Episode 11: Part 1: How to Suffer Well
Season 1 · Episode 11
Part 1: How to Suffer Well: Honesty and Friendship with Jesus
Show Notes
Justin and Amy Howard open an honest, two-part conversation about suffering: why it is such a difficult topic in Christian circles, and how learning to discern what kind of suffering we are facing changes the way we bring it to Jesus. Drawing on the story of Job, the temptations of Christ, and their own recent season of pain, they name four kinds of suffering and begin walking through how to respond to each one, both when we suffer and when we sit with friends who suffer. This first part lingers on the suffering of a broken world and the suffering caused by our own sin, holding out the hope that in communion with God, no suffering has to be wasted.
In This Episode
- Until the kingdom of God is fully here, suffering is a guaranteed part of life, and what we do with it, and how we bring it to the Lord, determines what it does in us.
- The Christian hope is redemptive suffering: engaged in intimacy with God, suffering can soften our hearts, make us more like Jesus, and be transformed into hope.
- A common temptation is to try to solve a heart problem with the head, aiming for the right answer when the pain is not primarily logical, much like Job's friends.
- Justin and Amy name four kinds of suffering: suffering from a broken world, suffering from our own sin, suffering from others' sin against us, and sympathetic (unitive) suffering shared with Jesus.
- Jesus enters our suffering only through the gate of our yes; he is not a manipulator or a hijacker, so we neither force help on others nor judge those not yet ready to receive it.
- We respond to a broken world's suffering through practical, missional service (Matthew 25) and bold intercession, remembering the kingdom's deepest value is servanthood rather than mere equality.
- Suffering caused by our own sin is met with the four R's, repent, renounce, release, receive, restitution and deep transformation, and receiving God's healing even when the fault is ours.
Going Deeper — Discussion Questions
- When you are in the middle of suffering, do you tend to move toward denial, cheap thoughts about God, or a functional agnosticism that assumes He is far off? What does that reveal about what you believe of His nearness?
- Amy describes trying to 'solve a heart problem with your head.' Where in your life are you reaching for the right answer when what is really needed is care for your heart?
- Of the four kinds of suffering named in this episode, which one are you most tempted to overlook or mislabel, and how might naming it more accurately change how you bring it to Jesus?
- Job's friends began well by sitting in silence, then grew uncomfortable and started arguing. How do you respond when a friend's honest suffering makes you uncomfortable?
- Justin says Jesus only enters through 'the gate of our yes.' What part of your suffering have you not yet said yes to inviting Him into, and what holds you back?
- The hosts distinguish the kingdom's call to servanthood from a demand for equality. Where might God be inviting you to serve unseen, or 'in the secret,' rather than seek recognition?
- If some of your suffering is caused by your own sin, what would it look like this week to walk the four R's, repent, renounce, release, receive, and let God heal you even when the fault is yours?
Full Transcript
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0:03Introduction
Welcome to Between Heaven and Earth. We're your hosts, Justin and Amy Howard. And together, we lead a mission agency right here in beautiful New England. We are thrilled that you've joined us. In each episode, we'll explore what it means to follow Jesus by bringing Heaven and Earth together in your family and community. Our goal is to empower you to thrive in the collision of kingdoms and courageously join with Jesus in his great project of healing and restoration. This podcast is brought to you by Encounter Culture Mission Collaborative, dedicated to working with ordinary followers of Jesus to mend, make, and multiply disciples right where they are. Let's dive in.
Hey friends, welcome back to Between Heaven and Earth. We're Justin and Amy Howard. Hi. We're sitting here at the end of May and it's supposed to be down to 34 degrees here in beautiful New Hampshire and New England. I have regrets. I planted out some of my seedlings. That's very sad. Yep. And we're expecting a nor'easter tomorrow, which for Amy means a blizzard. Right, that's my only association. But apparently, it doesn't always mean snow. That's right, apparently. Just means the weather's coming from the northeast. That's right, the weather's coming from the northeast, lots of wind and rain and it's going to be cold. It's already cold. It is.
And actually, as I'm looking outside and it is so very dark, I am reminded of a promise I need to make good on. Yes. Which was after we shared your household project that you did to fill the time. Because that was embarrassing. Was it embarrassing for you? Well, I mean, I know I get easily distracted and I start projects that I can't necessarily finish. Yeah, it's still not finished. I wish we had a video. Yes, but we did have a friend come in and framed it all in. Yeah. And we did an excellent job. Yeah. So now we need to put the drywall up. Right. So in return for having shared that, I have volunteered that you may in fact share the story about this. Something embarrassing about you.
