Elizabeth Elliot's Insights on Suffering, #1

Suffering is a Gift

Who better to write a book about that subject than Elizabeth Elliot! I assume most readers know her story: she and her husband Jim Elliot were missionaries to Ecuador, trying to make contact with a jungle tribe. When Jim and 4 colleagues tried to make first contact they were all speared to death (The missionaries had guns but chose not to use them.) A few years later Elizabeth took her daughter and moved in with that tribe and was used to bring them to Christ. A few years later she married again. After several years of marriage her husband developed cancer and died fairly quickly. She later remarried, but that husband outlived her. During her life she wrote many wonderful books, including Suffering is Never for Nothing, the one which is the basis of my sharing in this blog.

So Elizabeth Elliot is qualified to write about suffering. Many people have endured terrible suffering and could have written a book about what the Bible says about suffering as a gift from God, but Elliot's book, Suffering is Never for Nothing, has touched me in a way that no other book I have read has done! Her insights into how God uses suffering have led my wife Jean and me to tears several times, and I wanted to share those insights with others.

Actually, I feel unqualified to write anything on the topic of suffering because my life has been easy. My parents died in old age, Jean and I have been blessed with three healthy and generally happy daughters and 11 grandchildren who are all basically healthy. That rosy scenario almost ended a year ago when my wife almost died as a result of cancer but she didn't and though the cancer is still inside her, she is also happy and "healthy", energetic and pain-free. My life has not been filled with suffering! Nevertheless, Elliot's personal story and her insights into this topic from scripture have touched me and Jean very deeply.

We studied her book as part of our adult Sunday School class. It was a powerful series of lessons. The lesson book divided her book into four parts, which were a logical progression through the topic. I plan to create four posts in this blog-- no more than that-- to share the insights she shared with us through her book.

Insight #1: God is God. 
That is the easiest of the insights in this series. This is both good news and bad news. The bad news (though as we shall see it isn't actually bad) is that God determines the events that happen in our lives including the sufferings and sorrows. For Elliot this meant that he determined that her first two husbands would die painful deaths. But the good news is that he was with her through those experiences. She wrote, "We're not adrift in chaos. We're held in everlasting arms. Therefore we can be at peace, and we can accept." She says her prayer was, "Yes, Lord, I don't like it. I don't understand it. But God, You're in charge." "Lord, whatever you want to give me, I'll take it."
Her implication to insight#1: "Do the next thing." She will explain that in later lessons.

I can imagine that for a few readers this first insight is too simple, maybe even simplistic. This was not the lesson that brought me to tears. But each of her four insights takes us deeper into understanding the gift of suffering. Each one is more profound. Next week's post will reveal the first time I cried in this series. Please come back.
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