The God Who Suffers with Us: Hope at the Cross

I asked the question, “Where is God in this?” not in my seminary classroom, but in the ICU. As I watched my sweet little boy seizing, being intubated, and placed into a coma, I prayed, “Lord, where are you, and what are you doing?” Not in theory. Not in a sermon. Not in a theological framework I had affirmed for years. But in this reality, we did not choose, where are you? If God is good, why this? If God is all-powerful, why didn’t He stop it? If He loves our son—and we believe He does—then why allow him to suffer like this? Those questions were not rebellion. They were grief searching for understanding.

Philosophy seeks to answer the question formulaically. Christianity and the Scriptures answer with a person. This does not mean that we bury our heads in the sand and do not wrestle with the deep philosophical and theological questions. We do. Our faith is a reasonable faith. However, we ultimately recognize that God does not shout all the answers from heaven. Instead, He enters humanity to deal with them directly.

Colossians 2:9 says, “For in Him the whole fullness of Deity dwells bodily.” Jesus, the Second Person of the Trinity, entered into sinful humanity and human suffering. Though fully God, He suffered. The cross is God’s response to the problem of evil. He does not watch injustice from a distance. He enters it and bears it.

In Jesus Christ, God steps into our misunderstandings, griefs, pains, sicknesses, and the death of loved ones. Isaiah called Him “a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief” (Isa. 53:3). Those are not mere words, but a true reality. John Stott writes, “I could never myself believe in God, if it were not for the cross.” The cross reveals that God does not stand detached from suffering. He personally enters it and bears it.

When I ask where God is in my son’s story, I am reminded of the lasting scars of Christ. The Savior who reigns supreme over our lives is not unfamiliar with pain. He has entered it. He wears it. And that changes how I endure mine.

The Cross as God’s Answer to Evil

Isaiah called the Suffering Servant “a man of sorrows” who was “acquainted with grief.” The New Testament shows us that He experienced sorrow and grief in all the ways we do, and more. He was born in very humble circumstances. Jesus grew up in a carpenter’s household, without social status or privilege. When His parents offered sacrifices at the temple, they brought “a pair of turtledoves, or two young pigeons” (Luke 2:24), which was the provision allowed only for those who could not afford a lamb.

Jesus was also born under Roman rule. The Jewish people were suppressed. Everything about Jesus’ upbringing was humble, difficult, and lowly. During Jesus’ ministry, He was misunderstood and rejected. He endured conflict with the Pharisees, who sought to stir the people against Him. Eventually the opposition intensified. He was falsely accused, subjected to an illegal trial, beaten by soldiers, mocked by authorities, and executed on a cross under Roman power.

Isaiah also tells us that He has “borne our griefs and carried our sorrows.” The text says that Christ has “borne” our griefs. Jesus came to bear the heavy burden of our griefs and the sorrows of living as sinners in a fallen world. Jesus did not just come to bear our burdens but also pay the penalty for our sin with His own life. “He was pierced for our transgressions; he was crushed for our iniquities” (Isaiah 53:5). The language Isaiah uses is deeply personal. The suffering described is not vague or symbolic. The sinless Savior willingly bore the sins of sinful humanity.

The Servant does not rescue His people by avoiding suffering. He rescues them by absorbing it. The punishment that should fall on the guilty falls instead upon the innocent. The grief that belongs to humanity is carried by the Servant. The result is not only forgiveness but healing. “By his wounds we are healed” does not suggest that suffering disappears immediately; it means that through Christ’s suffering, He has addressed our deepest wound, our sin, and provides reconciliation with God.

This reveals something profound about how God confronts evil. He does not stand above it; He steps beneath it. The Suffering Servant bears the weight of the world’s rebellion and breaks its power from within. His suffering brings redemption and reconciliation. The cross is therefore not passive sympathy. It is active redemption. God confronts evil by bearing its full weight so that we might be restored.

God Does Not Watch Suffering, He Enters It

This truth brings Hebrews 4:15 into sharper focus: “For we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses.” This is experiential sympathy. Christ has lived it. He sympathizes as One who has lived under the pressures of human weakness. He was tempted, He suffered, and He endured.

This means that when we suffer circumstances we did not choose, pressures we did not ask for, diagnoses we could not have imagined, and losses we cannot reverse, we are not praying to a God who does not understand our plight. In Christ, God has experienced human suffering from the inside. The Gospels show us this repeatedly. For us, this means we pray to a God who has lived it, and cares so much that He was willing to suffer and die to redeem it.

The Significance of Christ’s Wounds

When Jesus appeared to Thomas, He invited him to see and touch the wounds in His hands and side. The glorified body of Christ still carried the evidence of His sacrifice for His people after the resurrection. The scars were no longer signs of defeat but reminders of victory. They were a permanent testimony to Christ’s love for us.

Charles Spurgeon wrote: “The wounds of Christ are His glory; they are the marks of the battle by which He has conquered our enemies.” Glory does not delete suffering; it redeems it. The wounds of Christ should remind us that our wounds matter. As His scars are eternal testimony to His love for us, our scars give testimony to what the Lord has brought us through. Our wounds become effective instruments of God’s grace.

The Cross and Personal Suffering

The cross should change how we view our suffering. It does not take it away. It does not explain every detail or relieve all the pain. But it reminds us that suffering is not foreign either to the Christian life or to Christ Himself. We are not alone. Christ was betrayed. He was oppressed and abandoned. He suffered injustice and physical agony. He was a “man of sorrows” who was “acquainted with grief” (Isaiah 53:3).

If suffering were the evidence that God has left or does not care, then Christ’s suffering and death would be truly meaningless. The cross shows us that suffering can be part of God’s good and perfect plan. In fact, it was central to His redemptive plan for you and me. The cross does not remove suffering from the Christian life, but it does help us understand it better.

Evil Is Real — But It Is Not the End

The Christian faith does not pretend that evil is small or imaginary. The cross itself proves that evil is horrific and unjust. Jesus was mocked, beaten, and crucified by those He came to save. The cross reminds us that evil is real, and it is pervasive. It has infected every part of our world and has hit some of us in significant ways.

Though evil is real and devastating, the resurrection declares to us that evil is not supreme.  The worst evil in history, the unjust execution of the sinless Son of God, was actually the means by which God brought us salvation. The evil perpetrated against the sinless Son of God was devastating, but evil did not win. It could not thwart the redemptive plan of God.

This truth should encourage us as we endure grief and sorrow. Our suffering is not the end of the matter. The empty tomb reminds us that evil is not supreme, Christ is.

Footnotes

John R. W. Stott, The Cross of Christ (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 1986), 335.

Charles H. Spurgeon, The Metropolitan Tabernacle Pulpit, vol. 15 (London: Passmore & Alabaster, 1869), 385.