Christians are asking, especially those of us who were praying for his conversion and thought it would happen one day.

Maybe

What do you think?


Why believers loved Christopher Hitchens...
The Believer's Atheist


Victor Davis Hanson reflects on his conversations and relationship with Hitchens...
Goodbye, Mr. Hitchens


Andy McCarthy was not impressed with Hitchens...or his admirers
Why They Wept for Hitchens

The Gospel in 155 Words

Jesus Christ, God’s Only Beloved Son, was sent into the world to be mankind’s Savior and Lord. Jesus lived a sinless life and then offered himself in the place of sinners upon the cross to bear the judgment of God’s holy wrath against sin for their sake. After he suffered and died, Jesus rose from the dead and ascended to heaven, having secured forgiveness, peace and eternal life with God for those who trust in him. God regards those who believe in Christ as righteous in His sight, for He credits the righteousness of Christ to the account of those who turn from sin and receive Jesus by faith. All of this—forgiveness, peace with God, righteousness and eternal life—come about, not by right thinking or good works, but only by the free grace of a just and loving God who chose to deliver from sin and death those who could never deliver themselves.