I attended the funeral of a man named John, who died of Lou Gehrig’s disease (also known as ALS). He died within a year of being diagnosed with that horrible condition. His ex-wife, who cared for him in his final months, gave the eulogy and spoke of how people rallied to help John. For example, a stranger who had lost her husband to ALS heard about John's case and decided to drive him to all his daughter's sporting events in her wheelchair van. Why would a total stranger do that? I think that woman illustrates an important insight into compassion.

God wants His people to be compassionate. Paul told us to “put on compassion” (Colossian 3:12). The problem is that it doesn’t come naturally to us. On the contrary, as Phil Zylla writes, “Apathy and indifference are more natural to us than compassion” (The Roots of Sorrow, p. 93). If we see someone suffering, our first instinct is not to go and help. We prefer to avert our eyes and go about our business, preferring not to get involved. Zylla goes even further. He claims we not only try to avoid suffering but are repelled by it: “Suffering repels our inner being, and very often we participate in an unconscious despising of the afflicted” (p. 93 ). Those natural tendencies make us apathetic to suffering, not compassionate. It discourages us from taking practical steps to help the neighbors around us.

Given the gap between God’s command and our natural desires, how do we change our attitude toward suffering? How do we become a compassionate people?

A Lordship Salvationist would probably try to “inspire” compassion by telling people that true believers show compassion but false ones do not. They would make compassion proof of salvation or require it as a work necessary to having saving faith.

Readers of this blog know that approach is incompatible with the gospel, which proclaims we are saved by grace through faith, apart from works (Ephesians 2:8-9). We’re justified by believing in Jesus, apart from whether or not we show compassion (cf. Galatians 2:16). So, if salvation does not depend on our compassion, what motivates a grace believer to do something about suffering?

In his second letter to the Corinthians, Paul teaches one way in which God changes our attitudes in this matter.

Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of mercies and the God of all comfort (2 Corinthians 1:3).

First, God is the God of all mercy and comfort. The word for comfort means “encouragement, comfort, consolation.” God is the source of encouragement and consolation. That tells us God is not a distant deity uninvolved with the world. The world's suffering moves Him. God’s comfort also implies that Biblical faith is realistic about suffering. We’re not called to pretend that suffering doesn’t exist nor are we promised never to experience it. We wouldn’t need God to encourage us if we didn’t face discouragement and we wouldn’t need comfort if we weren’t in distress. Paul speaks to the reality of our suffering in the next verse:

He comforts us in all our affliction (v 4a)

Second, God comforts us in our affliction. The implication is that Christians will suffer. Some of us think that it is outrageous for God to allow His children to suffer. But Paul treats it as inevitable. He doesn’t say God will remove the affliction from us, but that He comforts us in it. Why wouldn’t God make our lives comfortable? Listen to what Paul says next—

so that we may be able to comfort those who are in any kind of affliction, through the comfort we ourselves receive from God (vv 4b).

Third, God comforts us so we can comfort others. Being comforted by God in suffering creates an opportunity for loving your neighbor. There is something about receiving God’s comfort that can enable us to comfort others with the same comfort we’ve received. Suffering can equip us for more effective service.

For just as the sufferings of Christ overflow to us, so also through Christ our comfort overflows (v 5).

Fourth, suffering connects us to Christ. What does it mean to say that the sufferings of Christ overflow to us? Paul may mean that identifying with Christ means identifying with His sufferings during His earthly ministry. Or it may be another way of saying that we should take up our own crosses (Mark 8:34). Suffering is coming. But here is good news. But just as grace abounds over sin, Christ’s comfort will overflow over our sufferings (cf. Romans 6:1). Someone who has only suffered a little will only have experienced a little of Christ's comforts.

What does this teach us about how Christians are to "put on compassion"?

As we saw, we normally recoil from suffering or are indifferent to it. But something seems to happen when you’ve experienced a particular kind of tragedy. It could be cancer, a child’s death, alcoholism, a parent’s mental illness, or trauma from war. Whatever your particular affliction, that painful experience can help open your eyes to recognize when other people are going through the same thing and create a unique area of sympathy for people experiencing that pain. It gives you the nudge that moves you from apathy to action.

What motivated the stranger to drive John to his daughter’s games? She had lost her husband to ALS. She knew the pain that would bring to John’s family. Her own experience created sympathy for their situation, leading her to take action and show compassion for them. Suffering can do that—it can break through the natural walls of apathy and indifference and motivate us to love our neighbors. That is one of the reasons why God permits us to suffer: to teach us to show mercy and compassion to our neighbors.

God doesn’t comfort us to make us comfortable but to awaken our compassion.

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Send your questions or comments to shawn@freegrace.in.

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