Suffering is an important part of the Christian journey, although you wouldn't know it from all of the self-help doctrine that is going around today in America through churches who emphasize wealth and health. Despite the self-help message which is being communicated by several people who are very effective communicators, we can still go back to the Bible to understand what God intends for us in finding joy in suffering.
The book of 1 Peter is one example. George Ladd once wrote, "The most important emphasis in Peter's thought about God is that of the divine providence in human suffering. The sufferings of which Peter speaks are not those of physical afflictions, natural evils, or accidents, or the sort of ordinary tragedy that besets all human beings. It is the sufferings people are called upon to endure because they are Christians... However, this is to be regarded as nothing strange, but as the normal experience of believers in an evil society."
So, how are you doing with your suffering? Are you suffering at all, or have you arranged for life in such a way as to remove all signs of unpleasantness? Are you suffering at all? If you are indeed a Christian, then you should be suffering at some level. Are you suffering well?
3 comments:
Bryan
Gee, Bryan, I don't think there's enough time and space to say everything there is to say on this subject. But here are a few thoughts:
We must always remember the main reason for suffering - it is to draw us to God. Humanly speaking there are many reasons for suffering - consequences of sin, poverty, famine, natural disasters, etc.; but if you believe in a Sovereign God then you must also believe that He has not only allowed but ordained these events for His purposes. It's sometimes hard to embrace that concept, but I believe it to be true.
As Christians we must understand that suffering is 'good for the soul'. It is the mechanism through which God can teach us many things about ourselves and about Himself. When we allow God to be God in our suffering, we grow and mature. When we fight and whine and try to maneuver our way out of it, we are in a sense rejecting God and His plan to mold us into the persons He wants us to be.
John V
Great post Bryan. This is a topic that I am passionate about though it be more on the format of physical suffering. I do agree though that we are to suffer for Christ and if we are not then we are not producing fruits for the kingdom. The concept of "suffering well" has always intrigued me...even to the point of writing a book on it.
This is an interesting topic... I'm curious though, about the direct connect between suffering and being within God's will/plan/service. I do agree that if we are walking closely with God, we are likely to experience suffering of some sort since the more we incarnate the Kingdom, the less we "fit" in this world. So - getting close to God equals suffering in this world.
However, I don't think the formula works as neatly the other direction. Suffering does not necessarily indicate we are close to God. For example, I have a strange (maybe morbid) fascination with Christian snake-handling churches. They are a strange department of the Christian subculture. They are generally mocked and ostracized for their religious beliefs and practices. They also tend to suffer poisonous snake bites (go figure). All of this falls under the chapter of "suffering for Christ" in their book.
Is it? Does their suffering have anything to do with Christ? I'll leave that up to you...
A less dramatic scenario might be the obnoxious Christian who holds to fundamentalist truths without listening to those who disagree with them. They define "faith" as "holding to the faith/truth" - and when others challenge them, they are claim persecution. Don't you sometimes want to say, "No, that's not suffering. That's just the inevitable result of being a jerk (in Jesus' name)"?
I think the harder question for us is maybe an interpretive one. What KIND of suffering are we experiencing? How can we discern the nature of our suffering in light of scripture, communal feedback and accountability, fruit... etc.
In other words, how are we able to discern if our suffering is "for Christ," or simply the result of our misguided (though well-intentioned) distortions of faith?
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