God Uses the Darkness of Suffering to Shine His Light of Hope
In the movie The Dark Knight Rises, the villain Bane, confronted by the hero Batman, taunts the caped crusader by saying, “You think darkness is your ally? You merely adopted the dark. I was born in it, molded by it.” I wonder how many of us think about the darkness in our lives this way. The deep wounds, the health scares, the sudden death of close friends or family, the battle with mental illness, the brushes with poverty, the unraveling of friendships, and the fear of sickness on a global scale are very dark things indeed. Do they define us? Do they mold and shape us as people? In a positive sense, all our suffering shapes us into the people we are now. If I hadn’t battled life-crippling depression on multiple occasions I would not be the same person I am today. It made me stronger and more compassionate towards others who suffer. There is always a reason for the ‘darkness’ in our lives. Though each person’s shadows look different, they all tell a unique story. That thing in your life that just won’t go away, that stubborn darkness that plagues your soul is there for a reason. God’s Word says that our suffering builds character and forms a muscle of faith that gets stronger when stretched (James 1:2-4; Romans 5:1-5).
Facing the Shadows Together
No one ever signed up for suffering, but it finds us all. Affliction is no respecter of persons. Darkness descends on every person during his or her earthly journey. Here’s the difference. If you know Christ, you have hope, unbreakable hope. We spend so much time evaluating the darkness in our lives that we forget the light shining just overhead. Following Christ, we possess eternal hope on even the darkest of days. On the show America’s Got Talent, a man named Archie Williams, who was wrongfully convicted, spent 37 years in prison for a crime he didn’t commit. Enduring great darkness in his life, on the show he sang his heart out and brought many to tears. He is living proof that the darkness doesn’t have to define you. Our suffering is a teacher, perhaps the greatest one in our lives. Without it, we will never become like our Savior. After all, Jesus carried a heavy, blood-stained cross with a crown of thorns driven into his skull for us. He endured the greatest darkness, the rejection and abandonment of the Father because he took our sin upon himself (Matt. 27:45-46). No one in history has suffered as Jesus did and no one in history has triumphed as he did. We only taste of the suffering Christ endured for us. This “momentary light affliction,” as Paul puts it, “is producing for us an absolutely incomparable eternal weight of glory” (2 Cor. 4:17). Stretching our perspective, our faith informs our suffering. The weight of glory involves the resurrection of our earthly bodies. When we suffer the full measure of hardship God has for us we will rise up. We will rise up at the last day, when Christ returns and our tears will be wiped away and our fears will be silenced. Your darkness doesn’t have to define you, but it does mold you. It molds you to be more like Christ. Friend, I know your burden seems heavy. It is. But just think of the day when all you will see is light, when all you will see is our triune God, when all you will see is the sea of redeemed saints lifting up their voices to King Jesus. What a day that will be! In the meantime, let’s face the shadows together knowing that the light is just ahead. Amen.
*photo by Gabriel Barletta
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