One of the questions that drives many people away from God is a variation of: “Why does God allow suffering?” Because our human mind doesn’t understand why a good God would allow bad things to happen, especially to those who are called His. The last few weeks, we’ve been talking about righteousness and justification. This week, we begin to dig deeper into the fruit of what it means to be justified before God and what type of character is produced through suffering. 

• What benefits of being justified does Paul lay out in verses 1-2?

• Fill in this diagram from verses 3-4:

Suffering ----> ____________  ----> ____________ ----> ____________----> ____________

Based on this diagram, why does God allow suffering? 

• How does suffering produce endurance? 

• Can you think of an experience in your own life of a time of suffering and how it impacted your faith? 

• Read 1 Peter 5:10, Psalm 34:19, Revelation 21:4 and 2 Corinthians 4:17. What other promises does God make to those who endure suffering? 

• What kind of suffering is the Bible talking about? See 2 Timothy 3:12, Philippians 1:29, 1 Peter 3:14 and 2 Corinthians 4:8-10.

• Have you ever suffered for righteousness’ sake (1 Peter 3:14, Psalm 34:19)? If yes, how? If no, can you think of a real life example of this from someone else’s life or for modern Christians in general? 

• How does endurance produce character? See also Hebrews 10:36

• What kind of character do you think is produced in those who have endured suffering? Hint: see the Greek definition of character (dokimé), which means approval through testing or proof of genuineness.

• Read James 1:2-4, James 1:12, Proverbs 17:3 and 1 Peter 4:12-19. What do these passages teach us about the importance of being tested?

• What is the difference between being tested by God and temptation? See 1 Corinthians 10:13, Matthew 26:41, James 4:7, and James 1:12-16.

• How does a character that endured suffering produce hope? 

• Why does hope not put us to shame? (v. 5)

• How is God’s love shown to us? (v. 6-8)

• What are we called to rejoice in? (v. 3 & 11)

• How did we receive reconciliation with God? 

Reflect & Respond

• What does this passage teach me about God?

• How does this change the way I live? 

Scripture to memorize

“Not only that, but we rejoice in our sufferings, knowing that suffering produces endurance, and endurance produces character, and character produces hope, and hope does not put us to shame, because God’s love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit who has been given to us.” -Romans 5:3-5

If you’re new here or missed a week, you can find prior weeks here:

• Week One

• Week Two

• Week Three

• Week Four

• Week Five

• Week Six

• Week Seven

• Week Eight

• Week Nine

• Week Ten

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Yelena is the founder and editor in chief Tirzah. Yelena works as an attorney in tax and in her spare time, she is working on her first book for unmarried twenty-something women in extended waiting seasons and running Tirzah. She has a passion for pointing young women to Christ, and enjoys reading, writing, traveling, and spending time with her family.