Finding strength, beauty in suffering

“Why does God let it hurt so much?” my 4-year-old son cried in the dark, waking up with a sore throat and fever.

“I don’t know, but do you want me to pray with you?” I asked, lying beside him.

It was all I could think to do after having already offered him juice and a pain reliever. Pulling Asher close, I wrapped my arms around his small chest, tilting his burning cheek toward my shoulder, asking God to make him feel better even as I wondered at his haunting question.

Why does God let it hurt so much? When the doctor says it’s incurable. When someone we love betrays us. When the disappointments and difficulties of life are too much to bear?

Losing our precious daughter Ruth, which I shared about last week, plunged me into a crucible of faith. I asked God to direct my life when I was young, falling in love with Jesus in first grade. Yet, here I was three decades later, struggling to believe that God was good, that he was in control, that he even existed.

This summer when someone close to me was diagnosed with cancer, it seemed to confirm my suspicion that God could not be trusted. Or why would he let someone who has devoted two decades to serving him be struck with such a devastating disease?

I’ve heard preachers say it’s wrong to ask God why, the way Asher did, crying out in pain. Have they so quickly forgotten Christ’s words on the cross?

“At about three o’clock, Jesus called out with a loud voice, ‘Eli, Eli, lema sabachthani?’ which means ‘My God, my God, why have you abandoned me?’” (Matthew 27:46).

There it is, in the thick of suffering, from one who did no wrong: Why.

When facing incomprehensible questions, some reject faith in a personal, loving God. I choose to go deeper, to draw closer, to acknowledge my doubts even as I seek answers.

This week I glimpsed a flash of understanding in a most unexpected place — Rosemary Sutcliff ’s children’s novel, “The Shining Company,” which I picked up for two bucks at Goodwill. You may know this late, British historical-fiction writer for the recent movie “The Eagle,” which is based on another of her books.

In the one I’m reading, a boy asks a smith why both soft and hard metals are used to make a beautiful sword.

“Without the hard iron, the blade would bend in battle,” the smith says, “and without the soft iron it would break. … It’s the strength of the blade that is the aim of all this; the beauty is by the way. The beauty is by the grace of God.”

When shaped by God, the hard things in life build strength, the soft kindness and compassion. In a world stricken by sin, we need both. The first step, as with my son, is to cry out to God. Through him, I find the beauty.

MEADOW RUE MERRILL is a Mid-coast Maine writer who shares about God in her everyday world through weekly “Faith Notes” at www.meadowrue.com where you can comment and follow her on Twitter or Facebook.