Yes, so this is very embarrassing, I think. The spiders. Basically, Amy has this thing that sometimes she'll wake up in the middle of the night and she will freak out because she believes she has just swallowed a spider. No, it's because I have just swallowed a spider. No, you think you swallowed a spider. How do you know? Doesn't someone actually swallow a spider once or twice a year? I read an article one time. That said the number of spiders that people swallow while they're sleeping. I feel like that is an irrational fear, perhaps. You might want to receive some prayer for that. Probably I should go outside of our little circle here for that prayer.
Yeah, because I will definitely just maybe laugh at you. Yeah, you don't laugh in the middle of the night. No, because you're hitting me in the middle of the night. Like, I just swallowed a spider, I swear. Oh my God.
3:21Suffering and the Kingdom's Tension
Okay, so we are going to be talking about suffering. Just like— Like suffering. Like, yes, it's suffering for you. No, we don't want to belittle or demean anyone's suffering. We've all suffered and many of us in profound ways. And we're going to talk about the different kinds of suffering. So, Amy, why don't you give us a lead-in to this episode? Because I think this is going to be really helpful for everyone who's listening today. Yeah, I hope so, I hope so. Because today we're going to look at, how do you discern the different kinds of suffering? So a lot of times when something's just a hot mess, everything hurts. It's hard to kind of say what's going on right now.
So how do we discern between the different types of suffering when it's possible? And what are some practices for engaging each kind of suffering, both as the person who is suffering and as a friend to those who suffer? Yeah, great. So this is all about equipping each of you who are listening today and reminding us, basically, how do we engage the Lord in suffering? How do we identify what's going on? Yeah. Yeah, and we're guaranteed to suffer. I mean, I always think it's a little unfortunate that here in the West, we live with this sort of sense that I'm entitled to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. I think the Middle Ages were a little more honest.
They just said, this is the vale of tears. Right. And your life expectancy is like 33. Yeah, I mean, there's just an expectation, right? Until the kingdom of God is fully here, one of the distinctives of the kingdom of God is, for the people of God, the ending of suffering. There will be no more tears or sorrow or sickness or pain or death. That's right. Because the gospel of the kingdom or the kingdom of God will be fully manifest on the earth. Right. But until that day comes, suffering is a part of the conversation. Yeah. There's no way to avoid it. That's right. Everyone will have suffered. Everyone will cause some amount of suffering and be a part of suffering, the suffering story.
It's part of living in what we call the tension. That's right. Between the kingdom of God, the kingdom of heaven and the broken world that we live in. That's right. And so we live between heaven and earth and this reality of suffering, and what you choose to do with your suffering and how you bring it to the Lord will determine what suffering does in your life. Yeah. And so we're going to dive into that today. So Amy, I'd love to just kind of touch on why suffering is such a difficult conversation in Christian circles. But why do you think it's a difficult conversation? Well, I can speak for what I've seen.
There may be other reasons for this, but I think as humans, first of all, I mean, suffering is suffering. So you're always trying to get out of it. I mean, unless there's something really broken inside of you, you're trying to move away from suffering rather than towards it. I mean, we move toward things that feel good rather than toward things that feel not good. And I think Christians are no exception to that, where we're looking to move away from pain. And in some ways, the message of the gospel is a message of peace and joy and the cessation of certain kinds of suffering. We are running a whole podcast on healing. Right.
So there is a very real way that we know deep down that the Christian message, the good news, actually addresses suffering. I mean, Isaiah 61 addresses suffering. Jesus' opening sermon in that synagogue in Nazareth—you can read it in Luke chapter four—where he reads from the book of Isaiah, was all about the ending of different kinds of suffering. So we know as believers, this has something to do with me. But a lot of times, I think the way that that works itself out, we hate mystery. I mean, we're okay with maybe the mystery of the virgin birth, but as far as the mystery in the day to day, we really like answers. And in some ways, we have some great answers.
And in other ways, when suffering is near us, it's easy to fall back on, well, if I have the right answer, this suffering is going to stop. And that starts really young and it's good. I mean, you learn really young certain things that hurt and how to avoid them. And so your logical brain is consistently going to be saying, how do I get out of this place of suffering? And how can I do the same thing for you? So I don't think it's different for Christians necessarily than anybody else, except for us I think maybe sometimes there's more dissonance, because you know deep down inside that God actually does care. He cared enough to die to end the suffering.
8:25Redemptive Suffering and Soul-Making
So one of my questions though around that is, I mean in Christian circles we would say, like, we believe in redemptive suffering. Yeah. That God never wastes any of our suffering if we bring it to him and we utilize it in intimacy with him, right? Like, and so, you know, yes, we believe in redemptive suffering. We also believe in healing and all those. Can you explain redemptive? That for those that aren't in relationship with God or living in proximity to intimacy with him, suffering can cause bitterness. It can lead to more suffering.
