How can God be loving if He doesn’t let people escape unbearable situations through suicide?
Question:
In your sermon on suicide, you state:
E. It brings no comfort to the suffering soul.
If one takes their own life, then one's unendurable physical or emotional pain is taken away immediately. If God wishes to punish them for wanting some 'morphine for the soul', then he is not really a loving God, is He? The Bible says that He does not allow believers to suffer in life more than they can endure, yet obviously from the fact that many Christians have taken their lives, or tried and were unsuccessful, means that He pays no heed to their unbearable situation, otherwise He would intervene! No wonder many Christian, including myself, have a hard time with the absolute statement that "God is love".
Answer:
Your mistake is assuming that consciousness ceases at the end of life. Jesus taught that our existence and awareness continues past the point of death. "So it was that the beggar died, and was carried by the angels to Abraham's bosom. The rich man also died and was buried. And being in torments in Hades, he lifted up his eyes and saw Abraham afar off, and Lazarus in his bosom" (Luke 16:22-23). Suicide is a form of murder. Murderers will end up in torments. Therefore, the person who commits suicide to escape imagined pain in this life replaces it with eternal pain in the next. Such brings no comfort to the suffering soul.
Your second mistake is assuming the right to accurately judge the situation. We don't allow the victim of a crime to judge a crime because they are too closely involved. We know they cannot see the situation clearly. The person contemplating suicide is acting as both the victim, the judge, and the executioner in his own life's situation. Yet you have the disrespect to charge God as being unloving because He disagrees with your view of your own situation. There are many examples in the Scriptures where God's people thought the situation to be hopeless and gave up -- but they were wrong! "And he prayed that he might die, and said, 'It is enough! Now, LORD, take my life, for I am no better than my fathers!'" (I Kings 19:4). The remainder of I Kings 19 shows just how wrong Elijah was.
You misquote I Corinthians 10:13, "No temptation has overtaken you except such as is common to man; but God is faithful, who will not allow you to be tempted beyond what you are able, but with the temptation will also make the way of escape, that you may be able to bear it." God's promise is access to avenues to escape sin.
God does not promise a life free from suffering here in this world. Satan remains active and suffering will occur.
"For what credit is it if, when you are beaten for your faults, you take it patiently? But when you do good and suffer, if you take it patiently, this is commendable before God. For to this you were called, because Christ also suffered for us, leaving us an example, that you should follow His steps" (I Peter 2:20-21).
"For consider Him who endured such hostility from sinners against Himself, lest you become weary and discouraged in your souls. You have not yet resisted to bloodshed, striving against sin" (Hebrews 12:3-4).
There are Christians who have fallen to Satan's schemes. Being a Christian doesn't make us immune to sin. The fact that Christians sin isn't a reflection on God's strength but on the Christian's weakness.
"But, beloved, we are confident of better things concerning you, yes, things that accompany salvation, though we speak in this manner. For God is not unjust to forget your work and labor of love which you have shown toward His name, in that you have ministered to the saints, and do minister. And we desire that each one of you show the same diligence to the full assurance of hope until the end, that you do not become sluggish, but imitate those who through faith and patience inherit the promises" (Hebrews 10:9-12).
You need to get out of your self-pity party. There is real work to do and a world falling under the power of Satan. Sitting on your hands moaning "Woe is me" isn't helping others or yourself.
