Category: Suffering

Shame and Suffering Avoidance

Posted on by Michael Wine

…for God gave us a spirit not of fear but of power and love and self-control. Therefore do not be ashamed of the testimony about our Lord, nor of me his prisoner, but share in suffering for the gospel by the power of God, who saved us and called us to a holy calling, not because of our works but because of his own purpose and grace, which he gave us in Christ Jesus before the ages began, and which now has been manifested through the appearing of our Savior Christ Jesus, who abolished death and brought life and immortality to light through the gospel, for which I was appointed a preacher and apostle and teacher, which is why I suffer as I do. But I am not ashamed, for I know whom I have believed, and I am convinced that he is able to guard until that day what has been entrusted to me. 2 Timothy 1:7-12

This section from 2 Timothy shows a link between being ashamed of our fellow Christians and the avoidance of suffering. When we see our brothers and sisters in Christ being mistreated and suffering public scorn, if they are suffering righteously, we should embrace them instead of being ashamed of them.

Those who are ashamed of the believer who is going through suffering merely for following Christ are really just avoiding suffering themselves. And yet it is not presented that way is it? They puff out their chests and pretend to be above those of whom they are ashamed.

Like Peter when he denied Christ, they boast that they have nothing to do with them. They never knew the man. The outside is a mask of confidence, but inside is a scared soul, ashamed of what he believes.

But if we really believe in Jesus, if we believe He is coming again and will set everything right, suffering for Him now is a glorious thing. Instead of feeling ashamed of our fellow Christians who are being shamed in the world, we should feel honored to stand with them and share their so called shame for Jesus’ sake.

Christians and Government

Posted on by Michael Wine

First of all, then, I urge that supplications, prayers, intercessions, and thanksgivings be made for all people, for kings and all who are in high positions, that we may lead a peaceful and quiet life, godly and dignified in every way. 1 Timothy 2:1-2

Paul, who wrote during the reign of Rome, who had his personal freedoms taken away by the government, says we should pray and give thanks for people who hold powerful offices.

The aim is to live a ‘godly and dignified’ life, while at the same time being at peace with those around us. And what is the means to get there? Prayer for those in authority over us.

Note that Paul is not saying that our godly lives depend on the government. We must strive to obey God no matter what the government says. However, our ability to live a peaceful life, while at the same time being godly and obedient to Christ, does depend on the government.

When our obedience to Christ causes the government to persecute us, what is to be the response? Is it to stop obeying Christ? No. Is it to rise up in violent revolution? No. It is to pray.

Praying for God to change hearts, for God to give wisdom and insight, for God to keep them healthy, to forgive their sin. In short, it is to ask God to bless them.

The blessings of God have a way of changing the heart of the person blessed. They may not always seem like blessings at first. God knows what is truly good for those in authority over us. And what is truly good for them is also truly good for us.

Therefore, the Christian response to government, any government, is to wish it well without compromising obedience to Christ. It is to ask God to bless it according to what God calls blessing, not according to what man calls blessing. To ask God to keep it healthy enough to recognize that Christianity is a good thing for the country it governs, and to allow it to flourish.

Then, when the prayer is done, the Christian must rise up and live a godly life, pleasing to God, regardless of the mandates of powerful men.

Be Salty

Posted on by Michael Wine

You are the salt of the earth. But if the salt loses its saltiness, how can it be made salty again? It is no longer good for anything, except to be thrown out and trampled under foot. Matthew 5:13

A Christian must be different from the world, as salt is different from the meat it preserves.

There must always be an element of pushback between the Church and the worldly culture of the day. For when the Church becomes so well blended in with the world, when we cannot tell the difference, the salt loses its saltiness.

Be different how? By loving our enemies; living in humility; fearing God more than man or death; risking the hatred of others to follow Christ; not compromising our consciences.

Christian Sanity Check

Posted on by Michael Wine

“Jesus, when he began his ministry, was about thirty years of age…” Luke 3:23

Imagine what it would have been like for Jesus to live those first 30 years. He spent them learning to live as a Jew – following the law of Moses perfectly. The one who possesses all knowledge, took on a feeble human brain and had to learn the law that he wrote about fifteen centuries earlier.

He would have helped Joseph with the carpentry. The one who invented trees took on weak human hands to slowly and imperfectly turn those trees into chairs.

He would have played with friends and his brothers. They didn’t have screens so all the kids probabally played outside as much as possible. The King of the universe spent 30 years growing up.

