What does Tribe teach about why does god allow suffering?
Drawn from the messages where it was actually addressed: the words said from the front, the passages taught, and where to hear the whole thing.
At Tribe, the teaching on suffering and why God allows hard things starts not with an answer but with permission to ask the question. Brian Hunter says the 'why' question is a completely normal human response, and you should give yourself room to ask it. But he also pushes back on it as the most productive place to stay. Brian says, "God does not owe me an answer at all. There's no pleading with him." That is hard to sit with, but it is foundational to how Tribe approaches this topic: God is perfectly holy, he is not on trial, and demanding an account from him puts the conversation in a place where it tends to loop rather than move.
The more productive question, one that came up in the room during the teaching, is to ask God what he wants you to learn about himself in the situation. That posture shifts things from protest to relationship. Brian draws this out from two fire events in Leviticus 9 and 10 that sit on the same page, one fire producing worship, one producing death, both coming from the same God. The God of the Bible, he teaches, is a consuming fire who will not and cannot compromise his holiness, because a God who makes exceptions to his own character would be less than perfect, and a less-than-perfect being cannot be God.
That is where suffering and the cross connect in this teaching. The problem of a holy God and sinful people is not a small one. Brian says, "The most incredible dilemma in the history of the universe required the most brilliant solution ever conceived." That solution is Jesus, whose death is not presented here as covering over mistakes but, as Brian puts it, literally erasing them. Suffering, in this frame, is not evidence that God is absent or indifferent. It is one of the places where his character and his costly love come into sharpest focus.
Taught from Leviticus 10:1-6 · Leviticus 9:18-24 · Hebrews 9:27-28 · Psalm 2 · Luke 12:47-48
“God does not owe me an answer at all. There's no pleading with him.”
From A Consuming Fire
The passage taught · Hebrews 9:27-28
27 Inasmuch as it is appointed for men to die once, and after this, judgment,
28 so Christ also, having been offered once to bear the sins of many, will appear a second time, without sin, to those who are eagerly waiting for him for salvation.
World English Bible
Messages that go deeper
- February 24, 2025 A Consuming Fire Brian Hunter explores Leviticus 9-10 and Hebrews 9 to ask how a holy God can love sinful people without compromise, and why Jesus is the only answer.
- February 23, 2025 Finding Jesus in Leviticus A pastor and congregation wrestle with Leviticus 9-10 and Hebrews 9 to ask how a holy, consuming God can love sinful people without ever compromising his holiness.