Finding Comfort in God When a Loved One Is Suffering

The post, titled as a prayer for comfort when someone you love is suffering, opens with Isaiah 53’s picture of a man of sorrows who carried our griefs. The author begins by admitting that emotional pain weighs more heavily on her than physical pain, and she shares that living with Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder has brought hard seasons in which she wondered why God had not given her a different burden.

She then widens the lens to the shared reality of a fallen world, where bodies and minds are not whole yet, and to the particular ache of watching someone you love suffer. She names several seasons from her own life, including a sister’s breakup, her mother’s grief, her husband’s job loss during the 2020 pandemic, and her oldest son’s daily fight with Type One Diabetes. In those moments, she notes, a person can feel helpless and even angry, and may find faith shaken.

Her central reflection is that God allows free choice, and that the suffering in the world is tied to human choices. People often want God to resolve their pain while still insisting on their own way, wanting freedom without its consequences. She argues that God is not indifferent, since He carries every burden and feels the weight of each soul. She says that questioning God over suffering is not necessarily wrong, but that bitterness aimed at God will not ease grief or bring healing.

The post closes with encouragement to keep the faith, a reference to Psalm 77:14, and a prayer that asks God to bear burdens and to be present in every hard place, from the therapist’s office to the bathroom floor. It asks for the faith to trust God’s love while placing a loved one’s heart and body in His hands.

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