It can be a downward spiral where, you know, unforgiveness, resentment, whereas in the Christian life, we are promised that in communion with God our suffering can actually soften our hearts and cause us to draw near to the Lord and to become more compassionate or kind or empathetic people, people that love. And that our suffering can be genuinely transformed into hope as the end of a long process oftentimes. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So the Christian hope is that none of our sufferings can be wasted, that if we engage the Lord in the suffering and actually engage the Lord in it, that it will be used to remake us into the image of Jesus, that we will become more like him. And then he's gonna win.
Right, and I mean, the writer of Hebrews says, you know, Jesus himself learned obedience through the things that he suffered. And so there is this soul-making that happens as we engage the Lord in suffering. And what, you know, the big kind of theological term would be theodicy, like, well, why do we suffer? I mean, we know that, you know, why we suffer, but what is the place of suffering in the Christian life? Because you can have different circles, as we were talking about in the Christian church, that either like deny suffering and wanna overcome it by the power of positive thinking and positive confession.
And then you have others who are like, embrace all the suffering, you know, that it is—— All of it's unto Him. I'm gonna offer it up to Jesus. All of my suffering. All of it's good. Yeah, all suffering is good, yeah, yeah. At least when it applies to me. Yeah. Other people suffering, maybe not so much, but anything that comes my way is just to be embraced, not to be handed to Jesus, or for us to expect some relief, some transformation. Right, relief, transformation, breakthrough. And so we are kind of straddling the tension here. Yeah, yeah. In suffering, and it always requires a conversation with Jesus. Yeah, can I say two things about that? Absolutely.
One is, if I were listening to this right now, I know in some seasons of suffering in my own life, if I even heard two people just talk about suffering, I would wanna start throwing punches. Like just the conversation itself hurts so much when you're right smack in the middle of it sometimes. So I just wanna acknowledge that. Like if this is a—if there's a place where you really need tangible on-the-ground, felt presence more than just words, it's okay to acknowledge that. Absolutely. Yeah. Absolutely. That's really real. Yeah.
And then the other thing that I find in Christian circles that bears saying is, I think I'd like to divide different church groups loosely anyway into destination people and journey people. Yeah. And the destination people are the ones that are like, this matters for you now. And, you know, we're going to believe for healing today. And so very, very, very much fixed on the now component of healing or of the ending of suffering. And then the journey people, I'd say those would be the more like the spiritual disciplines camp. And maybe what you were talking about, like, suffering is redemptive. The sense that suffering produces something of quality in me.
But oftentimes that camp doesn't have any imagination maybe for the ending of suffering besides death. Yeah. Going to heaven. Yeah. So holding in tension, the journey and the destination at the same time. That's right. And that is a mystery. But I think both are ongoing and part of a very real non-static reality. It's important to keep that in mind. Absolutely. And I think it's important for our listeners to know too that, you know, we're talking about suffering right now, just coming out of an intense season of suffering ourselves. Yeah. You know, and not the first one. No, and not the first one. I mean, times when you're like, Lord, are you even there? Like, have you forsaken? Have you?
And so it's been two years of intense suffering, disappointment, and trial. One day we'll get into that and have a conversation about that. But yeah. So let's talk, just talk about, I mean, if you are experiencing suffering—most of you, most of us have or are, and, you know, in the relatively near time, I'm sure. But what are the temptations that we can fall into when we suffer ourselves? I mean, feel free to answer this. Just, I can speak for myself. I know the temptations that I experience are, I mean, first of all, denial. I just, this isn't really happening. This will blow over right away.
I want to lean into some kind of cheap thoughts about God, like, you know, if God really cared, he would do X, Y, and Z. I want to, I want to, and I also, I also, I feel like there's the very strong temptation to not be curious about what the Lord is saying for myself and just want the suffering to stop. So you're like, this noise is so loud, I don't care what it takes to make it stop. I just want it to stop right now. Yeah. I don't know. How about you? What are your temptations when you're suffering? Yeah, I think the temptation is to basically be a functional agnostic.
Yeah, to be honest, you know, when I'm suffering and I feel like it's such an injustice, that there's no good reason for this. It's hard not to go through the season wondering if God cares. Yeah. If he's even present, or if I'm deluding myself, that maybe, like, that God would even use this. Yeah. And if I offer myself any kind of encouragement, it's just like a part of self-delusion. I'm just trying to make myself feel better so that I can get through this and be a kinder, more empathetic person for others. But I think that the temptation for me is a functional agnosticism. Yeah. That the Lord is like far off. Yeah. And he's not near. Yeah. Or that it's unsafe to be angry even with God. Oh yeah. I think that you can't handle it. That's right. Yeah, that he can't handle my anger and my disappointment. Yeah. Right. So I think that
16:13Sitting With Those Who Suffer
You know, that's when we're suffering, but how about when people that we love suffer and we're watching other people suffer around us? So what kind of temptations do you fall into when you watch other people suffer? I mean, I love a good solution. It's easy to be Job's friends. For those of you who haven't read the story, the book of Job is all about one guy's suffering and the way the Lord interacted with that and how his friends interacted with that. And Job's friends and his wife really stunk for the most part when they saw their friend suffering. They weren't so bad in the beginning. No, they started off well.
