The Meaning of Suffering

 

"If there is a purpose in life at all, there must be a purpose in suffering!" (Frankl 9). And as an existentialist would say, to live is indeed to suffer! Pain, sorrow and heartache however big or small are an ineradicable portion of life. But so is our unwavering quest to make sense of it. How do we give meaning to suffering? We say that it produces resilience and fortitude, that it strengthens the human spirit and sanctifies the soul. If this is true, I for one would go even further to say that there is a poignant beauty in pain and struggle, one which in its intermingling of tears with love, defeat with triumph and despair with hope, creates something exquisitely powerful and moving. Because every shred of human suffering evokes a bit of the commendable strength and courage required to withstand and overcome it. And we have witnessed this in our suffering-infested world, time and time again. We have heard stories from far-away lands of great bravery in the darkest of times, we have listened to tales of incredible personal sacrifice, we have seen touching acts of kindness in response to the suffering in our own little worlds, we have witnessed the unassuming valour of people around us as they brave their own trials and perhaps we have even experienced how hardships have moulded our lives and forged the fires of its own refining furnace. Thus, out of suffering is born something far greater and nobler than it!

Even so, an unremitting question begs to be asked. Can every last remnant of human suffering be cleverly reinterpreted or construed to assume the pleasing guise of a plaintive, but moving tragedy which has the potential to simulate hope and meaning? Aren’t some calamities and agonies simply harsh, evil or disastrous without being anything else? Simply put, is there meaning to be wrought from all suffering?

Let me for a brief interlude, turn your attention to the horrendous scenes of Ukraine. Infiltrated by an enemy displaying a marked cruelty and ruthlessness, its people have been subjected to a soul crushing tribulation. What meaning can their misery have to the millions of people who were displaced and savagely wrested out of their homes and the familiarity of their normal lives? What meaning can their torment have to all those who witnessed and bore the pain of their loved ones being tortured, raped or killed? What meaning can an irreparable separation from their children have to their parents? What meaning does their daily poverty, their terror and the cruel upheaval inflicted upon their existence have to the tyrannised masses of that unhappy nation?

Finding meaning in suffering makes it bearable, both to the sufferers and to the hapless onlookers. In fact the neurologist and philosopher, Victor Frankl even says, “In some ways suffering ceases to be suffering at the moment it finds a meaning, such as the meaning of a sacrifice.”(Frankl 11) What's curious is that Frankl talks about 'finding' meaning, not about creating it as we are generally inclined to think. If so, is there something or someone in this world that bestows meaning upon all suffering? 

Some of us would immediately be prompted to recollect vague notions of an omniscient, transcendent being who dwells aloofly in the mystical vaults of some unseen realm, looking down upon the vast seas of lesser humanity with a sort of patronizing but detached benevolence. If you have ever thought of this depiction in connection to suffering, you are not alone. Many are the Gods which men have created, in order to conjure some image of the enigmatic painter brandishing His capricious brush over that canvas which is their own miserable world. We have named Him with many names. And yet the God of our creation has doggedly remained nothing more than an impassive spectator of human suffering. Though it is generally presumed that He loves us, He evidently cannot be bothered to lift a finger to rescue humanity from the tortuous fires of never-ending affliction. John Stott's thoughts take the course of my own when he says, "In the real world of pain, how could one worship a God who was immune to it? I have entered many Buddhist temples in different Asian countries and stood respectfully before the statue of the Buddha, his legs crossed, arms folded, eyes closed, the ghost of a smile playing round his mouth, a remote look on his face, detached from the agonies of the world." (Stott) Indeed, such are almost all the Gods of our world. They rule from the distant peaks of their serene ease and privilege, never having known the weaknesses and sorrows of mortal men. Is there a God who has actually tasted our humanity and its suffering?

Perhaps there is! Frederick Nietzsche ridiculed Him as 'God on the cross', expressing his distaste for what he considered to be a feeble and embarrassing representation of the Godhead. And He certainly has good reasons for his contempt of the crucified Christ. The apostle Paul said, "We preach Christ crucified: a stumbling block to Jews and foolishness to Gentiles!" (Berean Literal Bible, 2 Cor 1:12) In the ancient Greco-Roman world which preceded the rise of Christendom, it was inconceivably shocking and unfathomable for a 'God' to willingly endure torture and death at the hands of mortals. Tom Holland, an atheist and award-winning historian says, "Familiarity with the biblical narrative of the Crucifixion has dulled our sense of just how completely novel a deity Christ was. In the ancient world, it was the role of gods who laid claim to ruling the universe to uphold its order by inflicting punishment – not to suffer it themselves!" (Holland)

And yet out of the wilderness of nowhere appeared this man who claimed to be God but nevertheless did not attempt to prove it like a 'God' was expected to. Instead of riches He welcomed poverty, instead of being served He chose to serve, instead of conquering He allowed himself to be conquered, instead of honour He recieved shame and humiliation and instead of annihilating the wicked He gave himself over to torture and death for their sake! What sort of 'God' was this? So utterly alien was this notion of divinity that it was foolish and repulsive to Christ's generation.

