Please pass the F & S

Two words circle my thoughts and peer at me through sermons, scripture, and books.
Faith
Suffering
Human logic would say that God must be planning some painful time of suffering requiring much faith. I don’t feel this truth.
But I will share with you my musings on the two words.
Faith
this gift. The more I understand it, I don’t understand it. It seems impossible for humans to conjure up faith and then have enough of it to last and not run out. As I read scripture-I see that God strengthens us in faith (Rom 4:20) that it is a gift not of ourselves (Eph 2:8).
Faith is imperative in the abundant life. I have a friend who is in a theological battle. He wonders at God’s character. A God who created man with the weakness to sin and in foreknowledge knew man would fall. He planned redemption, but not before knowing His justifying wrath. Millions damned to Hell with a chosen few to be saved by the blood of His son.
This thought sucks. There is not enough known about the Lord to satisfy an answer. This battle causes me to look up at God and know that his ways are not my ways (Isa 55:8). With faith, I move on. But my friend cannot.
What is faith?
Suffering
a blessing. I view suffering through the lens of economics. If I suffer for a season, God will reward me and reveal wisdom as to why I suffered. We say things like this all the time when our friends are going through hard times. “God has a reason…you’re learning from this…it will pass…” It’s like paying God five dollars, he owes us something for it. This begs me to look at the opposite. Perhaps God never reveals a reason, perhaps you never learn anything from it, or you never leave that suffering, will you still love God? Will I?
so we come back to faith.