The answer
"To everything there is a season and a time to every purpose under heaven..." (Ecclesiastes 3:1-8). Sometimes we put too much emphasis on the cause rather than on the purpose. Illnesses, accidents, or hardships are tools sometimes used by God to lead us to repentance and reveal His bountiful mercies. Sometimes adversities are weapons used by Satan to lead us to hopelessness. Other times people simply place themselves at risk by their own carelessness and destroy their own bodies for example, by smoking, drinking, obesity, drugs, etc. God's only desire for any of us is that we share eternal life with Him. Cognizant of this purpose, Satan relentlessly stalks each individual awaiting an opportune event that would lead to despair. God allowed Satan's harassment towards Job but protected Job's person. By the grace of God, Job was victorious in that case and is the classic example of the virtue of patience. "The Lord has chastened me severely, but He has not given me over to death" (Psalm 118:18 NKJV).We can say that there are five reasons for sufferings and our response differs based on the reason:
- Personal sins and our response should be repentance
- The corrupted world in which we live and our response should be perseverance
- Satan's attacks and our response should be putting on the armor of God
- Discipline of the Lord and our response should be acceptance
- Test of faith and our response should be obedience.
Answered by His Eminence Metropolitan Youssef (opens in a new tab)