Can You Show Me God? Where Is God When It Hurts?

Most people ask these and many related questions, not only atheists and scientists. Christians also have their doubts - more often than not, I think.

These questions come up for all humanity, especially when we are facing great pain, loss and tragedy.

Then we ask other related(theological) questions. "Why does God allow pain and suffering?". "Why doesn't He show up and do something about this?". "Why didn't God prevent this?"

There are many more related questions and very few concrete, scientific and satisfying answers.

However, the Psalmists, like David, have often responded to these questions by stating that God makes Himself clearly visible through nature. This includes the glorious designs of God on earth, the seas and the heavens - and the design-blueprint found only in humans.

The current New Age culture is to meditate and do mindfulness training - usually in nature and during outdoor retreats, acknowledging a Supreme Force or Being or some Higher Power. This in itself tells me a lot about humanity and our hunger to experience, see God and have a more tangible encounter with God.

This nature factor, in part, is what we call "evidence that demands a verdict" - in theology this and other related topics are dealt with in the "school" of apologetics.

In summary: These scriptures touch on the fact that God reveals Himself through nature.
For as the waters fill the sea, the earth will be filled with an awareness of the glory of the Lord. Habakkuk 2:14 (NLT)

When I consider your heavens, the work of your fingers, the moon and the stars, which you have set in place, what is mankind that you are mindful of them, human beings that you care for them? Psalms 8:3-4 (NIV)

If you are facing any of these questions, I hope that the following passages and quotes will comfort you and bring you peace of mind. Contact us if you need help in this area.

Be still, and know that I am God; I will be exalted among the nations, I will be exalted in the earth. Psalms 46:10 (NIV)

I lift up my eyes to the mountains—
where does my help come from?
My help comes from the Lord,
the Maker of heaven and earth.
He will not let your foot slip—
he who watches over you will not slumber;
indeed, he who watches over Israel
will neither slumber nor sleep.
The Lord watches over you—
the Lord is your shade at your right hand;
the sun will not harm you by day,
nor the moon by night.
The Lord will keep you from all harm—
he will watch over your life;
the Lord will watch over your coming and going both now and forevermore. Psalms 121:1-8 (NIV)

I will go away but I will give you a gift of peace. It is mine to give and yours to keep. It is not like a gift that this world gives. Do not let yourselves be sad. Do not be afraid. John 14:27 (EASY)

Some quotes to respond to the question: Where is God when it hurts?
“C. S. Lewis introduced the phrase “pain, the megaphone of God.” “God whispers to us in our pleasures, speaks in our conscience, but shouts in our pains,” he said; “it is His megaphone to rouse a deaf world.” The word megaphone is apropos, because by its nature pain shouts. When I stub my toe or twist an ankle, pain loudly announces to my brain that something is wrong. Similarly, the existence of suffering on this earth is, I believe, a scream to all of us that something is wrong. It halts us in our tracks and forces us to consider other values.”
― Philip Yancey, Where Is God When It Hurts?

“As we rely on God, and trust his Spirit to mold us in his image, true hope takes shape within us, “a hope that does not disappoint.”We can literally become better persons because of suffering. Pain, however meaningless it may seem at the time, can be transformed. Where is God when it hurts? He is in us—not in the things that hurt—helping to transform bad into good.We can safely say that God can bring good out of evil; we cannot say that God brings about the evil in hopes of producing good.”
― Philip Yancey, Where Is God When It Hurts?

“The fact that Jesus came to earth where he suffered and died does not remove pain from our lives. But it does show that God did not sit idly by and watch us suffer in isolation. He became one of us. Thus, in Jesus, God gives us an up-close and personal look at his response to human suffering. All our questions about God and suffering should, in fact, be filtered through what we know about Jesus.”
― Philip Yancey, Where Is God When It Hurts?

“A wise sufferer will look not inward, but outward. There is no more effective healer than a wounded healer, and in the process the wounded healer’s own scars may fade away.”
― Philip Yancey, Where Is God When It Hurts?

“The surgery of life hurts. It helps me, though, to know that the surgeon himself, the Wounded Surgeon, has felt every stab of pain and every sorrow.”
― Philip Yancey, Where Is God When It Hurts?

“Paul says that Spirit lives inside us, detecting needs we cannot articulate and expressing them in a language we cannot comprehend. When we don’t know what to pray, he fills in the blanks. Evidently, it is our very helplessness that God, too, delights in. Our weakness gives opportunity for his strength.”
― Philip Yancey, Where Is God When It Hurts?

“True health is the strength to live, the strength to suffer, and the strength to die.”
― Philip Yancey, Where Is God When It Hurts?

Source: goodreads, www.goodreads.com