They sat in silence with him when they saw him suffering. And the story of Job, you know, God highlights Job and says, hey—the scripture says he was in the council of the—that sort of heavenly beings are there, you know, Satan is there and God highlights Job and says, there's no one like my servant. And Satan basically says, yeah, well, he has no reason to disobey or to be bad. You've always just blessed him. He would betray you if you allowed him to suffer. And what's fascinating is God himself does not cause the suffering, but he does allow the suffering in that story of Job. So Job's kids die and his health is decimated and his wealth is destroyed. And it all happens very suddenly.
And in the midst of that, his friends come to visit and initially they seem to at least honor the horror by sitting in silence with him for an extended period of time. Right. But then, but then Job speaks. And Job is talking about basically his disappointment with God. And he's like leveling accusations. Yeah, he's being honest with them and he's sharing his feelings. It's like, I didn't do anything to deserve this. So why is this happening to me? And Job's friends get uncomfortable. Yeah, they get uncomfortable with Job suffering in his honesty. And they start arguing with the premise, start arguing with him. That's right.
18:27Head Versus Heart in Suffering
And I got to say, I think one of the temptations in suffering is to go for the head. So suffering, if it's physical, if it's in our hearts, if you're suffering just because you have a bad idea—I today was having a really rough morning. And I called my friend and I was like, this is what's going on. I'm not going to call this grade-A suffering, but I was just feeling just about a situation that I just don't want to walk. I just don't want to handle it. I don't want to have to be a grown-up in this scenario. And she listened to me talk and she said, I can't help but think that you're trying to solve a heart problem with your head, that you're troubled, that this is a sad situation.
And that if you—you're thinking, if I can think this through for long enough, I will find a way that this situation doesn't hurt or isn't going to be difficult. And she's actually—actually, I don't think that that option exists. I think this just is a difficult situation. And it was so helpful because she went for the heart and then we were able to converse on a heart level about the difficulty and what I was afraid of and how I felt about the scenario. But so I think the temptation often is to move into our heads entirely and to say, I'm going to solve this problem with my head. So I'm going to have a theology that either makes it so it's okay.
Or, you know, I'm going to say God's going to heal me today. And if he doesn't, then I just didn't have enough faith. So my logical conclusion is the problem's with me. Job's friends' logical conclusion: Job, the problem must be with you. God doesn't do anything wrong. So fix your thinking and repent. Yeah. So I think it's really easy to be one of Job's friends and aim for the head when the suffering is not primarily located in the head. It's not logical. Right. Yeah. Part of what makes it suffering is that it's not logical. Yeah. Well, I think just around the—I feel like when I think about Job's friends and how uncomfortable they were with Job's suffering and his honesty. Oh yeah.
I mean, I see myself in that. I mean, I've been a pastor for 20 years and been with people who are suffering unimaginably. Yeah. Or lost. And the desire to say something that is going to like somehow make it better is really strong. Or just do something. Yep. And that's not typically what's needed. Sometimes a timely word can be a real blessing, but I would say that—don't put too much hope in just the timely word to relieve great suffering. That doesn't mean don't say words, but it does mean don't think that just explaining away the situation or helping someone change their mind about it a little bit is actually going to fix the suffering.
So I think you can deeply minister to someone's heart through the things that you say in the midst of suffering, for sure. Yeah. Can you just back up and say a little bit more about the head and heart reality? So what would it look like for someone who is facing suffering to not go at it with their head, but primarily tend to their heart? Yeah. We're going to look at that a little bit as we kind of break down the different kinds of suffering. But I think that there are certainly some kinds of suffering that can be addressed with your head. I mean, you can logically fix this problem and now it's not a problem, right?
I'm suffering financially and I can use my brain to come up with a new plan to make more money. And now I am not experiencing that kind of suffering. And it has a logical solution that I can address with my mind and that's good. God made you to be able to solve problems, but there are some kinds of suffering that cannot be resolved through your head. If you are in physical pain, thinking through it or trying something different or having a new plan doesn't necessarily relieve the suffering, it doesn't make the cancer go away. It doesn't make your kids okay or come back to the faith. Thinking about the scenario differently isn't necessarily going to relieve the pain.
