Our second Beyond Today program today is entitled, “Will Suffering End?” Steve Myers is the host and Gary Petty and I are guests in the final segment. One of the thoughts I had in response to a question, “what is God’s purpose in allowing suffering?” revolves around the story of The Velveteen Rabbit. Do you remember the story? A little boy is given a stuffed rabbit as a toy. He loves the rabbit very much and the rabbit wants to become a “real” rabbit. Through the course of the story the boy becomes sick and forgets about his favorite stuffed toy. Replaced by a new better looking rabbit the old velveteen rabbit is about to be burned in a fire. Distressed, the rabbit sheds a tear. Through the experience, and with the help of a magic fairy, the rabbit becomes a real rabbit. He becomes real–not stuffed and fake. Suffering does that for us. It helps us shed the layers of ego, imagery and false pride we build up through our culture and life experiences. All the things we put on that we think make up the real person get removed through the hard knock experiences of life. Suffering, if allowed its perfect work, transforms us into something closer the real image of God. And that is a key lesson to learn as we go through a trial. If we take that approach we can then “rejoice…when we run into problems and trial, for we know they are good for us–they help us learn to endure. And endurance develops strength of character in us, and character strengthens our confident expectation of salvation.” (Romans 5:3-4, NLT)