The way men speak about suffering reveals how much they have departed from the faith. They dress up their weakness as if it carried some hidden poetry, and they elevate their pain as if it produced virtue. Religion has baptized this error into a doctrine, telling people that their misery is part of a divine romance. The truth is that most suffering is meaningless, and much of it is the direct result of unbelief, sin, or folly. It does not glorify God but blames him, and it does not sanctify the person but deceives him into treasuring his own ruin. There is nothing romantic about this.

Only one man’s suffering is romantic. The suffering of Jesus Christ was filled with purpose and power, because it was substitutionary. He suffered for his people, so that they would not have to suffer in the same way. His agony was noble because it was endured to redeem, not to indulge in sentiment. His death was beautiful because it carried eternal meaning, not because it satisfied the melancholy cravings of the human heart. The cross is romance because it joins the highest cost with the highest gift. By contrast, the grief of man is hollow when he treats it as if it were part of the same story.

The attempt to romanticize human suffering is more than an error in taste. It is a theological insult. If the sickness, poverty, or despair that weighs on men is something they are meant to carry for God’s glory, then what was the point of Christ carrying it? If the cross means that he bore our sins, our griefs, and our pains, then to embrace them again is to declare his work unnecessary. To hold on to your suffering as if it were sacred is to waste his suffering, because you prefer to treasure your own misery instead of his victory. That is why those who teach people to love their affliction are enemies of the gospel. They encourage believers to find meaning where God has given none, and in doing so they rob the Son of God of the honor due to him.

Most of the suffering that fills the world is not only useless but shameful. A man who commits a crime and is punished for it is not suffering for righteousness but receiving justice. A man who forgets to lock his door and loses his possessions to a thief is not enduring a mysterious trial but paying the price of his carelessness. These things are the fruit of sin and error, not the glory of God. The apostle Peter wrote that if you suffer as a Christian, it is a blessing, but if you suffer as a criminal, it is your own disgrace. He did not tell people to reinterpret their misdeeds as acts of piety. He told them to stop sinning.

The same principle applies to folly. If a person refuses to believe God’s word about healing and remains sick, that is not suffering for the glory of God. It is the misery of unbelief. If a person refuses to trust God for daily bread and lives in want, that is not an exalted trial but a self-inflicted prison. Depression is another example. Some Christians read the Puritans and other teachers who romanticized melancholy, and they think their heaviness proves depth of spirit. In reality it proves rebellion. They refuse to believe what God has spoken, they resist his joy, and they prefer to bathe in sorrow as if their despair gave them character. The truth is that they enjoy feeling bad, because it makes them feel profound. In their vanity they become devoted to their depression, and when anyone points out their unbelief, they turn in accusation. They do not want deliverance. They want to preserve the romance of their own pain.

Jesus told Peter to come, and he walked on the sea toward him. His faith was working, and the miracle was real. But when he looked at the wind and waves, he began to sink. Jesus did not say he misunderstood the redemptive-historical meaning of the statement. He did not say it was about something else. He did not say it was not the will of God for him to walk. He said, “Why did you doubt?” Peter’s sinking was not noble. It was failure. If you suffer because of unbelief, your suffering is not romantic. It is disgraceful.

This exposes the foolishness of slogans like “don’t waste your suffering.” The truth is that suffering is already a waste. There is nothing in it to redeem. What must be guarded against is wasting the suffering of Jesus by preferring your own afflictions to his finished work. To take pride in your wounds is to insult his stripes. To treasure your pain is to ignore his cross. If you love your misery, you are wasting your life on delusions and declaring that his sacrifice was not enough.

The only sensible approach is to curse false suffering, to reject it, and to stand in the victory of Christ. You do not need to accept the sickness he carried. You do not need to embrace the poverty he bore. You do not need to preserve the depression he conquered. To cling to them is to live in unbelief. To resist them is to honor him. Satan comes as a thief, but he can be stopped in the name of Jesus. To treat his theft as a blessing is to side with him against your Lord. To resist him is to live by faith in the Son of God.

The romance of suffering belongs to Jesus Christ alone. His death was where eternal love meets eternal cost, and in him it becomes our salvation. At most, a believer may suffer for him in faith and obedience, whether by persecution or sacrifice for his name. That is romantic, because it is directed toward him. But the majority of suffering that men endure is useless. It comes from sin, unbelief, or foolishness, and it brings neither sanctification nor glory. The church must stop romanticizing such misery. It must stop preaching sermons and writing books that encourage people to see their despair as beautiful. It must start proclaiming the triumph of Christ as the end of such things.

When I had no hope and no friends, I discovered that Jesus died for me. His suffering was the gift that changed everything, and his death was the romance that entered my story. That was the day when misery lost its charm, because I saw that my grief had no beauty in it, but his grief for me was filled with glory. From then on, the question was never whether my depression or poverty or sickness carried meaning, but whether I would believe that he bore them so I could be free. To honor him means to believe him. To believe him means to reject the deception that my suffering is noble. His cross was noble. Mine is useless.