And what is that, like a form of control, like a desire to control outcomes? Like I desperately—like I have, I believe we have some certain amount of power. I must have some kind of power in this situation to make it better. Yeah, maybe, but maybe also just, in some—our brains know in some circumstances this is the right move and it works sometimes. And when it's the only one that we think we have, it makes sense that we're going to try to use it. It makes sense that you're going to look at a suffering person and try to just say, well, God needed another angel. By the way, that's terrible theology. Don't ever say that.
But that idea that, you know, like—— If someone dies and the surviving person is there in front of you. God just needed an angel. Yes, do never say that 'cause it is not true. Well, yeah, I mean, people don't become angels, and also that's terrible theology. Right. Right, he died to eventually end death altogether. That's right. Like he died to destroy death. He loves the whole resurrection plan that burns in his heart and that he is working to bring about. And is the bearer of the most suffering in that it takes longer than any of us want it to? I actually think that personally, I think that that is the crux of that temptation of Jesus.
24:52Jesus' Temptation in the Wilderness
Remember how Jesus was baptized by John the Baptist and the Holy Spirit comes and descends on him. And then the Spirit of God, the Holy Spirit led him out into the wilderness for 40 days fasting, where he was tempted. And one of the temptations that the devil threw down before Jesus was, he showed him the wealth of the earth. He showed him all of the kingdoms of the earth or the riches of the earth, however you want to put that. And he said, "This can all be yours if you bow down to me." And I've thought about that a lot and I've thought, man, what does wealth mean to Jesus? Like here's God who is love. Like Jesus wasn't not—he was fully God and God is love.
So how is the God-man who is love itself? What does he think is wealth? And in that moment, I just, I wonder what the enemy showed him. And I wonder if the enemy showed Jesus everywhere that his kingdom, that his wealth, his influence—the enemy's kingdom was causing pain. Yeah. Every person that is dying this moment of starvation, everyone who's being abused right now, Jesus, everybody—that if you just circumvent the long game, the plan that maintains the integrity of the human heart and free will, but makes a way for the suffering eventually to end—if you cut that short right now and you just submit to Satan, if you just submit to me, I will take my hands off of every pie.
I mean, you can just hear the enemy. If you just take the shortcut, I will take my hands off of every one of those pies right now. Like, I will stop the torment. I will stop the—all of those things that you can see, 'cause I have the power to do them. And that—I mean, he does. Satan is the ruler of this age and has the power in this age to inflict a lot of suffering. Yeah, no, it's—yeah. So there's something in us that is a great temptation to say—to capitulate. Right, just to say, if God really loved me, this would be faster. And if God really loved you, there's a logical, quick way through this scenario.
And then some of it's really reasonable 'cause God gave you a great thinking brain that sometimes does solve suffering with your brain. Sometimes you can solve the problem with your brain. Right. So it makes sense. Hey listeners, are you ready to become fully alive? Life can feel overwhelming, and many of us struggle to feel fully alive. Perhaps you feel stuck in your marriage or career. You might be struggling with anxiety or depression, or you really want to take your relationship with God to the next level. The good news is that you don't have to go through it alone.
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28:33The Four Types of Suffering
So, with that, let's look at the—you have four types of suffering that you talk about. There is suffering that is the result of our broken world, which we're just talking about, that the whole world is under the power of sin and under the power of the evil one. And then you talk about suffering caused by our own sin that comes upon us, and then suffering caused by other people's sin against us. And then there's also something you call sympathetic suffering. So I think we understand that suffering, the result of our broken world, we can understand that. And suffering even caused by our own sin. Do you want to say anything about that? Suffering caused by our own sin. Yeah, I think it's sticky.
I think a lot of times it's hard for us to receive forgiveness or sometimes when our own sin or even negligence—I was talking to someone a little while ago and they were just saying, "I don't know if I could bear finding out that my kids are suffering in some way because of me and I didn't mean for it to be this way, whether it was a generational curse that I never broke or a—" I mean, you know, I—something else. The well water I never tested or the—No, I'm serious. Like something like that. I mean, there's something even unintentional. The idea that I either inflicted this pain or in my ignorance didn't prevent it somehow.
Sometimes it's so sticky because we can't bear the weight of it. We can't bear the thought that we're a part of the conversation, that we've caused some of the suffering. Right. So how about suffering caused by other people's sin against us? What does that look like? Yeah, that includes everything from accidental or unintentional offense. I said something and it hurt you and I didn't—maybe I didn't mean for it to hurt you. Maybe I did. Maybe it was a little passive aggressive. So I'm injured by somebody else. I'm hurt by them. Accidentally or unintentionally, all the way to abuse or neglect or generational curses or witchcraft or the things that were intentionally perpetuated.
