By Jessica Brodie

If there’s anything constant in life, anything we should expect, it’s suffering. It’s one of those universal experiences. I know of no person alive today, regardless of age or how kind or seemingly blessed they are, who hasn’t experienced a moment of wretchedness. Perhaps it was debilitating sickness. A moment of gut-wrenching fear. Dreadful loss or heartbreak. Violent pain or soul-draining depression. It sounds trite, but even an infant’s wails for milk or a diaper change qualify—to the infant, their pain is just as intense.

Yet when it happens, suffering often catches us off-guard. We seem utterly surprised—why me? Why now? Did I do something to cause this?

In the throes of agony, sometimes we cannot see past the suffering at hand. All-consuming, it can threaten our very will to live.

Recently, a friend experienced a health crisis so excruciating he joked that he begged his wife to beat him senseless with a tire iron; I’m not so sure he was joking.

For those of us who follow Jesus, who live our lives in a godly manner and boldly exhibit the fruit of the Spirit, perhaps we expect we’ll be immune from that suffering. Maybe we think our goodness will somehow keep it at bay.

Maybe we think suffering only occurs to teach us a God lesson, or that God wouldn’t possibly inflict such pain on someone he cherishes.

Yet this is the same God who sent his only begotten Son, Jesus Christ, to suffer and die an agonizing crucifixion. Make no mistake—Jesus was fully God and fully man, and he fully experienced the pain of that crucifixion, not to mention the violent beating before that. He even refused the painkiller soldiers offered to him (wine mixed with myrrh) before they drove nails into his hands and feet, then hoisted him up so all the world could see “the king of the Jews” put to a humiliating death.

Why do we expect any different? And why—if Jesus suffered such pain so that we who believe could enjoy eternal life in heaven with him—do believers today still experience suffering?

I think it’s because there is something beautiful in suffering, something good, that we often don’t recognize.

And if we can only get past the pain to recognize it, we’ll be immensely blessed.

I think about the times in my life I’ve experienced suffering and met God there in my deepest, darkest valley. The time I felt Jesus wrap his arms around me as I sobbed brokenhearted on my bathroom floor. The times I’ve been certain the searing pain from my migraine would claim my life, only to reach new peace as I felt God bring relief. The time the flu wrapped its deadly tentacles around my aching body so intensely I could see no end to the onslaught, then felt the Lord right beside me. Holding my hand. Stilling me with his presence.

There’s a song I love that proclaims the God of the mountains and the valleys—the same God, there through it all.

Suffering is a very human experience, one that brings vast opportunity both for good and for joy.

Here are a few things I have learned about suffering:

1) Suffering is to be expected. Jesus taught that trouble is guaranteed, warning his followers, “In this world you will have trouble. But take heart! I have overcome the world” (John 16:33). The original Greek Jesus used for “trouble” translates to distress, suffering, anguish, and trials, and note that he didn’t say this could happen. Jesus said believers will have trouble.

2) Suffering teaches and prepares us. Often, suffering is showcased in the Bible as a test, an opportunity to hone and refine God’s people for further work they are to do on earth to glorify God and his kingdom. Suffering gives us a chance to trust God. Romans 5:3-4 tells us “suffering produces perseverance; perseverance, character; and character, hope.”

3) Suffering unites us with Christ. When we suffer, we have the opportunity to experience what Christ experienced; we align ourselves with him. In 1 Peter 4:13, Peter says, “Rejoice inasmuch as you participate in the sufferings of Christ, so that you may be overjoyed when his glory is revealed.” The apostle Paul yearned to know Christ through “the power of his resurrection and participation in his sufferings, becoming like him in his death” (Philippians 3:10). The suffering we experience today might not lead to death, but it gives us the chance to understand and relate to our Savior, to appreciate what he endured for us.

4) Suffering brings unique comfort. When we suffer, we learn to look to God. We cling to him, and we learn to rest in the Lord with abandon, something that I’ve learned firsthand leads to peace and comfort (thanks, flu and bathroom-floor crying jags). All other illusions are tossed away as we realize only God is the answer; only God saves; only God stands above all, forevermore. As the apostle Paul proclaims in 2 Corinthians 1:3-4, “Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of compassion and the God of all comfort, who comforts us in all our troubles, so that we can comfort those in any trouble with the comfort we ourselves receive from God.”

5) Suffering can be a way to love others. Jesus suffered a painful death on the cross for us. In 1 Peter 2:24, the apostle says Jesus bore our sins “in his body on the cross, so that we might die to sins and live for righteousness.” Often in our lives, suffering is something that happens to us—we get sick, we lose someone we love, we are persecuted. But other times, we might have the opportunity to voluntarily offer ourselves up for someone else. Maybe this is a soldier or police officer who willingly enters battle to save another, or a bystander who jumps into the ocean to save a swimmer caught in a riptide. For me as a lesser example, I recently chose to push through a debilitating headache and pain to do some mission work on a roof because someone I cared about needed a break. It was a way for me to love someone, to put another before myself. And it taught me much.

Suffering is hard, but we never suffer alone. The same God who walks with us on the mountaintop meets us in the valley—holding our hand, stilling us with his presence, and working even our deepest pain into something beautiful.

So when suffering comes (and it will come), take heart. He has overcome the world, and he will not waste a single tear.

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