Managing our attitudes toward pain

You'll have to excuse yet another post on pain and suffering. I don't intend to be morbid, I simply find again and again that the theology of pain and suffering is of the utmost importance in how we view ourselves and how we view God.

I recently stumbled across a blog post of John Piper's from July 2008. You can read the whole thing here, I remember reading it when he posted it and finding it extremely helpful, but had until recently forgotten. Here's the gist:

One of the reasons God rarely gives micro reasons for his painful providences, but regularly gives magnificent macro reasons, is that there are too many micro reasons for us to manage, namely, millions and millions and millions and millions and millions.

Knowing the limitations of our finiteness, God doesn't reveal to us the micro reasons of our pain but directs us to faith. Pain is one of the best opportunities to grow in trusting God, especially when we are completely powerless to take the pain away. All of sudden, challenges raise in our minds to God's love, God's sovereignty, God's goodness. All of these questions are resolved, if dealt with, during an experience of pain. Either God is loving, sovereign, and good, and this pain is therefore for my ultimate good - despite the fact that I don't understand all of the micro reasons for my current suffering. Or, this pain is so terrible that God cannot possibly be loving, sovereign, and good. The former response is bolstering to one's faith. The latter is a rejection of faith. Suffering shows us who we are.

Over the past several years, Daniel 9 has been an encouraging passage for me with regard to managing pain. It presents a perfect example of God's general policy to direct the suffering to grand and magnificent hope and not on minute details. Here's the story: Apparently, Daniel had been reading Jeremiah, and had come across the prophecy where God proclaimed that Israel would be in captivity for 70 years. He began to pour out his heart toward God, asking for mercy for the Jewish people. Eventually, the angel Gabriel brings Daniel God's answer. The answer does not include small details of Israel's suffering, but rather points to God's magnificent and overarching plan. God's response declares a much greater return from exile than Daniel was even asking for. Namely, the coming of the Messiah, who would "put an end to sin, and atone for iniquity".

One of the hardest things to do when in pain is to pick your head up and look at the big picture. This is precisely what God calls us to do time and time again throughout Scripture. But he doesn't expect us to do it with our own power or with some self-manufactured hope. Only with the hope of the gospel - that Christ has come in the flesh and atoned for our sins and purchased our righteousness - only in this hope can we pick up our heads. Then we can even rejoice in our pain, knowing that it is working for us an eternal glory in Christ.