By Michael Strating, PhD
Suffering has a way of exposing what we really believe. It is relatively easy to affirm that God is good, loving, and sovereign when life is going well. But when suffering comes – especially when it is severe, prolonged, or seemingly senseless – our theological convictions can suddenly become much more difficult to hold onto. We may find ourselves asking, If God is good and sovereign, why did He allow this to happen? Where is He in my suffering? Can I really trust Him when I cannot understand what He is doing?
God’s Sovereignty and Goodness
Scripture presents God as sovereign over all things. He directs the course of nations (Prov. 21:1; Dan. 2:21), works through the human heart and will (Prov. 16:9; Phil. 2:13), and exercises His providential care over the smallest details of our lives – even the hairs on our heads (Matt. 10:29-31). Nothing is ultimately outside His sovereign rule or beyond His providential care. And yet, this sovereignty is not arbitrary or detached from His character: “In all things God works for the good of those who love him” (Rom. 8:28).
Christian faith does not promise that suffering will be eliminated in this life. Instead, Scripture points us toward something deeper: the transformation of suffering. Paul’s “thorn in the flesh” illustrates this. He pleaded with God for its removal, but God responded, “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness” (2 Cor. 12:9). Paul learned to receive his suffering differently because God could use it for a greater good. Similarly, believers are encouraged to find joy in trials because the testing of faith produces perseverance and maturity (Rom. 5:1-5; Jas. 1:2-4). This is not bitter resignation or apathy. Christian surrender is an act of trust: I do not understand what God is doing, and I may desperately wish that my circumstances were different, but I choose to entrust myself to Him.
When We Cannot See the Good
The challenge then, especially in suffering, is learning to trust His goodness and wisdom when we cannot see how He is working for our good. Christians rightly turn to the promise of Romans 8:28, yet there is an important distinction between knowing that God is working for good and being able to see what that good is. The story of Job reminds us of this. Job suffers catastrophic losses and repeatedly asks why, yet God never gives him the detailed explanation he seeks. Instead, Job encounters God Himself and is reminded of the vast difference between God’s wisdom and his own (Job 38-42).
In fact, suffering confronts us with the limits of our perspective. We see a small portion of the story; God sees the whole. We experience the present; God sees the beginning, middle, and end. We know what we have lost; God knows what He is accomplishing. And sometimes, at least in this life, we may never fully understand how our suffering fits within His purposes.
This can be difficult when we are accustomed to solving problems and controlling our own lives. When we cannot understand why, we may become consumed with trying to make sense of what happened. We ruminate, replay events, imagine alternative outcomes, and search for an explanation that will finally make the suffering comprehensible. But faith sometimes asks us to live faithfully without having all the answers.
God’s Compassion
There is another danger, however. In emphasizing God’s sovereignty, we can unintentionally portray Him as distant, passive, or indifferent to human suffering. Scripture gives us a different picture: God is sovereign AND compassionate.
God describes Himself as compassionate and gracious, slow to anger, abounding in love and faithfulness (Ex. 34:6). The Psalms portray Him as a Father who has compassion on His children (Ps. 103:13) and as one who is “close to the brokenhearted” (Ps. 34:18). Jesus Himself weeps at Lazarus’s tomb (John 11:35), even though He knows what He is about to do. Even God’s discipline is described relationally: “the Lord disciplines the one he loves” (Heb. 12:6). His purposes are not sadistic attempts to inflict pain, nor is suffering evidence that God takes pleasure in our distress. Rather, the God who sovereignly works through suffering is also the God who loves His children and desires their ultimate good.
This matters when we minister to those who suffer. Telling someone, “God is sovereign, so you need to trust Him,” may be theologically true but pastorally incomplete. The suffering person also needs to know that the God whose sovereignty they are being asked to trust is good, loving, patient, and compassionate.
Responding to Suffering with Trust, Patience, and Hope
Suffering can test and refine our faith. Peter describes trials as testing the genuineness of faith, like gold refined by fire (1 Pet. 1:6-7). We can therefore see suffering as an opportunity for our faith to move from something we profess intellectually to something we actually live relationally.
Severe suffering can expose the gap between what we say we believe and what we actually trust. Yet Christians sometimes respond to suffering by trying to close this gap too quickly. We may offer explanations or solutions, quote Romans 8:28, or simply encourage someone to “trust God.” These responses are often well-intended, but they can minimize another person’s pain. Job’s friends remind us how easily theological explanations can become unhelpful when they are offered without compassion. Scripture reminds us that God’s apparent “slowness” is not indifference but patience (2 Pet. 3:9); sometimes our expectation that God should act quickly can become an additional source of suffering, when what He invites us to do is patiently wait for – and with – Him.
At the same time, we can become so focused on our suffering that we lose sight of God altogether. Pain naturally draws our attention inward. We become preoccupied with what happened, what we have lost, what might happen next, and how powerless we feel. We are finite, but God is not. We are weak, but God is strong. We cannot see the whole story, but God can. We cannot control everything that happens to us, but God remains sovereign.
Faith does not require us to deny our pain or manufacture positive feelings. The Psalms give us permission to lament, question, grieve, and cry out to God. But lament is fundamentally different from abandoning God. The person who cries, “How long, O LORD?” (Ps. 13) is still turning toward Him.
Perhaps, then, the deepest invitation of suffering is not to understand everything God is doing but to learn to trust the God who is doing it.
This kind of trust is not passive resignation or stoic acceptance. It is an active surrender of our limited perspective to God’s greater wisdom. It is the gradual discovery that we can bring our questions, grief, anger, fear, and confusion into relationship with a God who is both sovereign over our circumstances and compassionate toward us within them.
We may not be able to see the good. We may not understand the purpose. We may desperately wish that the suffering would end. But even there, we can learn to say: “I do not understand, but I trust You. I do not like this, but I will not turn away from You. I cannot see what You are doing, but I believe You are good – and I will entrust myself to Your compassionate care.”
Dr. Strating completed his Ph.D. in Clinical Psychology at the University of Windsor as well as his residency with the London Clinical Psychology Residency Consortium. His areas of focus include working with relationship concerns, difficulties managing or engaging with emotion, anxiety, panic, anger, grief, depression, self-criticism, perfectionism, trauma, and OCD. He is also experienced in research as well as teaching and supervising therapist trainees.
He is an Assistant Professor of Psychology at Redeemer University and a practicing Clinical Psychologist at Abide Psychology.
