Does God suffer?

[zander]

I recall reading something once where Ray said God has/had suffered.

Can anyone reaffirm this?

Does God suffer now?  Did he suffer before and does he continue to do so?

We know Jesus did (does he still).  But the Father - did he/has he suffered? 

Does God feel pain?

Thanks

[lilitalienboi16]

I recall reading something once where Ray said God has/had suffered.

Can anyone reaffirm this?

Does God suffer now?  Did he suffer before and does he continue to do so?

We know Jesus did (does he still).  But the Father - did he/has he suffered? 

Does God feel pain?

Thanks

Hi Zander,

Galatians 5:22 "But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, longsuffering, gentleness, goodness, faith,"

This is a fruit of the spirit. God is spirit. He existed long before He decided to create this universe and ourselves and yet He possessed this quality of "LONG SUFFERING." So does God suffer? Did He ever suffer? He must have. Ray in the audio below points to the "birthing" of wisdom which occurred in great pain and agony for God. The wisdom that would allow Him to create the universe and children in His image. Here is a snippet of that audio (the full can be found on the front page):



     Does God Learn ?

I've ask these questions all my life. I didn't have an answer for them. But I ask the questions. Does God learn?  I know He knows everything, but does He know everything because He learned it all? 

Well I though, there's a lot of stuff I'm not going to know. But then I also believed that there is so much more in the Bible than we have ever seen. I mean it's in there  There is so much in there, you just have to pay attention to the words.

You know I look at Scripture and I read them over 30... 50... 180 times and then sometimes something jumps out at me.  I'm relentless, I'm like a bulldog and I beg God.  I say, 'God I don't know this, show me. Show me! I know it's in there, show me!' 

Anyway, is there any indication in the Bible that God, before the creation, before there was a universe or even a Jesus Christ, is there any indication that God either learned something or accomplished something that didn't exist with Him, prior to that? Some might say, 'Ray I think you are on dangerous ground. I think you are talking heresy and this verges on sacrilegion.' 

I ask the question... I had a debate with Jeff Priddy, I friend of mine, has some screwy ideas, but he's a nice guy. I was talking about emotions and he said, 'Ray God does not have emotions.' I said, well what is love and how come God is love, if God does not have emotion. He said, 'No, that's just for human terms and He is so way above and beyond that and everything else.' 

But then over time I got to thinking about that and I said, wait a minute in Galatians 5 we are given a list of the fruits of God Spirit. One of them in the King James is longsuffering.  Okay longsuffering, what does that mean? Patience. What is that made up of? Is it made up as an archaic English term? 

Longsuffering - to suffer long. One of the fruits of God Spirit is to suffer long. How can it be a fruit of God's Spirit if He doesn't even possess it Himself? 

I told somebody that I was going to ask a question at this conference; Did God ever do an honest days work in His life? I mean a really hard day's work. Did He? Well you would say, 'well He created the universe, that was a little work.' No, all these Christians theologies say He just spoke it, let there be stars... let there be suns and moons... let there be an earth... let there this and that... just let there be... let it be... let it be... and there you are.  Wow, I'm tried I think I'll rest a day.

Did God ever do an honest hard days work in His life? You say, 'Ray it doesn't apply, you can't apply what we do to what He does.' How can you say it doesn't apply? Jesus Christ worked and He suffered, He had long suffering and He had patience and He was the very image of His Father! The expressed stamped image of His Father! And we are to be in the image of Jesus Christ (Rom. 08). In the very image of God and the very image of Jesus Christ, our elder brother.

So how could Jesus have all this love and all this patience and all this mercy and He said everything He got came from His Father? Every thought He thought, every word He spoke, every deed He done came from His Father. How can you say the Father doesn't have patience? 

Patience is doing without something you want, but you can't have it now. You have to exercise patience. You might even have to have longsuffering, you might have to suffer long. That is a fruit of God's Spirit.