And the world's full of it. It's just—and the trickle-down effects of that. So it may not just be, you know, you sin against me, but people way outside of my sphere of influence, their choices are impacting me for good or for ill and some of that really hurts. Yeah. So if someone unintentionally hurts you, is that actual sin against you? I think that we handle it the same way. Okay. But it might not—it's not necessarily sin on their part. I think that it only—God truly knows the human heart. And so even trying to fully pull that apart may be not satisfying at the end of the day. You may be able to make some headway, but the human heart is very tricky. It is, it is very tricky.
I'm just thinking of the cultural climate that we're in right now that if someone feels hurt by someone else, like intent really doesn't matter. What matters is how that person received it. Yeah, and I just wanna say that the gospel works in both scenarios. Like actually there's freedom for you through forgiveness and the justice to be found in Jesus' side and trusting him with the next season of your life, whether somebody meant it or not. And so actually at the end of the day, you can release the other person to their own story in Jesus. That's what forgiveness ends up looking like. The thing that'll drive you insane is assigning motive everywhere and guilt.
Because actually, once you get sucked into that game, you'll never get to the end of it. Well, yeah, it's a spirit of judgment. 'Cause you're guilty too. Yeah, and it's a spirit of judgment. Yeah, that's a great other podcast. Put a pin in that one. We'll get back. We're actually gonna have a guest soon that we'll talk to him about spirit of judgment. The spirit of the age. Talk to me about this fourth part, which is the sympathetic suffering. Yeah, sympathetic suffering is suffering that leads to or is the substance of friendship with Jesus.
So the fellowship of his suffering. Yeah, where he shares some of his experience or some of what's on his heart for another person. And it actually costs you something. It can be related to suffering caused by other people's sin, but it's not necessarily the same thing. I mean, that belonging under that category would be something like, you're praying for somebody and your shoulder starts to hurt. And then it's like, oh, oh, now I understand a little of how you feel. And I also have some clarity about how to pray. So I'm sharing, I'm participating in this suffering in some way. Yeah, I think I see sympathetic suffering most commonly among the intercessors of the church.
People that are really called to the ministry of intercessory prayer, where they will oftentimes in their bodies or in their minds just be so burdened with God's heart. Yeah, they're not making it up. They're not just thinking about it too long or too hard, but God actually shares some of what's—— And they feel it deeply. Yeah. They share in God's heart and feel what God feels for a situation. Yeah. And that enables their—empowers their intercession. And it's also—— They're able to press in for the—— Unitive. What do I mean by unitive? I mean, it's actually forging friendship with God. The Philippians three. Yeah, that Philippians three. Like, I wanna know him.
I don't wanna just know about him. I wanna know how he feels. I wanna know—I mean, I'm not really a friend with somebody unless they really get me. You know what I mean? Like if we don't have any common sympathy really at the end of the day, we're not friends. We might be—you might've read a Wikipedia article about each other, but we're not really friends. Friends understand on a level that matters. Yeah. And so I do, and we'll talk a little bit more about that as we talk about kind of how we navigate that when it comes up. Yeah, I love it, I love it. So we're gonna talk about how we respond to each of these different types of suffering. Yeah, yeah, how do we respond?
So I mean, some of it is just discernment. Do you know which kind of suffering you're dealing with? Are you dealing with suffering that's a result of the broken world? Are you dealing with suffering caused by your own sin? Are you dealing with suffering caused by other people's sin against you? Or is this an invitation to union with Jesus? And at the end of the day, all of it ends there. All of it is an invitation. All of it is always an invitation to being closer to Jesus.
And sometimes you can't tell the difference and sometimes it's all four of these at the same time. So some of this is—we're giving to you some categories, but they're not hard and fast. They bleed into each other and they can all take place at the same time. Job's suffering being a really good example. He was suffering because God, he was suffering because Satan, he was suffering because his friends were not on board, and what's going on?
And at the end of the day, even though Job did protest, he was a weak and broken and guilty human just like the rest of us, right? Right. And I think it's, like, you know, it's sort of like when you get baptized, you renounce the world, the flesh and the devil, and people want to know, well, who's causing the suffering, the world? It's all. And it's like, well, yes. But sometimes there is kind of a clean path through, and as we're holding these things before the Lord in prayer and asking him how to address each one of them, we handle them differently.
We do handle them differently. So, and it's also important to know that Jesus only enters through the gate of our yes. We've talked about that in other podcasts, but he's not a manipulator and he's not a hijacker. So welcoming him into suffering for ourselves or for other people does not come through force or manipulation. It's just really important. We're not forcing help on someone and we're not judging people who aren't ready to be helped yet. We're waiting for their full and free yes, and he's waiting for our full and free yes in the midst of suffering. Yeah, that's great. So let's look at suffering
37:10Responding to a Broken World
that's a result of living in a broken world. So how do we respond to the suffering that we receive from living in a broken world? Yes, some of it's just really practical, right? Yeah, like Matthew 25 would be a great example. Feed the hungry, clothe the naked—that missional lifestyle where you are—what I mean by missional is where you are basically seeing where God is at work. You're identifying where God's at work and you're joining him there. Yeah. And you see legitimate suffering and you are in tangible ways seeking to alleviate that suffering. You can look up Matthew 25. You are giving a cup of cold water to someone who is thirsty.
