In All Their Suffering

Isaiah 63:7-9 and Matthew 2:13-23

In an age when the historicity and reliability of the Bible is often called into question, it should come as no surprise that some scholars doubt the authenticity of this story. “Herod wouldn’t send soldiers to murder. This is just embellishment by Matthew. After all, this story is unknown outside of the Bible.” So, did it really happen?

I see no reason to think it didn’t. Here’s the thing about Herod the Great: He was awful. This is a guy who murdered several members of his own family because he thought they were conspiring against him. On his deathbed, he ordered that thousands of prominent citizens of Jerusalem be rounded up and executed when he died because he didn’t want anyone to be happy he was gone. Would someone who did those things really stop short of murdering a few children?

The other thing is, Herod did so many atrocious things that this probably didn’t get a lot of attention outside of Bethlehem. This was a small massacre by Herod’s standards. Most scholars who have looked into it have come to the conclusion that the population of Bethlehem at this time was no more than about 800 people. There were probably less than ten baby boys two years old and under. When you consider that Herod killed thousands of people, this was a small matter, by comparison.

It was still terrible, of course. But that is life in this world. What do we really mean when we say that God stepped out of eternity and into this world? The lovely image in our minds of the shepherds and the magi gathered around the manger in a lowly cattle shed while angels sang in the skies above is gone pretty quickly. This is the world we live in; a world where tyrants cling to power and murder innocent people, a world where lives are often cut short, a world full of danger.

The next question some skeptics have asked about this story is, “If God could send a message to Joseph to get Jesus out of town, then why didn’t he send the same message to every parent in Bethlehem with a little boy to do the same?”

There is a slippery slope argument there, for sure. If God could intervene and save one child, then why not intervene and save ten? If God could save ten children, then why didn’t he stop Herod the Great from ever coming to power in the first place? Why did God allow Herod’s son, Archelaus, to take his place, because he continued in the murderous ways of his father? Why did God not stop the rise to power of Adolf Hitler, or Joseph Stalin, or Mao Zedong, or Pol Pot, or Idi Amin?

For that matter, why doesn’t God turn hurricanes back to sea before they make landfall? Why doesn’t he stop earthquakes from happening? In short, why does God allow anything bad to happen in this world? Why did God allow Adam and Eve to fall into sin in the first place? Why did God ever let sin and suffering into our world?

Not sure I’m qualified to answer that question, but the best answer I’ve heard is that God values our freedom. God values a created people who have free will and could choose for him or against him rather than robots who could not choose at all. There is a great risk in freedom, but the value of freedom is worth the risk. We are often angry at the state of the world, and rightly so. It is a fallen and corrupted world, removed from the goodness in which God created it. But God created a world with free will, and suffering is often the result.

When suffering comes our way, we pray for God to intervene. Sometimes he does; sometimes he does not.

A common expression about prayer that I have heard many times over the years is that God answers prayer in three ways: Yes, no, and not yet. But somewhere along the way, I heard something different. I don’t even remember where I heard it, but I think it holds up better. God answers prayer in one of three ways. First, sometimes God changes the circumstances. That’s what we want him to do. Second, sometimes God changes our perspective. We pray for God to remove our suffering. Instead, God changes our perspective on the suffering. And third, sometimes God is just present with us in the midst of suffering. As the prophet said in Isaiah 63, “In all their suffering, he also suffered.”

In Jesus, we see God suffering with us. Jesus lost Joseph, his earthly father. He wept when his friend Lazarus died, even though in that case, God “changed the circumstances.” And when Jesus’ friend and relative John the Baptist was put to death by Herod’s other son, Herod Antipas, we see Jesus stepping away from his ministry and going somewhere remote to be alone for a while.

In the end, God will change the circumstances. This world and its suffering will not go on forever. But in the meantime, sometimes God just changes our perspective on the sufferings of this world. And sometimes, he is just with us in the midst of suffering. As people of faith, we will still suffer, but we know that we never suffer alone.