Questions & Answers
With Dr. Bob Burrelli, Grace Bible Church
Your observation is a perception one; the truth of 2 Corinthians 3:4 does contradict conventional wisdom at this point. The way out is not to reconcile them, but to replace worldly wisdom with godly wisdom. Paul tells us that the God of all comfort "comforts us in our afflictions so that we may be able to comfort those who are in any affliction with the comfort with which we ourselves are comforted by God." One purpose of our suffering is to help other sufferers. The way this works is simple. We comfort others only after having first received God's comfort by putting into practice, during our suffering, the appropriate truths of God's healing word confidently. This resultant comfort we enjoy enables, and obligates, us to comfort others. The principle at work is the same for that of love or forgiveness. We love others after having first received God's love (1 John 4:19) and forgive others after having first received God's forgiveness (Ephesians 4:32). What qualifies us to comfort others, then, is not a shared affliction, but a personal experience of God's comfort in our own afflictions. We shouldn't pretend to know what others are going though in a trial that we ourselves have not yet endured. The sage says that we can't know, "Each heart knows its own bitterness, and no one else can share its joy" (Proverbs 14:10). But we don't have to in order to help. Our passage reveals a common denominator in all suffering, regardless of the extent to which we endure it. Certainly, each of us has experienced enough hardship at least to appreciate another believer's heartache. But Christians don't stop at appreciating someone's pain; They do something about it. They comfort sufferers by guiding them to the truths of God's Word that correspond to their particular situation. Let's remember that these truths come from someone who has experienced every hardship imaginable, Jesus, the great Physician and Healer. In Hebrews 4:15 we read, "For we do not have a high priest who cannot sympathize with our weaknesses, but one who has been tempted in all things as we are, yet without sin." It only makes sense, then, that we "draw near with confidence to the throne of grace, that we may receive mercy and may find grace to help in time of need" (v. 16). Is there any benefit to having suffered the same affliction as the one we help is currently suffering? Yes. The benefit goes to the sufferer. He sees living proof that God's truths really do work when they are trusted and that if he trusts and obeys, he too will be the better for it.