And indeed when the innocent was crushed without mercy and the dreadful torment finally over, the men who had over the preceding years hailed Jesus as their promised Messiah and followed him devotedly, fled those perilous scenes and deserted the man they no longer believed could be 'the Son of God'. As one of his persecutors mocked him, "if you are the Son of God, save yourself and come down from the cross!"(New Living Translation, Matt 27:40) His disciples reasoned too that if Jesus was who he claimed to be, he should have been able to save himself. Before darkness set that night, the man who vowed he would follow his master to death, had already denied the name of Christ three times and all the others had retreated in terror. All except the few, faithful women who wept and mourned at the foot of the appalling sight presented on the cross. What was it about that bleeding, dying heap of torn flesh abandoned and despised by the world, which attracted the attention and sympathy of those daughters of Eve? What did they perceive in the pale, languishing visage of that tortured figure who had not once opened his mouth in defence when he was led away like a lamb to be slaughtered? Did they, oppressed and silenced themselves in a world ruled by men, perhaps see their own suffering and misery marked and reflected upon the mutilated frame of the crucified Christ? Something bound them and held them there so that they could not leave. But what was it? 

In His suffering, the man who claimed to be God had identified Himself with them in their humanity. He had drunk deep from the bottomless dregs of the bitter cup of human suffering, He had consumed their weaknesses and borne their temptations. Instead of remaining distant from the harsh reality of human suffering, He had come down and partaken of it! Did it refresh and revive the starved souls of those poor women, the dross of their society, to shift their weary gaze from all the Gods who wore attitudes of detached abandonment to the anguish of the world and turn instead as John Stott elaborates, "to that lonely, twisted, tortured figure on the cross, nails through hands and feet, back lacerated, limbs wrenched, brow bleeding from thorn-pricks, mouth dry and intolerably thirsty, plunged in Godforsaken darkness!"(Stott)

Although He was hated and spurned in His lifetime, it is the final torment He endured which best elucidates Christ's identification with the most atrocious human suffering. From historical records we know that the Roman crucifixion was specifically designed to be the most humiliating, excruciating and surefire method of execution imaginable and no one has ever survived it. 

To quote Nabeel Quereshi, "During the flogging process which preceded the Crucifixion (to which was added the mocking, slapping and spitting in Jesus's case), a whip called a flagrum would be used which was devised to rip skin off the body and cause excessive bleeding. After just a few lashes, the victim's skin began to come off in ribbons and their muscles tore. After a few more lashes, the muscles became like pulp. Arteries and veins were laid bare. Sometimes the flagrum would reach around the abdomen and the abdominal wall would give way, causing the victim's intestines to spill out. Obviously, many people died during the flogging alone. After the flogging, victims were nailed through their arms to a crossbeam. The nails would go right through the median nerve, causing extreme pain and incapacitating the hands. A seven inch nail would then be driven through both feet, and the Crucifixion victim would be made to hang naked from His arms, a position that makes it nearly impossible to breathe. He would have to use his little remaining energy to push against the nail in his feet so that he could breathe out. He could breathe in as he sagged back down, but he would have to push back up before breathing out again. When all his energy was drained and he could not push up any longer, he would die of asphyxiation." (Nabeel 151)

He took up the penalty of sin and bore our suffering and our pain, but what does Christ's suffering have to do with our suffering? If you believe that He is truly God, it would obviously have everything to do with it! For to conceive that the infinite cause of the universe would contain Himself in the body of a man with all its weaknesses and constraints, to think that He would abandon His celestial robes of divine power and eternal glory to don the piteous garb of mortal flesh, to imagine that He would willingly taste the sorrows and agonies which accompany it, to fathom that He would bear upon His own body the wounds and scars of evil and allow Himself to be pierced, crushed and torn apart, yes to apprehend all of this is to realize that God did not consider suffering and tragedy to be something which must be avoided at all costs. Instead He took part in it. Why then did God readily choose to suffer unless there was some meaning and end to that suffering? 

What did the suffering of Christ accomplish? Out of the greatest evil the world has ever witnessed, i.e the brutal murder of the pure and sinless Son of God, was wrought the greatest good that was bestowed upon it: "By His wounds we are healed!"(New International Version, Isaiah 53:5) Christ's suffering paid the wages of our sin and rescued us from eternal death. Thus many millions who have trusted the name of Jesus and made Him their Saviour, will be redeemed from death into everlasting life through His atoning sacrifice. What does this profoundly testify to, but God's phenomenal ability and will to create good out of evil, joy out of sorrow and life out of death! And we are thus persuaded to believe that every last tear shed on the shores of earth has a purpose that will be revealed when the enlightening floodgates of eternity are wrenched open upon the parched desert sands of our mortal ignorance. The Psalmist writes, “You have kept count of my tossings; put my tears in Your bottle!” (English Standard Version, Psa 56:8) What a comforting reflection, to think that not one drop of our tears is shed in vain! C.S Lewis says, “You cannot in your present state, understand eternity. Mortals say of some temporal suffering, ‘No future bliss can make up for it,’ not knowing that Heaven once attained, will work backwards and turn even that agony into a glory.”(Lewis)

The cross is the place where Jesus bore the suffering of humankind. Yes, the infinitely precious treasure of heaven, the living God who was the fountain of all life, had made His dwelling on earth and become one with humanity! And it was by taking up their suffering that the pathway to heaven was cleared for them by their Maker. Thus suffering, which was a curse and plague upon the world, itself became, through the supernatural work of Christ, the very medium of its redemption! Grace had indeed erupted over the children of men, a way of deliverance which could give them in the darkest of their hours and the gravest of their suffering, a wondrous hope which spreads its light beams far beyond the visible realms of gloom and affliction into a glorious dawn of never-ending joy! 