I could never believe in my heart of hearts that God would expect of us, things that He would not move His little finger to do Himself.

Jesus Christ berated the Pharisees. He said you load these heavy heavy burdens on people, very difficult for them to do what you tell them they need to do to be holy and righteous and good. Yet you would not move them with one of your fingers.

Mat 23:4  For they bind heavy burdens and grievous to be borne, and lay them on men's shoulders; but they themselves will not move them with one of their fingers.

Is He accusing the Pharisees of something His own Father is guilty of? Are you following me? Is Jesus Christ condemning and berating the Pharisees for something His own Father is guilty of... that He lays heavy burdens on us and He wouldn't lift them with one of His fingers, but we have to? We have to suffer through sixty or eighty years of sometimes horrible misery and disease and heartache and everything. What does God know about that? Nothing? I don't think so. I don't buy that nonsense anymore. I think that God has gone through a lot for us.


Ray's transcript on: "Where did God get knowledge?" 
Src: http://forums.bible-truths.com/index.php/topic,8831.0.html

Its a great audio/transcript and I highly recommend reading it through or listening to it if you have not already.

God bless,
Alex

P.S. Edited part of my post for clarity.

[zander]

Thank you for the answer.

I did ask if he suffered but I did also ask if he is suffering now.

[Ian 155]

if he is suffering now.

1Pe 3:18  Because Christ also died once for our sins, the just for the unjust: that he might offer us to God, being put to death indeed in the flesh, but enlivened in the spirit,

He no longer "suffers"

Now we travail  ...Gal 4:19

[Kat]

I did ask if he suffered but I did also ask if he is suffering now.

Hi Zander, there are Scripture that indicate that God certainly sympathizes and is long-suffering towards us while we bare through the physical life.

2 Peter 3:9  The Lord is not slack concerning His promise, as some count slackness, but is longsuffering toward us, not willing that any should perish but that all should come to repentance.

Rom 9:22  What if God, wanting to show His wrath and to make His power known, endured with much longsuffering the vessels of wrath prepared for destruction,

Rom 2:4  Or do you despise the riches of His goodness, forbearance, and longsuffering, not knowing that the goodness of God leads you to repentance?

This is a time/age that God takes no delight in the suffering and death of the wicked. Here is where spoke a bit about this.

http://bible-truths.com/twelve.htm ----------------------------

A few years ago someone tried to trip me up with this verse:

"They have built also the high places of Baal, to burn their sons with fire for burnt offerings unto Baal, which I commanded not, nor spoke it neither came it into My mind" (Jer. 19:5).

Here, I was told, is absolute proof that God learns new things that He didn't know before. Nonsense.

This is a simple problem of translating. The word translated "mind" in this verse is the Hebrew word leb, and it means the "heart with its feelings," not the mind. The King James very often confuses heart with mind and mind with soul, as if they were one and the same thing even though there are different words for each.

God's plan and purpose for humanity consists of many, many things which are not after God's own heart, but that are, nonetheless, absolutely essential for the completion of His plan:

"Say unto them, As I live, says the Lord God, I have no pleasure in the death of the wicked; but that the wicked turn from his way and live: turn ye, turn ye from your evil ways; for why will ye die, O house of Israel?" (Ezek. 33:11).

This is God's HEART speaking in this verse. But in the MIND of God, the death of the wicked was absolutely necessary, and a prophesied fact that could not be avoided:

"For I will lay the land most desolate, and the pomp of her strength shall cease, and the mountains of Israel shall be desolate, that none shall pass through" (Ver. 28).

This is but another of countless examples in Scripture that show God's mind and His heart. God takes no pleasure or delight in His heart over the horrible things that continually happen to humanity, but nonetheless, these things are absolutely essential to the fulfillment of the plan that God has devised in His mind.

It is absolute blasphemy to think or teach that God is the Creator of all that is, but then takes zero responsibility for all the evils of that creation—ALL is of God.
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mercy, peace and love
Kat