Why does God love others more than me?

Questioning Brother said:

I don't want authority, I'd rather be a philosopher about it.

The second part quoted makes me ask how do I get off of the entrusted list.

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Yes ...I know it would be much , much easier . But love demands hard things . We are told to accept Jesus but never are instructed that we are to count the cost . When we "enlist" , we are basically signing up to do battle with the god of this world who loves death and does not play fair and has no rules . And the enemy knows his time is short . But be of good cheer , as a vessel of God's love , you will have the opportunity to make a difference in someone else's eternity .

You do not want to be off that list but do ask the Lord to carry your load . To do your battles . To give you an increase in love and the ability to see by faith . Personally , I have lived my whole life very selfish and immature . I am trying very hard ( by His grace ) to grow into a man of God. The times in which we live call for sober minded maturity . Like you , I sometimes think wish to shirk my burdens for i am not up to the task ( which is true ) It is more comfortable to be spiritually dead whereas the cross of Christ is uncomfortable . I do not know your age but I am too old to be so weak . I ask your prayers for my race as well . I leave you with this verse which seems applicable . 1st Corinthians 16:13-14 . Do you have others with which you pray ?

God has laid tremendous physical suffering on me which led to emotional suffering trying to deal with the pain. Realizing that your life is forever changed as you cannot do physical things is hard to accept. But I did accept it and started praying. He told me he loved me and he would help me, and he has. Its amazing, HE is amazing. Do not pitty yourself or think he does not love you. He is making you strong. You have to stay positive and pray. I hear you, it sucks but Christians suffer temporarily to avoid eternal suffering.

Does God love you more than Jesus, or less than Jesus? The same Jesus who was unjustly crucified.

Questioning Brother said:

I am going through a lot of problems now, and to be honest, my faith is failing. One common thing I hear often in replies is how God planned this so I can reach others . If that is so, why does he love them enough to make ME suffer, and hate me enough to keep it in the plan?

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I don’t know what problems you are going through right now but it seems like you are in one of those storms in your life where everything is hard to get through. Suffering/hardship can have many purposes. It could be for what you have described...an experience that prepares you to help others. In my experience, God gave me the opportunity to carry a bit of other ppl’s burdens in their hardship and in turn later on, I experienced very similar experiences and was able to adapt well to hardship that I experienced. In other experiences, I have kept very bad family secrets away from my brother (b/c I knew it would make him super angry and would fill him with more hate and damage his relationship with another family) so that he would have less stressful things on his mind as he was heading towards the direction of marriage and becoming more independent. As a result, my emotions have been battered and bruised too many times holding secrets and trying to contain my own emotions/thoughts and my ability to socialize has notably worsened, but I took this sacrifice/suffering/hardship so that my brother can live his life with less hate.

Sometimes suffering can be punishment from sin, it could be God answering your prayers (if you pray for patience/perseverance, He will give you opportunities to be patient and to persevere), it could be suffering so that others can see how strong you are in your faith even in the midst of your suffering (even if it doesn’t seem like it), it could be God trying to draw close to you and that He wants you to truly lean on His understanding and not your own in the midst of these issues or it could be multiple purposes. Job experienced rly bad hardship as Satan wanted to see if his faith would fail when everything was stripped away from him. (I doubt Job ever knew why all that had to happen to him).

Although it rly sucks to be involved in some problems, it does seem like God wants you to lean on Him in these times. Love doesn’t always come in forms of happiness. Love can be in the form of discipline as well to train you up for His future ministries too. And God doesn’t hate anyone (especially the people starving in 3rd world countries and have survival issues). If He wants us to be effective in his ministry, He will train us in ways that moulds is to His image. For some, it’s as ‘easy’ as seminary training...for others, it’s learning how to persevere through issues before entering the real storm.

All in all, I am happy that you feel God is involved somehow in some way. There are some who don’t have any hardship and think life is perfect...that is the real danger. He is using in you, he is teaching you and you may not know for what or why but He has a plan for you (Jeremiah 29:11). If you need support, I’d be happy to hear you out or reach out to a few Christian friends/mentor that can walk along side you in the midst of your hardship to affirm and encourage you.

God helps me more when I am in pain then happy. It is very difficult what I struggle with but I now feel closer during struggles than I ever did.

Questioning Brother said:

I am going through a lot of problems now, and to be honest, my faith is failing. One common thing I hear often in replies is how God planned this so I can reach others . If that is so, why does he love them enough to make ME suffer, and hate me enough to keep it in the plan?

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While I do not know the nature of the problems you are facing, God never promised anyone a trouble-free life. But He did at the very least promise to help us through our troubles. (Rom. 8:28)

But whatever the reason is, it is not a matter of God loving one person more than another, for scripture says that He is “no respecter of persons.” (Acts 10:34) Keep in mind also, that those whom you perceive to be loved more by God than you have troubles of their own of which you may not know and if they don’t, they will eventually. But whatever the problems are that you are facing, it is much better to endure them with the Lord at your side than without Him.

Questioning Brother said:

I am going through a lot of problems now, and to be honest, my faith is failing. One common thing I hear often in replies is how God planned this so I can reach others . If that is so, why does he love them enough to make ME suffer, and hate me enough to keep it in the plan?

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If you feel that you cannot take on this burden, you can pray to God to lift them off of your shoulder. I don't know what His answer will be, but it's okay to ask.

