He Knows How You Feel

Sometimes the greatest comfort isn't an explanation. It's knowing you're not alone.

There are moments in life that never leave you.

One of those moments for me happened in a children's hospital.

Our oldest daughter had been battling Crohn's disease. It seemed like one setback after another. Every time we thought she was getting better, something else happened.

This day was especially hard.

She was sixteen years old, fully aware of what was happening, and the doctors needed to insert a feeding tube. She knew exactly what that meant, and she was terrified.

As her father, all I wanted to do was make it stop.

If you've ever watched one of your children suffer, then you know exactly what I'm talking about.

There is a pain that only parents understand.

You would trade places with them in an instant.

You would take their pain if you could.

You would gladly put yourself between them and whatever is hurting them.

But sometimes...

you can't.

I stood there feeling completely helpless.

Eventually, I had to leave the room.

I walked out into the hallway broken.

I was crying.

Praying.

Asking God, "Why?"

Not just why was this happening to my daughter.

Why any of it.

Why so much suffering.

Why so much pain.

And in that hallway, I sensed God speak to me.

Not with a long explanation.

Not with an answer to every question.

Just these simple words:

"I know how you feel."

At first, I wasn't sure what to do with those words.

But the more I sat with them, the more I realized what He was saying.

No one has ever watched a son suffer the way the Father watched His.

God watched Jesus be mocked.

Rejected.

Beaten.

Humiliated.

Nailed to a cross.

He watched His Son willingly bear the weight of our sin and our shame.

He knows what it is to watch someone you love suffer.

But then I realized something else.

Unlike me...

God wasn't helpless.

He could do something.

And He did.

When He saw humanity trapped in sin...

headed toward eternal separation...

lost in our own brokenness...

He didn't stand at a distance.

He stepped between us and our suffering.

He sent His Son.

Jesus willingly took upon Himself the punishment that belonged to us.

He entered our pain so that we could enter His life.

The cross isn't just proof of God's love.

It's proof that He understands.

He knows what it feels like to watch someone you love suffer.

And because of Jesus...

He also knows how to redeem suffering.

Over the past few weeks, I've talked with several parents whose children are walking through incredibly painful circumstances.

Some are facing illnesses.

Some are watching their children make destructive choices.

Some are carrying burdens no parent ever wants to carry.

As I've listened to them, I've found myself back in that hospital hallway.

Remembering those words.

"I know how you feel."

If you're a parent carrying that kind of pain today, I don't know why you're walking through it.

I won't pretend to have all the answers.

But I do know this.

You are talking to a Father who understands.

Not because He read about suffering.

Not because He observed it from heaven.

But because He lived through it Himself.

And He loved us enough...

to step between us and our greatest pain.

That's the heart of the Father.

"The cross is more than the place where God forgave our sin. It'the place where He forever proved that He understands a Father's heart."