The God Who Suffers
Courage Amidst Suffering: A Hope Beyond Persecution
What comes to mind when you think of “persecution”? Few issues are more challenging to process than “bad things happening to good people.” The very essence of evil may be the horrific abuse of innocent people due to ideological differences. There are well-known historical examples of persecution, like Roman Emperor Nero using the bodies of Christians as torches for his parties,[i] the Inquisition, or the Soviet gulags under Joseph Stalin that led to the deaths of more nearly two million people.[ii] However, persecution for one’s faith is not limited to our history books.
Research suggests that more than 300 million followers of Jesus are currently living in very high or extreme levels of persecution.[iii] Nearly 5,000 believers were killed last year because of their faith! These statistics can be shocking to those who presume we’ve moved on from such closed-minded and barbaric realities in this “enlightened” Digital Age. Of course, the wisdom of Scripture rings true yet again:
What has been is what will be, and what has been done will be done again. There is nothing new under the sun. –Ecclesiastes 1:9
And of course, in the wake of the October 7th attacks on Israel, there has been a surge in public expressions of virulent antisemitism. All of this provokes us to ask…
How does God view persecution?
What does the Bible say about persecution?
What hope and encouragement does faith offer persecuted people?
We see the first instance of “persecution” in the Bible in Genesis 4:8, “Cain spoke to Abel his brother. While they were in the field, Cain rose up against Abel his brother and killed him.” This heinous act of fratricide came on the heels of these two brothers worshiping. We should point out that not only did their worship differ, but God’s response to it did also, suggesting not all worship is equally valid (see vv. 3-5). This line of demarcation provoked a man to murder his brother.
There are at least two things that we need to say about the murder of Abel: God saw it and it provoked God to act. These seemingly obvious statements merit further consideration. If God saw the persecution of one soul, we have every reason He is attentive to it on a larger scale. In other words, no persecution slips past the Almighty’s view. He sees. But this claim would be of little comfort if all He did was observe persecution. No, God responds to persecution with action. In the case of Cain and Abel, the flow of the text seems to suggest that His response was relatively immediate, but this is not always (usually?) the case.
The Children of Israel spent more than four hundred years in Egypt, many of them suffering as slaves. When the Lord called Moses to serve as Israel’s deliverer, His words confirm what we mentioned above.
Now behold, the cry of Bnei-Yisrael has come to Me. Moreover I have seen the oppression that the Egyptians have inflicted on them. Come now, I will send you to Pharaoh, so that you may bring My people Bnei-Yisrael out from Egypt. –Exodus 3:9-10
These two stories are foundational to our understanding of God’s relationship to persecution. He is aware and He acts. The timing of this divine action is as dynamic as it is mysterious. What we do know is that compassion for those who suffer “moves” God to action. God is aware, and He acts, but He also feels. He revealed this following Abel’s death: “The voice of your brother’s blood is crying out to Me from the ground” (Genesis 4:10). Rather than a forensic, legal tone, this verse is deeply personal, emotional even. Likewise, the cries of the slaves in Egypt had reached God’s ear to the point that the Almighty declared, “I know their pains” (Exodus 3:7).
The Hebrew word for “know” in that verse is yada, and it transcends mere comprehension of information. Biblical scholar Nahum Sarna notes, “In the biblical conception, knowledge is not essentially or even primarily rooted in the intellect and mental activity. Rather, it is more experiential and is embedded in the emotions, so that it may encompass such qualities as contact, intimacy, concern, relatedness, and mutuality.”[i] The (shocking) point here is that God takes persecution personally.
There may be no better biblical example of God seeing persecution and being so personally moved by it that He intervenes, as in the story of Saul of Tarsus. A zealous Pharisee, Saul understood the persecution of an upstart Jewish sect (heretical, in his estimation) known as The Way, to be an expression of faithfulness to God. Having procured the necessary paperwork to persecute believers in Damascus, Saul set out with his entourage only to have his journey interrupted by a blinding light. Notice the personal tone in Luke’s description of the encounter:
Falling to the ground, he heard a voice saying to him, “Saul, Saul, why are you persecuting Me?” “Who are You, Lord?” Saul said. “I am Yeshua—whom you are persecuting.” – Acts 9:4-5
Scripture reveals an attentive God who intervenes in persecution because He so identifies with the plight of the suffering. This reality is a source of great comfort for the persecuted and fear for persecutors. Above all, these inspired testimonies of divine agency are a source of hope that can fuel the prayers of the oppressed.
Above all else, we must—as the writer of the Book of Hebrews directs—look to Yeshua-Jesus, “the author and finisher of our faith, who for the joy that was set before Him endured the cross, despising the shame, and has sat down at the right hand of the throne of God” (Hebrews 12:2 NKJV). In the Messiah, we behold the God-Man, the One who fully entered the human experience and bore the consequences of its sinfulness to completion in His suffering on the cross. The Lord’s brutal execution stands as the epitome of persecution. This means that our God sees, feels, and rescues but also suffers persecution Himself. The sufferings of Jesus serve as a “north star” for all who endure persecution, be it relational, emotional, or physical in nature (His involved all of that).
Yeshua’s Passion recalibrates our understanding of persecution and suffering. The Apostle Peter encouraged early believers,
For what credit is there if, when you sin and get a beating, you endure? But if you endure when you do good and suffer for it, this finds favor with God. For you were called to this, because Messiah also suffered for you, leaving you an example so that you might follow in His footsteps: “He committed no sin, nor was any deceit found in His mouth.” When He was abused, He did not return the abuse. While suffering, He made no threats. Instead, He kept entrusting Himself to the One who judges righteously. –1 Peter 2:20-23
God does not ordain or “will” persecution. But neither does He stifle humanity’s capacity for choice. That ability to choose makes persecution possible. Yeshua’s testimony stands in defiance of these evil choices, declaring that they will not have the last word. No persecution ever will. Those who suffer persecution must remind themselves that they are following in the Savior’s footsteps. He took what men meant for evil and used it for good. His persecution transformed their carnal expression of evil into a divine demonstration of love (cf. Romans 5:8). Maybe this is why Yeshua said,
“You will have suffering in this world. Be courageous! I have conquered the world.” – John 16:8 (CSB)