I wish the Bible had more to say about those years. Those years were needed to prepare him- God, all-powerful- for 3 years of ministry ending in a brutal death for all mankind.

Jesus probably lived a very average, dull, unremarkable life before his ministry. His ministry was hard, grueling work for 3 solid years. People followed him everywhere. He could hardly get a moment to sleep or be alone. He was always on the road. He spent himself for others. Then, to top it all off, he bore the wrath of God for all mankind, and died.

Christians are people who think Jesus is a good person to immitate.

At least we say that. But we still want a good life. Basically, we try to immitate Jesus, while filtering out all the suffering. Um… his whole life was suffering compared to how we live today.

We need a sanity check. Are we trying to ‘follow’ Jesus by filling ourselves up? Or, are we spending ourselves like him (however imperfectly) for others?

Do we really understand the mercy of God?

Posted on by Michael Wine

The steadfast love of the Lord never ceases; his mercies never come to an end; they are new every morning; great is your faithfulness. Lamentations 3:22-23

This is the prophet’s conclusion when considering all of the works of God. Immediately before this often quoted verse, the prophet Jeremiah lists some of God’s deeds:

  1. God has afflicted him with a rod of wrath (vs 1).
  2. Driven him into darkness with no light (vs 2).
  3. Been against him all day long (vs 3).
  4. God has wasted away Jeremiah’s skin and broken his bones (vs 4).
  5. Besieged him with bitterness and tribulation (vs 5).
  6. Has made him live like a dead man in the dark (vs 6).
  7. God has trapped Jeremiah in walls without escape (vs 7).
  8. Has ignored all Jeremiah’s prayers for help (vs 8).
  9. Made all his plans crooked (vs 9).
  10. God acts like a vicious wild animal toward the prophet (vs 10).
  11. God has torn Jeremiah into pieces (vs 11).
  12. God uses Jeremiah for target practice (vs 12-13).
  13. God has made the prophet forget what happiness means (vs 16-17).

The result of all of this is that Jeremiah despairs saying, “…so I say, “My endurance has perished; so has my hope from the Lord” (vs 18).

If anyone could question God’s love, his goodness, his faithfulness, it would be Jeremiah. And yet he does not. Instead he says:

But this I call to mind, and therefore I have hope: The steadfast love of the LORD never ceases; his mercies never come to an end; they are new every morning; great is your faithfulness. “The LORD is my portion,” says my soul, “therefore I will hope in him.” The LORD is good to those who wait for him, to the soul who seeks him. It is good that one should wait quietly for the salvation of the LORD. It is good for a man that he bear the yoke in his youth. Let him sit alone in silence when it is laid on him; let him put his mouth in the dust— there may yet be hope; let him give his cheek to the one who strikes, and let him be filled with insults. For the Lord will not cast off forever, but, though he cause grief, he will have compassion according to the abundance of his steadfast love; for he does not afflict from his heart or grieve the children of men. To crush underfoot all the prisoners of the earth, to deny a man justice in the presence of the Most High, to subvert a man in his lawsuit, the Lord does not approve. Who has spoken and it came to pass, unless the Lord has commanded it? Is it not from the mouth of the Most High that good and bad come? Why should a living man complain, a man, about the punishment of his sins? Let us test and examine our ways, and return to the LORD!

Lamentations 3:21-40

God’s mercy and faithfulness, wrath and justice, towards us, must never be divorced in our minds from our sin and rebellion against him. Notice how Jeremiah mentions man’s sin, and how it leaves him no excuse or defense.

“Why should a living man complain, a man, about the punishment of his sins?“

When we forget the magnitude of the offense we have given to God with our wicked ways, we cheapen his mercy, and run the risk of not accepting it from his hand. When that happens we must take his wrath. God will give one thing or another. He will give either his great wrath because of our sin, or he will give his great mercy and grace to cover our sin and accept us when we return to him.

The mercy of God is not a free pass. It is not sparkly fairy dust sprinkled on your life to make your dreams come true. It is the only thing that will keep you safe from the mighty wave of God’s wrath. Let us not complain when that wrath is manifested in our world.

Earthquakes, plagues, buildings falling, fires eating away homes and lives, panic and riots and hate – these are all results of our sin, and God’s wrath towards that sin. They are signs that we must return to God, and receive the mercy He freely offers to us in the cross of his Son Jesus.

The Unmatched Jesus!

