Tag Archives: suffering
What Happens When We Surrender?
It is a great moment when a soul surrenders to Christ. But the road does not suddenly become all sweet and nice. The fact is God begins to work in us now if we don’t resist Him. Yes, we can resist Him even after we give ourselves to Him. Because our free will is always there. God does not bring us into bondage. After we see how Christ suffered for us, we are now called into the fellowship of His sufferings. Christ suffered pain, rejection, humiliation, sorrow, and separation. We are called to suffer and experience His sufferings. It may not be appealing but this is the way we become like Him. The disciples counted it worthy to suffer for Him. Now our lives are not our own. We should not resist the dealings of God in our lives. Nothing happens to a Christian except what God allows. All things including persecutions and trials are for our good. We have to co-operate with Him to accomplish His will in our lives. The scars of Christ have to be planted in our lives. The Apostle Paul said, “From now on let no one trouble me, for I bear in my body the marks of the Lord Jesus.” These were not just physical marks but the marks of the sufferings that Christ suffered. We can know him only by sharing in His sufferings. It is not imagining how He suffered for us but in reality experiencing how Christ suffered for us. Christ died on a cross and He gives us all a cross to pick up and follow Him. It is a path of pain but the joy of knowing this Person far exceeds all the pain that we might suffer. Therefore the Apostle James says, “Count it all joy…” When hardships and trials come our way we count it all joy. It may not be joyful when we are going through it but we know God will fashion us in the image of His Son as we come out of it by His grace.
Suffering in The Light of Eternity
When we talk about suffering, the words of Paul the Apostle comes to mind where he wrote, “The sufferings of our present time are not worth compared to the glory that shall be revealed in us.” Jesus endured the cross because of the joy that was set before Him. There is a reason behind the things we go through and though we may not always understand everything at that moment, the workings of God in our life are made clear as we come out of it. “All things work together for good.” That is what the saints have been believing all throughout the centuries. The Apostles called themselves, ‘bond servants of Christ.’ They were willing to endure everything for the Master’s sake. Their life was no longer theirs. It belonged to Another. Christ gave His life and everthing for us, we ought to give and endure everything for Him. If we see our sufferings in the context of our present earthly life, they may seem to be absolutely unjust and unfair. But in the context of eternity, we know that everything including suffering is for the glory of God and for our highest good. When he was struck and smitten, Job fell on his knees and blessed God. Jesus said, “In the world you will have tribulations but be of good cheer I have overcome the world.” And we know that ‘many are the afflictions of the righteous.’ But in the light of eternity we can rejoice for we have been counted worthy to suffer for His name’s sake.