How did the Father suffer? 

February 23, 2021

What was the role of the Father as the Son learned obedience? Our theology doesn't say much about this. We learn that the Father gave his Son. He so loved the world that he sent his Son. Now think of any earthly father offering his own son, for example, who was injured by a criminal, in expiation for that criminal. There's probably no earthly father in the world who would do that. Yet the heavenly Father gave his Son. What did it cost him? Now of course he did not suffer exactly as we suffer. But did Abraham have some kind of suffering that intimated the suffering of the heavenly Father? While the Son was away did the heavenly Father 'feel' like the father of the prodigal son? A Japanese theologian by the name of Katamuri wrote a book entitled The Pain of God, in which he tried to bring out the 'sufferings' of the heavenly Father in giving his Son. The Father was disturbed by the sins of the world. In any case, while we cannot quite divine what the heavenly Father endured, as it were, we know he gave up something, in our language.