Not Only Kind

So we have come to know and to believe the love that God has for us. God is love, and whoever abides in love abides in God, and God abides in him.
(1 John 4:16 ESV)

I think many times when suffering comes our way, we scream out to God, “WHY?! What did I do?” But we forget – I forget that God is not just kind. For it is through suffering that we learn that God is not only kind to us. Yes, God is not only kind, rather He is love. For a god that is only kind would give drugs to a drug addict because it would make the addict happy in the moment, not willing to bring the suffering and pain required to remove the addiction from the addict in order to give him a life free from drugs. Kindness is unwilling to go all the way, unwilling to do that which is required to bring ultimate good to the recipient. But God is a God that loves us and so sometimes He wills us to go through difficulties and suffering not for the sake of suffering but for our own sake, as one withholding drugs from an addict, causing momentary suffering in order that the addict might be free from the addiction and live a full and free life. And so it is with us, we are addicted to this world, a world that in the end leads to death, and so God, our Father works to wean us off this world, causing us momentary affliction, that we might, in the end, have a life that is full, wholly satisfied and pure, not bound in slavery to sin, but filled with love for the One who loved us enough to cause our suffering for our ultimate good – everlasting life in the presence of the source of all good, God Himself. He is truly love.