Q & A from Suffering & Evil in JOB Pt. 1

There were a few questions we did not have not to answer this past Sunday during our panel conversation on suffering & evil in the Book of Job.  I've posted a couple of those questions and the answers that Richard Sugg and I put together.  We welcome your comments or further questions.

In Philippians 3:10 I read “that I may know him and the power of his resurrection, and may share his sufferings, becoming like him in his death”.   How do we joyfully embrace suffering as believers? "Sharing his sufferings" and "becoming like him in death" makes me uncomfortable/troubled.

Good.  We should be uncomfortable with this truth.  To be ‘uncomfortable’ with Jesus's teachings means either we belong to him and we're working/struggling with the work of sanctification, or in means we haven't actually heard and begun to obey what he said.

In truth, everyone has a story of suffering. Mine is different than yours, and we sometimes cringe when we here the depths of some people's horror. What we have in common, though, is that we all suffer. Becoming like Jesus in his suffering means, at least in part, that we are willing to trust the promises of God in the middle of that suffering.

What basis do I have for this trust? Why would I be willing to hold on to this Lord? Job held on in faith because he trusted the promises of God.   "For I know that my Redeemer lives, and at the last he will stand upon the earth.  And after my skin has been thus destroyed, yet in my flesh I shall see God, whom I shall see for myself, and my eyes shall behold, and not another. My heart faints within me!"  (Job 19:25-27 ESV)

We can hold on with confidence and joy because Jesus rose from the dead. And if Jesus rose from the dead, then whatever he says and whatever he calls me to do (or go through), I know that I can trust him to do what he has promised. He has made me, his enemy, into his son.   He promises to forgive my sins and give me a place at his banquet table in heaven, and in the mean time,  He will work ALL THINGS together for my good. (Romans 8)