Timothy Keller Quotes About Suffering
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We do not have to make ourselves suffer in order to merit forgiveness. We simply receive the forgiveness earned by Christ. 1 John 1:9 says that God forgives us because He is ‘just.’ That is a remarkable statement. It would be unjust of God to ever deny us forgiveness, because Jesus earned our acceptance! In religion we earn our forgiveness with our repentance, but in the gospel we just receive it.
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How could a good, all-powerful God allow suffering?
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If his suffering did not make Jesus give up on us, nothing will.
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At the end of history the whole earth has become the Garden of God again. Death and decay and suffering are gone. . . . Jesus will make the world our perfect home again. We will no longer be living 'east of Eden,' always wandering and never arriving. We will come, and the father will meet us and embrace us, and we will be brought into the feast.
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Jesus lost all his glory so that we could be clothed in it. He was shut out so we could get access. He was bound, nailed, so that we could be free. He was cast out so we could approach. And Jesus took away the only kind of suffering that can really destroy you: that is being cast away from God. He took so that now all suffering that comes into your life will only make you great. A lump of coal under pressure becomes a diamond. And the suffering of a person in Christ only turns you into somebody gorgeous.
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Suffering is unbearable if you aren’t certain that God is for you and with you.
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Suffering is the stripping of our hope in finite things, therefore we do not put our ultimate hope in anything finite.
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If God is treated as God during suffering, then suffering can reveal and present him in all his greatness.
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The Cross is not simply a lovely example of sacrificial love. Throwing your life away needlessly is not admirable — it is wrong. Jesus’ death was only a good example if it was more than an example, if it was something absolutely necessary to rescue us. And it was. Why did Jesus have to die in order to forgive us? There was a debt to be paid — God himself paid it. There was a penalty to be born — God himself bore it. Forgiveness is always a form of costly suffering.
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Job never saw why he suffered, but he saw God, and that was enough.
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When pain and suffering come upon us, we finally see not only that we are not in control of our lives but that we never were.
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Christianity teaches that, contra fatalism, suffering is overwhelming; contra Buddhism, suffering is real; contra karma, suffering is often unfair; but contra secularism, suffering is meaningful. There is a purpose to it, and if faced rightly, it can drive us like a nail deep into the love of God and into more stability and spiritual power than you can imagine.
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Jesus Christ did not suffer so that you would not suffer. He suffered so that when you suffer, you’ll become more like him. The gospel does not promise you better life circumstances; it promises you a better life.
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Christianity does not provide the reason for each experience of pain, but it does provide deep resources for actually facing suffering with hope and courage rather than bitterness and despair
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Only if you first seek inner forgiveness will your confrontation be temperate, wise, and gracious. Only when you have lost the need to see the other person hurt will you have any chance of actually bringing about change, reconciliation, and healing. You have to submit to the costly suffering and death of forgiveness if there is going to be any resurrection.
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God is so committed to your ultimate joy that he was willing to plunge into the greatest depths of suffering himself for you.
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In the secular view, suffering is never seen as a meaningful part of life but only as an interruption.
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Suffering can refine us rather than destroy us because God himself walks with us in the fire.
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Suffering dispels the illusion that we have the strength and competence to rule our own lives and save ourselves.
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Success and suffering will either darken your heart or make you wise, but they won't leave you where you were.
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Suffering is actually at the heart of the Christian story.
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Christ did not suffer so you wouldn’t suffer. He suffered so when you suffer you will become like Him.
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God takes our misery and suffering so seriously that he was willing to take it on himself.
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Some suffering is given in order to chastise and correct a person for wrongful patterns of life (as in the case of Jonah imperiled by the storm), some suffering is given not to correct past wrongs but to prevent future ones (as in the case of Joseph sold into slavery), and some suffering has no purpose other than to lead a person to love God more ardently for himself alone and so discover the ultimate peace and freedom.
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God so loved us and hates suffering that he was willing to come down and get involved in it.
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Christmas means Jesus came down and got involved in suffering. He hears your cries.
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When Job was prospering, he prayed. When he was suffering, he still prayed.
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Just because we don't see a reason for evil and suffering doesn't mean there's not a reason for it.
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Look at Jesus Christ. Every time he was in trouble he used the Word of God. When he was tempted he used the Word. When he was suffering on the cross he used the Word.
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