Suffering is part of life, and often it has to happen in order for God's work to be accomplished. Let me explain. When God sent Jesus to make a way into heaven by taking the punishment for Sin, the reason He sent Him was because God loved the world so much. That was His motivation. The consequence was that Jesus would have to suffer and die.
God doesn't delight in watching us suffer, watching us be in pain. He isn't an evil genius. Some may site Isaiah 53:10a where it says, "But the LORD was pleased to crush Him"
The pleased here isn't with the pain but with the outcome of the suffering. God will do anything to give us opportunity to choose Him.
This morning I really felt God saying to me, "Hold on. I'm coming!"
The suffering in our lives often happens in the wait time -- the time when we wait expectantly for God to come through. He says, Hold on. He's coming. He will come through.
Let me give you an example -- it is a silly example and I share it, not to belittle the extreme suffering some of our Brothers and Sisters in Christ are dealing with, but just to get this principle explained.
My youngest child loves to eat. She would eat all day every day if I let her. But I don't. Let's say she comes into the kitchen at 5:30 p.m. asking for something to eat. She is 'starving." She knows she is just "going to die from hunger." But I tell her no because I am making a good nutritious dinner for her. She has to wait.
Because I am making her wait for dinner, she will be suffering from hunger until dinner is ready.
I am not finding great delight in her "pain" but it is just what has to be while she waits.
As I said, this is a silly example because my daughter isn't truly suffering or truly in pain, but any situation could be put into this scenerio. And God will use the journey to the answer in our lives. For my daughter, she learns to wait and to also learn not to satisfy her lust for food.
I don't want to belittle suffering at all. I just want us to realize God isn't "mean" or "cruel." He loves us so much that He can allow us to deal with pain and such to get us to where He knows we need to be.