God Suffering

[futureKC123]

I have read that God does not suffer. If God is truly human and divine at once and Jesus, the second Person of the Holy Trinity suffered on the Cross. Does God suffer or is it only the human part suffer? And since God is outside of time and eternal AND He is eternally in the moment of His passion and death, is He eternally suffering? Yes, I understand He is both truly human and truly divine all at once, the God-man.
Thanks,
FKC

 

[Verum1980]

Your question is both simple and complex. The simple part is answering, “Does God suffer?”. God is our father. When He sees us suffer, it causes Him pain. It hurts Him when He tries to love us and we reject Him, or when innocent people suffer at the hands of injustice. The time issue is more complex because God exists beyond our understanding of time. So, no one can explain how He suffers within His time. We do know that this world will one day end, though. And all suffering, including His, will cease. That has been promised. So, except for the suffering of those who have rejected Christ forever, there will be no eternal suffering.

 

[praying4u2]

Hi, I think God suffers. Because when I heard about the tragedy at the school in Connecticut , my first instinct was to pray to the Lord in apologetic sorrow… I am so sorry that such a tragedy occurred because I know that God Loves us and because of His Love I believe that he would suffer along with the innocent. He suffers with the families , he suffers with all who are hurt from hatred and sin. Because ultimately it is sin that snuffed out the light, not only of the victims but of the young man who shot them. His light was snuffed out, and this was sin. Every time someone sins, and all people sin, because anything, Anything that does not Glorify God is sin, Jesus Suffers. That is why we are sooo dependent on his mercy and forgiveness to save us. When society fails it is all the righteous who suffer , including God. Remember that Jesus is a God who is right up close and personal. Our own personal light who lives in us. I am in sorrow that our culture did not help this man before he did such horror.

 

[cap76]

God most certainly does suffer. If it were not so, God’s patience would have ended long ago and He would have brought swift and final judgment upon the world. It is because of His suffering that we have a hope of being delivered from our sin and misery.
If God had no capacity for suffering, then there would be no opportunity for Him to display His mercy.
The Father would not have sent His Son to be crucified and forsake Him (Psalm 22:1);
The Son would not have been willing to go (Matthew 26:42);
It would not be said that the Spirit has the capacity to be grieved by our sin (Ephesians 4:30).

 

[Formosus]

I have read that God does not suffer. If God is truly human and divine at once and Jesus, the second Person of the Holy Trinity suffered on the Cross. Does God suffer or is it only the human part suffer? And since God is outside of time and eternal AND He is eternally in the moment of His passion and death, is He eternally suffering? Yes, I understand He is both truly human and truly divine all at once, the God-man.
Thanks,
FKC

The Divine nature does not suffer, but the Second Person of the Trinity suffers due to the communicatio idiomatum. The Logos suffers in His humanity, while remaining impassible in His Divinity. Since the Logos is God, one can say that God suffers.

 

[Psychlo]

…I wonder… and I suppose this is speculation on my part, though as a theist who believes in a transcendent (yet also intimately involved) God, I must say it makes sense.

Does a little pain (or even a lot of pain) when spread out over a sizeable breadth of time, remain pain? IF God is “infinite” than that means his being has the ability to weather the biggest pains. And if, like we see with small “pains” we can either ignore or get used to them (sort of like getting down into a hot bath really comfortably) then we can transform even the worst discomfort into sometimes something even pleasurable.

Just a thought.

 

[TomD123]

I think it depends on what you mean:

Christ certainly suffered. Christ is God and in that way we can say God suffered. Yet He suffered in his humanity not his divinity. Yes Jesus is both God and man but that does not mean he must suffer in both natures. Just like he is infinite in one nature and finite in the other…His two natures are distinct.

Christ no longer suffers as His humanity was in time as any human is. Therefore, God does not currently suffer because God is eternal yet the suffering was only in His humanity.

Finally, when talking about God in heaven or God the Divine Being in general, no He does not suffer nor could He. His life is happiness itself. God loves us very much and we often speak of Him suffering or being angry or experiencing human passions/emotions in order to understand Him better.