Undeserved suffering

Lutheran, The, Aug 2004 by Matthews, William R

I will neverfind the answers. But Job is tonic ... and psalm after psalm

"If God should wish to take me, he will surely find me. ... If my neighbor needs me, however, I shall not avoid place or person but will go freely ...." ("Whether One May Flee from a Deadly Plague" in Martin Luther 's Basic Theological Writings, edited by Timothy F. Lull; Fortress, 1989, page 749).

Luther lived in a time of plague, war, burnings, and religious and social violence. This morning's headlines show that we, too, experience death, hatred, disease, murders and more wars-agony upon agony, most apparently without rational cause.

Undeserved suffering seems to lie at the heart of existence. Where is God? How can he tolerate this? "The Litany" in our Lutheran Book of Worship (page 168) contains a long and gloomy list of mankind's sufferings and pleads with God for relief. I've been using this devotion all year.

Some argue that the waste of life is necessary for continuing improvement of the world's inhabitants. Thus, most species provide thousands of possibilities for potential offspring-only a few of which survive, humans or spiders.

In spring the air is prodigal with pollen; in August just specks remain to make new flowers. If acorns fulfilled their potentialities, the earth would groan beneath the weight of oak trees. Such bounty assures not more but stronger life. Thus, I must suffer and die so the human race may be bigger, stronger and wiser. And closer to God and more full of love? History is pessimistic.

Especially hard to take is the suffering and death of children. Martin Marty writes of Luther: "When in her early adolescence his favorite, Magdalena, died, he was inconsolable and almost lost the ability to sustain the life of faith" (Martin Luther, Viking, 2004, page 111). No rational modern person believes a child's death from cancer results from his or her own naughtiness or is God's response to the sins of the father.

Most human beings, thankfully, don't experience many such terrible moments. But common sense cautions-just wait! The older we get, the more Irene and I mourn the loss of those around us. And we are next. As my doctor told me recently, only half joking, "Well, Bill, you've got to die of something."

I've always been grateful to The Lutheran's editor, David Miller, who asked me years ago to write a series on Job. I'm buttressed by that ancient sufferer's response to God's nonanswer to searching men and women: "My world is too great for your merely human understanding."

Our choice is stark. We can curse God and die as Job's wife tempted her old husband to do. Or we can embrace God no matter what: content with a mere glimpse of his backside-the view he tendered Moses.

Church historian Jaroslav Pelikan spoke about the role of the Christian scholar at a Wittenberg University (Springfield, Ohio) commencement in the 1960s. He inspired me to live by Luther's idea of vocation: He who works well prays twice. That means to do the best we can with whatever is set before us and to stop worrying about tomorrow. As my pastor told me, "Grading freshmen themes is God's task for you."

This summer I remain alive and relatively free from suffering for some reason known only to God. How blessed I am by the challenge of these columns-how grateful I am to think I can still make even a small contribution. And that I remain strong enough to care for a beloved other. Death and suffering fade in the face of that.

Absent children remain absent. It may take old age to find comfort in Job's acceptance of God as we find him. My 20 years of retirement have been the high point of my life. All I can do is rejoice, accept, enjoy, give thanks and try not to wake up too fearful in the middle of the night.

This muggy Virginia day is enough. God's world is too wonderful for me. I will never find answers to undeserved suffering. But Job is tonic ... and Luther ... and psalm after psalm.

May I be able to say at the end of each day: "As best I could, I have done what God wanted me to do." I try not to get tangled up in the big thoughts, in the big words. God's request is simple: Love me and one another.

Next: The refusal to accept death

All I can do is rejoice, accept, enjoy, give thanks and try not to wake up too fearful in the middle of the night

Matthews, a longtime contributor to The Lutheran, is a retired English professor and member of Muhlenberg Lutheran Church, Harrisonburg, Va. This is the eighth in a 12-part series on theodicy-our experience of suffering, struggle and evil in light of God's mercy, love and omnipotence. For an outline of the series see www.thelutheran.org/0401/matthews.html.>

Copyright Evangelical Lutheran Church in America Aug 2004

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