You're visiting those who are in prison. You are giving clothes to those who don't have any. You're feeding the hungry. You are addressing some of the felt suffering of the humans around you and some may call that social justice. I hate that term. Me too. It was a big thing to say without a caveat to begin with, but I don't think the term in Christian circles is actually very helpful. It isn't helpful because it doesn't actually address the gospel of the kingdom, that it's missional. Yeah, I think the idea of a justice movement kind of can—and I know we all mean different things when we say that, so I just want to start there. But what it can do, if when we use this idea of a justice movement, is it can create a sense that everything boils down to our own sense of equality or inequality. That's right. And at the end of the day the deepest thing in the kingdom of God isn't equality. That's right, which is a crazy thing to say, but it isn't. The deepest thing in the kingdom of God is servanthood. Yeah, Jesus didn't consider equality with the Father something to be grasped, but instead took on the form of a servant, right? And so the highest calling is the lowest one, and so we're actually—yes, we want to do justly, that's not—it's not like we don't aim for justice in our lives, but the idea that all of the relief of suffering is going to come through our own sense of justice and a justice initiative—a lot of times we're aiming for bringing what we consider to be equality rather than necessarily the kingdom of God. And if I'm out for my own equality, or even if I'm preaching somehow in this lifetime, your highest good is going to be equality, you're gonna miss the opportunity to find Jesus in a lot of ways.
That's right, yeah, that's the upside-down kingdom. He interacts with a lot of pastors who don't feel comfortable with a woman teaching. Yeah. And if I were aiming for equality, you could say, "You need to listen to my wife. But you just—you have mom issues" or whatever it is. I did say that once to someone. You did, that's why. Or you know—— I said, you don't want to listen to my wife 'cause you don't want to listen to your mom. I might just not have had anything good to say that day too. So let's just leave that on the table. But instead, I love—I have come to love the opportunity to be in some ways invisible.
Because in that place, I am free to serve in the secret. So if we have someone to the house that is not interested in being in that kind of interaction or learning from a woman, then I actually get the opportunity to make dinner and serve. But if I were aiming for equality in that moment and my lens of equality, I would be looking for my own self-promotion rather than finding the opportunity to become like Jesus in that space. That's right, yeah. And that really has no place in the kingdom, does it? No, and I think we can get into easy gray areas by saying somehow justice doesn't matter—that's not true at all. But the deepest satisfaction isn't going to be human justice.
Right, and human justice—well, any kind of justice isn't going to come unless our mindset is like that of Christ Jesus, Philippians two, who didn't consider equality with God something to be grasped, but instead humbled himself. So there is a sense in which true justice can't come unless you are becoming like Jesus and trusting God with the outcomes. Yeah, and that doesn't mean—again, I wanna say it doesn't mean that we don't work for the betterment of the humans around us. It's actually, where we see pain, we interact in ways that we want to make life better for the people around us. Absolutely, I mean, that's part of addressing that Matthew 25 reality.
Yeah, and that's why we say too, when we teach on the kingdom of God, that the kingdom of God is the way life should be. It's, as N.T. Wright says, God putting the world to rights, which is justice. Yeah, that's right. But it's the justice of the kingdom. And what does justice look like from God's perspective and how do we get there from God's perspective? It's an upside-down kingdom, it's a race to the bottom. Yeah. So, okay, so yeah, so we're looking at—— So practical service, that's one of the ways that we deal with the suffering that we see around us, and also intercession, those big, bold prayers for the kingdom of God to come, like healing and provision and deliverance.
42:45Healing Suffering Caused by Our Sin
And we are interceding and we are acting in a way that brings about the kingdom of God. Yeah, amen, dare to pray daring prayers. Yeah, we'll talk about that a little more. So let's look at suffering caused by our own sin. So what do we do about that? Oh, well, in some ways, it's kind of the easiest to deal with 'cause we repent. But having the patience—— Repentance is a great work. I love it, finding out that my own problem is—I'm actually just jealous and I need to repent of jealousy, or pick your poison. It's kind of a relief because there's a 30-second turnaround on that. I can do the four R's, I can repent, I have some agency, my logical brain can get to have a part to play.
That's right. But having the patience to aim for deep transformation rather than just behavior management, that actually is a long process. Yeah, that means you're probably doing the four R's a lot. Yeah, so you can do the four R's. If you find out that the suffering is caused by you, you can repent. You can do the four R's. And again, if you haven't listened to that episode, repent, renounce, release and receive. There's this classical idea of penance and it gets a bad rap, but it actually is part of really the relief of the suffering that we ourselves have caused. Yeah. In the AA community, they call it making amends. Yeah. So. Right. We're restoring what we've stolen.