Yes, there is pain sometimes when we are going through things. To address an aspect of your inquiry, offering this for your consideration.

Yeshua is praying - "I in them, and thou in me, that they may be made perfect in one; and that the world may know that thou hast sent me, and hast loved them, as thou hast loved me."

Notice that last portion ...loved them as you love me. Based on this John 17:23 Scripture, Patricia King = We all know that the Father loves His son. You know, He loves Jesus so perfectly. As the Lord loves Him – that’s how much He loves you. You might think He can’t because I can’t be perfect like Jesus. God doesn’t love Jesus because He’s perfect, He loves Jesus because Jesus is His son. That’s why God loves Jesus and He loves you the same way. He loves you the same way He loves Jesus because you are His child. The Father Himself loves you”

Questioning Brother said:

I am going through a lot of problems now, and to be honest, my faith is failing. One common thing I hear often in replies is how God planned this so I can reach others . If that is so, why does he love them enough to make ME suffer, and hate me enough to keep it in the plan?

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Matthew 6:33 (WEB)
"But seek first God’s Kingdom, and his righteousness; and all these things will be given to you as well."

In my 20's I went through times of homelessness and in my 50's suffered a debilitating back injury. I went to read the NT many times. I read books about Biblical archaeology, ancient Near Eastern history and Biblical geography in one of the world's largest libraries in my spare time. I traveled to Israel and toured by rental car. I know reading about doing righteousness is not the same as doing righteousness. Now I have more than enough wealth and my back recovered enough for me to do physical chores.

Questioning Brother said:

I am going through a lot of problems now, and to be honest, my faith is failing. One common thing I hear often in replies is how God planned this so I can reach others . If that is so, why does he love them enough to make ME suffer, and hate me enough to keep it in the plan?

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Yeah, who knows.

Two things.

First, I ignore people who say that "this is how G-d planned it so you can reach others".

Nah. Bad stuff happens in this screwed up world. It's that simple. Bad things happen to everyone. The end.

Second, yeah I don't blame you for questioning your faith.

I figure out a long time ago, that life sucks. Some people have it great, and some don't. Some people end up running a super restaurant serving chicken sandwiches, and others end up having their heads cut off on a beach in Libya.

This is life. So why believe in G-d? Two reasons. One, not believing in G-d, doesn't make life suck less. It just doesn't. Life won't get any better because G-d did not respond to you rubbing the lamp and making a wish. It won't.

So getting mad at him, when he never owed you anything, won't make your life better.

Two, I believe that there is a Heaven, and I'm waiting for that. Yeah it sucks now. But at some point, you die and go to eternity, and I for one, believe that will be awesome.

Deep prayer friends...Satan is roaming around trying to devour us...he tries his best to get us to falter...tell him to leave you alone.. that you are a child of the king...we have to pray and put our armor on daily...but know Jesus is always there...

Questioning Brother said:

I am going through a lot of problems now, and to be honest, my faith is failing. One common thing I hear often in replies is how God planned this so I can reach others . If that is so, why does he love them enough to make ME suffer, and hate me enough to keep it in the plan?

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He doesn't hate you, though when we suffer or get problems, it sometimes seems to us as though he does.

Want to know how much God loves you? Look at the cross.
Jesus was perfect; led a sinless life and never did any wrong. Yet he chose to offer his perfect life as a sacrifice so that we could come to God, pray, be forgiven, have eternal life and become his children. He did that for you.
"This is how we know what love is: Jesus Christ laid down his life for us", 1 John 3:16.

I used to measure God's love for me by my emotions or problems. If I had no problems and felt happy, then that proved that God loved me; if everything was going wrong, my health was bad and I felt miserable, that meant (to me) that God didn't love me/was angry with me.
No.
Jesus died for sinners, Romans 5:8. Jesus suffered and died, and it was God's will for that to happen, so that you could come to know God as your heavenly Father.

Questioning Brother said:

I am going through a lot of problems now, and to be honest, my faith is failing. One common thing I hear often in replies is how God planned this so I can reach others . If that is so, why does he love them enough to make ME suffer, and hate me enough to keep it in the plan?

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Not good to compare your situation to that of others. Subjectively you'll always find a reason to place yourself either above or below them, usually below. Best to compare your suffering to that of Jesus.

I'm nearly 80 and can affirm that whatever doesn't kill you makes you stronger. You'll get through this. Prayers.

No ones life is perfect. I meet people at the Church who lives seems great but deep inside they struggle with issues just like I do. Everyone struggles with different issues what seems like no big deal to me is a big deal to someone else and what is a big deal to me is does not bother others. Remember God loves us for all of our faults that was what Jesus sacrifice was for.

I've just spent a few days in hospital. Some of the ladies on my ward were going through some horrendous things - and some of them were doing it without Christ and the prayers and support of the church. I have Christian friends who've both been through cancer, treatment and side effects, who still found it tough, painful, sad and sometimes horrific, but said they knew they were supported in prayer and knew the Lord's presence.
Being a Christian doesn't take away the bad things that happen in life. It means that we can know the Lord's peace, love and strength IN those bad times; that we can know the one who will never let us go and never let anything separate us from his love.

I don't believe that God sends suffering, so, for me, the phrase, "he trust you to be able to handle it" isn't at all helpful. But I can understand why people might say it; they want to give some sort of answer to the question, 'why?'.