And John Stott says of the 'God on the cross'- "That is the God for me! He laid aside his immunity to pain. He entered our world of flesh and blood, tears and death. He suffered for us. Our sufferings become more manageable in the light of his. There is still a question mark against human suffering, but over it we boldly stamp another mark, the cross that symbolizes divine suffering.The cross of Christ is God’s only self-justification in such a world as ours!" (Stott)

"The other gods were strong; but thou wast weak; 

They rode, but thou didst stumble to a throne; 

But to our wounds only God’s wounds can speak, 

And not a god has wounds, but thou alone." (Shillito)

Yes, this is what Christ has enabled us to do. Above our myriad doubts and questions, above the wobbling tightropes of our skepticism and above the sinking sands of the fears that plague our minds as we behold a world sinking under the excruciating burden of suffering, above all its undeciphered webs, we are able to lift "the old rugged Cross" which faithfully testifies throughout generations that the Creator of our world did not flee its many woes but rather embraced them!  

And precisely because He has shared in our sufferings, God is able to thoroughly empathize with all our weaknesses and sorrows. Therefore Paul was able to say, "Let us then approach God’s throne of grace with confidence, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help us in our time of need." (New International Version, Heb 4:16) We are assured beyond doubt that the God who drowned Himself in the ghastly mires of human suffering, will keep His earnest promise of being with us always, even as we walk through the dreary valleys of adversity. To all those who put their trust in Him, our suffering is His suffering and His nail pierced hands are constantly held out to us in loving attestation of the omnipotent grace which crushed them so that His wounds became the mainspring of our life and redemption! 

And two thousand years ago in that small town of Israel, three days after His little parade of followers were scattered at the death of their 'Saviour', the extinguished fire of Christ's mission was miraculously stirred into flame. What was it that led a band of lowly, cowardly men who once deserted Jesus in fear for their lives to be suddenly transformed into bold and fearless ambassadors who traversed the ends of the world to spread their master's message of hope and life? What was it that made them who once dreaded the prospect of suffering with Jesus, to forsake every worldly comfort, to bear the hatred and scorn of men and willingly be tortured and slaughtered for the sake of His name? Could it be anything else but the invigorating sight of the Resurrected Christ? Christ had suffered and died, but by rising again He had overcome death and conquered suffering once and for all. It did not mean that they would no longer suffer, but it did mean that they no longer had to fear suffering! Suffering was temporary and fleeting, but the life they had in Christ was lasting and eternal! 

What is the meaning of suffering? The meaning of suffering is found in Jesus Christ. The free salvation so lavishly offered to us on the Cross was a fruit of His suffering, and the immeasurable wealth we received because of it, in turn bestows hope and meaning upon every temporal suffering. For it offers all of humanity something imperishable, which promises to endure well beyond the span of the world's transient miseries and sorrows. Therefore, the meaning of suffering takes the form of a very simple truth:

"O blessed conquest, to lose all things and to gain Christ!" (Rutherford)

References

Frankl, Viktor. Man's search for meaning. Beacon Press, 1946.

Stott, John. The Cross. InterVarsity Press, 2009.

Berean Literal Bible. Bible Hub, https://biblehub.com/blb/1_corinthians/1.htm. Accessed September 8, 2022.

Holland, Tom. "Why I was wrong about Christianity". The New Statesman, 14 September 2016. https://www.newstatesman.com/politics/religion/2016/09/tom-holland-why-i-was-wrong-about-christianity. Accessed 7 September, 2022.

New Living Translation. Bible Hub, https://biblehub.com/nlt/version.htm. Accessed September 8, 2022.

Quereshi, Nabeel. Seeking Allah, Finding Jesus. Zondervan, 2014.

New International Version. Bible Hub, https://biblehub.com/niv/version.htm. Accessed September 8, 2022.

English Standard Version. Bible Hub, https://biblehub.com/esv/Accessed. September 8, 2022

Lewis, C.S. "The Great Divorce". 1945. https://barnardsvilleumc.files.wordpress.com/201. Accessed 8 September, 2022.

Shillito, Edward. "Jesus of the Scars." 1019. The Jesus Question, https://thejesusquestion.org/2013/10/28/jesus-of-the-scars-by-edward-shillito/. Accessed 8 September, 2022.

Rutherford, Samuel. "Letters of Samuel Rutherford: The shadow of death". 1973. Bible Truth Publishers, https://bibletruthpublishers.com/8-the-shadow-of-death/samuel-j-rutherford/letters-of-samuel-rutherford/s-rutherford/la161719. Accessed 8 September, 2022.