We're making an effort to heal the tears that we've caused, making restitution. Yeah. So if you've taken money, you give it back. If you've injured somebody, you're actually working toward their betterment and you're working toward the healing rather than just saying sorry. You're actually—there are actions that are part of that. Penance also kind of includes maybe sort of medicinal behaviors. So, you know, maybe you want to engage a season of fasting. Maybe there are behaviors and practices that you want to participate in that actually participate in the healing yourself.
So that are getting in the way of restoration and healing for yourself and for other people where that's involved. Yeah. And deep heart change and transformation. And then offering the potential for reconciliation where possible. So if you've sinned against someone else, you are, when it's possible, holding out the potential for healing in the relationship. You're not demanding it, but you're willing to work toward it. Yeah. I think that what we can do is—we don't have to finish this whole thing today because we don't have enough time, but because I kind of want to just briefly look at reconciliation there.
So how do you heal suffering that's caused by our own sin, and around reconciliation and forgiveness? 'Cause I think this is really important that, you know, we've been in the church long enough to know that for some in the church, the most important thing to strive for and to kind of push people toward is reconciliation. Yeah. And that's really unfortunate. Yeah. So why don't you explain that a little bit? Because, you know, I have seen some unfortunate moments where, you know, people are being pushed into reconciliation, but reconciliation really can't happen because there are some really important things that need to happen before reconciliation takes place. Yeah.
And the building of trust being one of them. So when people have been sinned against, there's been genuine injury. So sin always causes injury. So if I sin against you, it's injured. Now, whether that means I physically injured you or I've just injured the relationship by sinning against you. So there's been a wound. For you, forgiveness is to decide that you're going to hand the injustice of this situation to Jesus for him to deal with. That's forgiveness. And that's a choice that you make. Right. Healing of the injury that I've caused you, that's a miracle from God. So then we wait on him to enact healing and we ask him for healing. Reconciliation now involves two people.
It involves your choice and my choice, my choice being now I've repented against you. And I want to work toward an actual relationship. So I think the easiest way maybe to see this is Jesus—God forgives us, holds out full and free forgiveness through Jesus. He offers, like, all of the injury. He says, I will forgive you. He has forgiven and the justice is paid for in the body of his son. It's up to us to decide, actually, I want to receive that. And now I want to work toward a real relationship with God. Right. Absolutely. And that's why Paul can talk about in 2 Corinthians chapter 5 about being reconciled back to God. God doesn't need to be reconciled to us. We need to be reconciled to Him.
And because He already forgives. And so reconciliation means us coming home. Yeah. So I think that that's huge. Yeah. Forgiveness isn't reconciliation. It's just—it's not. Right. But yeah. And the last one. So you can repent, you can work towards restoration and giving God permission to heal you even when the sin was your fault. Yeah. Let's end with that. Why don't you just say a little bit more? I feel like that's just a mic drop. Give God permission to heal you even when the sin was your fault. Yeah. Don't resent yourself because He doesn't resent you. Yeah.
So the ending of suffering caused by your own sin often looks like receiving the tender washing and binding and healing that comes from God even when the sin is ours. Because you are in need of, you know, just as much grace as anyone else on the planet. And healing. Yeah. That's the gospel. You can say forever, I don't deserve it because I did this to myself. You're right. Yeah. Welcome to the gratuitous nature of the gospel. Come on. Love it. Well, next time in our next episode, we're actually going to dive into the next two. Okay. Because we've taken up enough time, but we're going to dive into suffering caused by other people's sin. And then we're going to actually talk about unitive sin—
unitive suffering with Jesus, which I think is going to super bless you. And we're going to talk about the mystery of suffering too. So join us next time as we wrap up. This is two part. This is a two-parter. We're anticipating it to be a two-parter, but it will be. All right, guys, we can't wait to be with you again next time. Blessings. Peace. Thank you for joining us on this episode of Between Heaven and Earth. We hope that you are stirred to curiosity and courage as we explored bringing heaven and earth together right where you are. Remember, you're not alone on this journey.
We're here to support you in understanding what the Spirit of God is doing in your life and responding in obedience to his good leadership. If you enjoyed today's conversation, please take a moment to like, share, subscribe, and leave a review. We'd love to hear from you. Share your thoughts and questions with us on our Facebook page or by email, podcast@encounterculturene.com. Your support helps us reach more people who are eager to join Jesus in his great project of restoration. Also, check out our website, encounterculturene.com, for upcoming events and equipping opportunities for you and your church. Until next time, may you find joy living in between heaven and earth and the courage to bring them together wherever you go.