Is God Afflicting Us or Speaking to Us?
Do you ever ask “why God,” when you are going through difficult circumstances? Why do we ask that question? It is no doubt because we feel that God, being God, can change our circumstances, and we don’t understand why He does not. Sometimes we conclude that prayers go unanswered because God has a purpose in our suffering.
Believing that God brings suffering into our lives for His own reasons is a common belief in Christian culture. One minister, who has quadriplegia, named Joni Eareckson-Tada states that she is paralyzed because it is God’s will. She quotes Isa. 53:10, saying that it “pleased God to bruise” her and to put her in a wheelchair for life, and then she gives reasons why she thinks that is God’s will. Doesn’t that sound compelling? It is important, however, to read that verse in its entirety:
[Isa 53:10 KJV] 10 Yet it pleased the LORD to bruise him; he hath put [him] to grief: when thou shalt make his soul an offering for sin, he shall see [his] seed, he shall prolong [his] days, and the pleasure of the LORD shall prosper in his hand.
In the same sentence that this lady claims applies to her, the verse states that the “bruising” is of the Messiah who is made an offering for sin. This is talking about Jesus dying for our sins because He was eligible to do so as God’s sinless Son. Can any of that verse or that specific sentence apply to Christian suffering? Joni can’t take the first part, “it pleased God to bruise Him” and apply to herself without applying the remainder of the sentence “as an offering for sin…” However – no man or woman can be an offering for anyone else’s sin because we are all (other than Jesus) born in sin. Therefore, if we suffer, that suffering cannot be applied in an efficacious way to someone else’s account. Sound strange? Yet many think like this. Parents see their children get sick, and they pray, “God let that sickness be on me instead…” That is wrong thinking. That parent and that child were both born in sin into a sin-laden world, and only Jesus by His suffering can lift that sickness off anyone.
There is another verse to consider:
Psalms 55:19 God shall hear, and afflict them, even he that abideth of old. Selah. Because they have no changes, therefore they fear not God.
You could look at this verse and say, “See there! God DOES send affliction!” Just one moment, however. Let us rightly divide this statement. The word afflict in this verse (amazingly) means “to speak to…” I wonder where the translators got “afflict” from a Hebrew word meaning to “speak to…”? Properly rendered, the meaning of this verse is “God shall hear and speak to them…” Who are “them”? Those who have no “changes,” which means those who need to repent. We want to threaten people with all kinds of dire curses if they don’t do what we think they should in the eyes of God, but Rom. 2:4 says, “the goodness of God leads to repentance…” If you are giving someone something other than God’s goodness, it is because you have some other agenda for that person than repentance. God shall hear and SPEAK TO those who need to repent. Isaiah confirms this plainly:
[Isa 1:18 KJV] 18 Come now, and let us reason together, saith the LORD: though your sins be as scarlet, they shall be as white as snow; though they be red like crimson, they shall be as wool.
Preachers for centuries have taught us to blame God for what the devil originates. It is the devil who comes to steal, kill, and destroy. Jesus comes that we might have life. Choose life today and believe the gospel.
