You Are Not Alone: The Suffering of God's People

In times of suffering, you feel alone, but that is not true. You are part of a great crowd of sufferers that includes all of God’s people. God’s people suffer. It’s impossible to look inside the cover of the Bible without seeing this.

We call Hebrews 11 the “honor roll of the faithful.” These are the heroes of the faith, men and women who were “moved with godly fear,” who were tested, who choose “to suffer affliction with the people of God than to enjoy the passing pleasures of sin.” God’s people faced the lions, the “violence of fire,” and “the edge of the sword.”

“Others were tortured…had trials of mockings and scourgings, … of chains and imprisonment. They were stoned, they were sawn in two, were tempted, were slain with the sword. They wandered about in sheepskins and goatskins, being destitute, afflicted, tormented of whom the world was not worthy. They wandered in deserts and mountains, in dens and caves of the earth.”

It is against this backdrop that the opening words of Hebrews 12 are to be understood.

Therefore we also, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us lay aside every weight, and the sin which so easily ensnares us, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us, looking unto Jesus, the author and finisher of our faith, who for the joy that was set before Him endured the cross, despising the shame, and has sat down at the right hand of the throne of God.

It is not my point to compare our suffering with the suffering of others. It is simply to remind us that, as we suffer, we are part of a great cloud of suffering witnesses.

You are not alone.

From cover to cover, the Bible is filled with the accounts of God’s loving care of people who suffer. Adam and Eve suffered the loss of a unique, innocent fellowship with God, hiding in shame and being driven from the garden. They also suffered the loss of two sons: one murdered and the other, his murderer. Noah suffered the mockery of a wicked generation and he, too, “lost” a son to the curse of sin.

Abraham and Sarah endured a lifetime of childlessness before God promised them a son; they waited years and years for this promise to be fulfilled. Hannah was inconsolable because of her inability to bear children, as was Rachel.

Isaac family was divided by deception and theft for most of his life. Joseph lived for years as a servant and a prisoner. Judah buried two sons and his daughter-in-law, Tamar, lost two husbands. Although she was twice widowed, Tamar was abandoned by Judah’s family; in despair, she resorted to prostitution to draw attention to this unfairness.

God’s promise to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob was that their offspring would be blessed. Over time they grew from a family to a small nation, consisting of twelve tribes. This happened over a period of four hundred years while they lived as slaves in Egypt in persecution and hard labor. At the time of Moses birth, Egypt’s pharaoh had commanded that every male child be killed.

The LORD said, "I have seen the affliction of my people who are in Egypt. I have heard their cry. I am aware of their sufferings.” They were God’s people and they suffered for 400 years.

Under Joshua’s leadership, Israel faced a crushing defeat at Ai because of the sin of one man.

Naomi lost a husband and two sons, Ruth lost a husband, and the two of them came empty-handed into Israel as little more than beggars. Although the great king David would descend from these two women, nothing in their circumstances indicated that God had a special plan for them as Ruth collected the leftovers during harvest.

Then, there is David—the great sufferer. So much of the Psalms deals with David’s faith-struggle in the face of suffering, opposition, and personal failure.

The normal experience of God’s prophets was rejection, persecution, and violent death. The same is true for the apostles, starting with James the brother of John, who was killed “by the sword.”

The persecution of the early church was so severe that they fled in all directions in fear for their lives. Although this was a powerful tool for spreading the gospel, persecution is persecution. Many were killed. Those who were not abandoned much of what was precious to them—family, friends, land, and homes.

Church history tells much the same story. To this very day, God’s people suffer. They cry out to God in their misery and he hears them.

Psalm 88 begins: O Lord, God of my salvation, I have cried out day and night before you. The author had found salvation. He was certain of that fact and certain that his salvation was from God. But the author of this psalm was suffering greatly:

My soul is full of troubles,
And my life draws near to the grave.
I am counted with those who go down to the pit;
I am like a man who has no strength,
Adrift among the dead,
Like the slain who lie in the grave,
Whom You remember no more,
And who are cut off from Your hand.
You have laid me in the lowest pit,
In darkness, in the depths.
Your wrath lies heavy upon me,
And You have afflicted me

This dark psalm offers great comfort to those who find themselves in a similar place and worry that those who are truly God's would not suffer in such a way. Charles Spurgeon wrote about this psalm, saying that those who feel this way shouldn't imagine that a strange thing has happened to them. Instead, they should look around and take comfort as they see the footprints of others who have walked this desert before them. And he offers the revelation that "he who now feebly expounds these words knows within himself more than he would care or dare to tell of the abysses of inward anguish."

To those who suffer, I write: you are not alone.