Midway through a baby shower I attended earlier this summer, the momma-to-be walked to my table with a coat hanger filled with clothespins. She got the attention of those sitting nearby and began explaining the rules of the game: the goal was for each one of us to take hold of all twenty-something clothespins that were clipped to the hanger, unclipping them one at a time using only one hand and without letting any pieces fall to the ground.
Once the rules were explained and all questions answered, the women who were preparing to play took off their jewelry, set down their phones, and began stretching their fingers. As each one angled and her hands to unclip and grip as many clothespins as she could, the rest of us watched her progress and counted along.
With each passing round, there came an unspoken moment when everyone at the table knew that she had reached her limit. It didn’t matter how many clothespins a woman was holding at the time—she could have successfully grabbed six, twelve, or twenty-two clothespins—but if she showed signs of losing control, if her fingers started to shake, then we knew it was only a matter of seconds before all she was holding clattered to the table.
When it happened, those of us watching couldn’t help but laugh. The final pieces seemed to fall in slow motion, and the pictures were priceless—a little goofy, but representing a fun afternoon.
The Breaking Point
Have you noticed how we can often sense when a woman is reaching her limit in other areas of life? You’ve seen the friend or family member who already seems to be carrying more than anyone else you know. She’s been struggling over challenges in her marriage, or she’s been battling a chronic health issue for decades, or she’s been working a demanding job while juggling responsibilities as a single mom. Then she’s handed something else, another overwhelming and painful challenge, and you know instantly this could be her breaking point.
News clips capture these moments often. They call your attention to the woman standing in front of her home in the hours before a hurricane is predicted to hit her already poverty-stricken island. Before the new storm arrives, you feel the seeming injustice of her circumstances deep in your chest. It’s a thirty-second clip on your screen, but you suspect that if one more drop of rain falls on her roof, you’ll watch her whole world crumble. The thought is enough to surface questions: how could this happen on top of everything else she’s already experienced? Hasn’t this woman suffered enough?
When Sympathy Skews Your View of God
For the last decade, I’ve wanted to write to her: the woman overwhelmed by suffering, who feels herself crumbling under the weight of all that’s on her shoulders. But recently, I’ve been paying more and more attention to the woman watching from the other side of the television and the other side of the table. Her faith is also formed as she witnesses someone else’s suffering—her faith will either be forged by the reality of a sovereign and good God or be weakened one storm at a time.
In recent years, I’ve watched friends deconstruct their Christian faith in response to suffering. Their drift away from God hasn’t always happened because of their own suffering. In some cases, it happened as they watched the rain fall on another woman’s roof: when her house caved in, so did their confidence in the Lord.
It started with sympathy. When you witness someone else suffering, it triggers a natural response. Compassion. Concern. Confusion. All of these feelings are genuine, and none are inherently sinful. You think:
- I can’t believe this is happening to her.
- It’s insane how much she’s going through right now.
- It seems cruel for one person to endure so much.
Those are normal reactions, right? They seem like simple expressions to convey how we’re feeling. But what if you take them a step further? They might imply something like this:
- I can’t believe this is happening . . .because this doesn’t fit within the boundary lines of my belief system and the God I thought I knew.
- It’s insane how much she’s going through right now . . . and it feels as though God doesn’t really have control of this situation.
- It seems cruel for one person to endure this much. . . . If God allowed this to happen, maybe He’s not as good as I once believed.
Sympathy is a right response when someone is suffering, but when you allow your emotional response to a situation to define who God is, your view of Him will always be distorted.
The Oldest Game
None of this is new. Satan has always known that if he can get you to stop holding on to a few key attributes of God’s character, the rest of your faith will eventually fall. Think back to Genesis 3.
Now the serpent was the most cunning of all the wild animals that the LORD God had made. He said to the woman, “Did God really say, ‘You can’t eat from any tree in the garden’?”
The woman said to the serpent, “We may eat the fruit from the trees in the garden. But about the fruit of the tree in the middle of the garden, God said, ‘You must not eat it or touch it, or you will die.’”
“No! You will certainly not die,” the serpent said to the woman. (vv. 1–4)
Satan began by questioning what God said and the truth of who He was. All the serpent needed to do was begin to shift the woman’s thinking about God, a little at a time. The serpent also knew that if Eve began rewriting what she knew to be true in her own mind without going back to the original Source, he could lead her wherever he wanted.
He uses the same tactic when you’re watching someone else suffer. He knows that if he can keep you asking questions without ever directing them back to the Lord, you’ll loosen your grip on what’s true. But consider the impact on your faith if instead you took your observations, emotions, concerns, and questions and turned them into prayers:
- “Lord, I feel like everything I’m seeing makes You appear cruel. I’m struggling to believe You’re really good, especially to those who are at their breaking point . . . but Your Word says You don’t delight to cause grief (Lam. 3:32–33), that You have great purpose within all affliction and are compassionate and merciful (James 5:11). Will You help me to believe Psalm 145:9 is true even now? “The LORD is good to everyone; his compassion rests on all he has made.”
- “Lord, I feel like this situation is too much, and that what she is experiencing is beyond the boundaries of what You ever should have allowed . . . but Your Word reminds me that my perspective is so limited, and that I’ve barely touched the fringes of Your ways (Job 26:14; Isaiah 46:9–10). You’ve established limits for the natural world—you’ve put “bars and doors in place,” declaring, ‘You may come this far, but no farther’” (Job 38:10–11). Surely, too, You know exactly what she is experiencing, and nothing can enter her life without Your awareness (Psalm 139:1–6). Will You help me believe that You are doing something greater than what can be seen? (1 Cor. 4:16–18).
The Anchor That Holds
As long as you live in a world impacted by sin and suffering, you’ll never be short of moments that challenge your understanding of God’s goodness and sovereignty. Each one will give you an opportunity to either allow your observations and emotions to begin redefining who You believe Him to be or to anchor You deeper into His unchanging character.
“You will have suffering in this world,” Jesus said (John 16:33). When you do, the answer isn’t to let go of a single of one God’s attributes. When your faith is challenged by what you see, hold on tighter to Him who is invisible. Your heart will waver. His love and sovereignty will keep you from falling.
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