Why Jesus Suffered

Scripture

But he was wounded for our transgressions, he was bruised for our iniquities: the chastisement of our peace was upon him; and with his stripes we are healed.

Isaiah 53:5 KJV

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Big idea

Summary

Graham opens by pointing out a feature of Jesus' ordeal that sets it apart from ordinary human suffering: Jesus saw it coming. Long before His arrest, He told His disciples plainly what awaited Him, yet they could not grasp it. Graham lingers on the loneliness of that night — the very men Jesus had trained and relied on scattered when He needed them most, leaving Him to face His accusers essentially friendless. From there he walks through the unraveling trial: trumped-up charges from paid witnesses, a governor who three times pronounced Jesus innocent yet still caved to political pressure, and a crowd that, given the choice, preferred a violent criminal to Him. Pilate's attempt to distance himself by washing his hands becomes, for Graham, a picture of how easily people try to avoid responsibility for costly moral decisions.

The chapter then turns to what the cross actually accomplishes. Graham insists that no human system — no government, philosophy, or scientific advance — can supply what only the cross provides: a genuine answer to humanity's deepest need. He reaches for an everyday image, recalling a hospital's appeal for blood donors, to help readers feel the life-giving, self-giving nature of Christ's sacrifice rather than recoiling from its language of blood. He acknowledges that this message strikes many as unpleasant or embarrassing, yet maintains that it remains, for those who receive it, the very means by which God's power reaches broken lives. Graham frames this not as an abstract doctrine but as the practical hinge on which every other answer to suffering in the book depends, since without a crucified and risen Savior, he argues, pain would simply be meaningless noise.

In closing, Graham addresses a modern instinct to put God on trial whenever tragedy strikes, as though people today are the injured party demanding an explanation from Him. He does not dismiss that impulse, since he opened the chapter acknowledging real people in real anguish, and he grants that the question 'Where is God when...?' is one every honest person eventually asks in some form. But he answers it by returning to the cross: because Jesus Himself experienced isolation, injustice, and unbearable pain, believers can trust that God is not a distant observer of suffering but One who has entered it fully, and who is therefore uniquely qualified to bring comfort, meaning, and eventual healing to those still in the middle of their own. Suffering, Graham concludes, only makes sense once we know that God has suffered too.

Key points

• Jesus' suffering was unique in that He foresaw it in advance, which added a distinct dimension of anguish.
• Jesus' closest followers abandoned Him at the moment He most needed their support.
• Pilate's three declarations of Jesus' innocence, followed by his surrender to public pressure, illustrate how injustice can triumph even when truth is plain.
• Graham presents the cross as the only reliable source of hope, superior to human progress, politics, or philosophy.
• Because Christ has fully experienced suffering and isolation, believers can trust that God understands their pain from within, not merely from a distance.

Illustrations & stories

• A recollection of visiting the Mayo Clinic and seeing a pamphlet urging blood donation, used to reframe the language of Christ's blood as life-giving rather than distasteful.
• The trial before Pilate, including the crowd's choice of the criminal Barabbas over Jesus and Pilate's symbolic hand-washing to avoid responsibility for the verdict.
• The disciples' desertion of Jesus at His arrest, presented as an example of the particular pain of being abandoned by those closest to you.
• A brief reference to real people in real anguish crying out 'Where is God when...?', framing the human instinct to question God's presence amid suffering.

Notable line

Jesus suffered more than any other person in human history.

Billy Graham Hope for the Troubled Heart, ch. 5, opening description of the cross as suffering's symbol

For reflection and discussion

1. In what ways does knowing that Jesus willingly endured betrayal and abandonment change how you view times you've felt let down by others?
2. Why do you think Graham considers it significant that Jesus knew His suffering was coming rather than being caught by surprise?
3. Pilate tried to wash his hands of responsibility for Jesus' death. Where might you be tempted to avoid taking a costly, right stand?
4. How does viewing the cross as humanity's 'only hope' challenge modern tendencies to look to science, politics, or self-improvement for ultimate answers?
5. What would it look like this week to bring an honest, unresolved 'Where is God when...?' question to Him rather than suppressing it?