When Life Hurts: Understanding God's Place in Your Pain

Pain calls our most basic beliefs about God into question. Philip Yancey's When Life Hurts addresses five major questions brought on by pain: Is God competent? Is He really so powerful? Is He fair? Why doesn't He seem to care about pain? And where is God when I need Him most? Yancey provides thought-provoking answers to questions faced by believers in their darkest moments and reveals that even in suffering and pain -- and sometimes because of them -- God's competence, power, wisdom, and love still shine through.

One of the greatest quandaries of faith often boils down to this question: how can God love me so much and still allow me to feel pain? "I confess that I once viewed pain as God's one great goof in an otherwise impressive world," writes author Philip Yancey. "Why didn't he create all the beautiful things in the world, but leave out pain?" Amazingly, it was Yancey's work in a leprosy hospital that taught him that pain is crucial to health and survival. Because leprosy victims cannot feel pain they became even more ill and disabled. For instance, one leprosy victim went blind because he had no pain cells in his eyes to alert him to blink. Taking the analogy further, Yancey explains how pain helps us participate in many of life's joys, such as sports, dance, sculpture, love making. It is not a mistake, but rather a necessary human condition. And when that emotional or physical pain feels unbearable, know that God is beside us, feeling enormous love and compassion, adds Yancey. With numerous quotes from the Bible and lavish illustrations, including one of the crucifixion, Yancey points to all the ways that God comforts us, rather than abandons or punishes us, when we are in the depths of pain.