Posted on by Michael Wine

Far above the thin skies, and down below near the dark earth, God is. He is here, in the pain, in the struggle, in the sweat. He smells the sick and the dying. And he is celebrating in heaven with the countless angels over the sinners who are coming to him in repentance every day.

He is with us, as we worry about getting sick, getting others sick, dying and watching others die. And he cares about our suffering.

He is above and outside us, busy running the entire universe.

God is sorrowful with us.

God is, fundamentally, wondrously, happy. He needs not our weakly worded belief in him to make him so. As if he was not the source of life in the universe. As if our explicitly worded or implicitly lived denial of Him caused him one shred of anxiety. No, He is imperviously joyful. He delights to save his own. He controls the stars in their orbits through space with a divine, holy, glorious belly laugh.

He is ever present with all that he is in every place where he is – which is everywhere. He is one hundred percent focused with all his mental faculties on the ant crawling on the sidewalk outside, on the nuclear power – impossible heat generator – of the sun, on you – little you, and me.

This God we refuse, by rebellion or neglect, to think about, pray to, read about, love, rejoice in, worship; this God inflates and deflates our lungs out of pure, wondrous, amazing, and terrifying love.

This God is the one who became a man. He was beaten and whipped until his blood spilled. He slipped on it as he stood and had a thick wooden and splintered cross laid on the ripped flesh of his back. Then, he walked. He walked through a city and up a hill, and on that hill, they hung him up, nailing him to his tree. And there he died, to take the sin from our backs.

And you know what he was thinking about while this was happening? He was thinking about joy. All he could see was the ever-approaching glorious salvation that he was going to accomplish for the ones he loved. Oh, Jesus! He went to the agony of death to win his bride, out of pure, joyous, love. And now he lives and enlivens our hard hearts, risen and conquering, ruling and saving his people.

Is there another God like my Jesus? Did Allah die to save his own? Can the countless gods of Hinduism compare to His singular excellence? Do our earthly idols of money, fame, power, beauty, and self-fulfillment appear as anything more than flecks of dust in the brilliance of His glory? No.

Jesus, the Savior, the Messiah, the Son of Man, the Son of God: Praise him for his wonderous love, life, joy and grace! Lift him on high and worship him! He alone is worthy of praise. He alone is worthy of glory, of all things.

Amen

The Role Of Faith In Suffering

Posted on by Michael Wine

What place does faith have when it comes to our regular experience of suffering in this life? Should it have a place?

It would be good to clarify more specifically some details surrounding this topic. What is faith? Faith in what?

A number of people (such as the atheist Sam Harris in Letter to a Christian Nation) have said that faith in a good God like the God of the Bible is at best an ignorant response to suffering in the world. At worst, it is immoral and deluded.

Others, like myself and others I know and have talked to, say that their faith in God is the only thing that allows them to get through the suffering and pain they are facing in life.

But what is faith? In our culture, to be called “a person of faith” implies that one practices some sort of religion and adheres to a set of practices and holds to certain doctrines as truth. So, faith can often be equated in the mind with religion.

However, while this is true, there is still an even more basic way to think about faith. The Merriam-Webster has a definition of faith that says it is “something that is believed especially with strong conviction.”

In other words, any time a person believes something with a strong conviction, he is demonstrating faith.

Faith in what? Does it matter what you are convinced of?

Some people are convinced that gravity is a constant force that will continue to ensure that we do not fly off into space as it has always done (I happen to be one of those people). Some people believe that God made everything out of nothing (I am in this camp too). Some people are adamant that all life (and the whole universe) were ultimately born out of a massive random explosion.

These are all examples of things that people can have faith in.

A lot of people will note an apparent distinction between faith and science. These people tend to believe that science is far more valid than faith when it comes to knowing truth. However, there is an assumption here. The scientific method, wondrous as it is, only works because our world has acted in a consistent way thus far. This means that by observing the way things have always been, we can say that that is the way they will continue because they have never changed.

For example, the earth will continue to orbit the sun because it has always done this. The conviction here is that things will continue the way they have always been. According to our definition above, that is faith.

Without faith in the simple idea that tomorrow will come, it would be impossible to live. How would we plan for tomorrow? How would we cope with the emotional turmoil that life might end with each night? This kind of faith is anything but “blind.” It is a faith that is grounded in experience and tested by observations. This kind of faith is something that each of us uses every day from driving our cars to eating our food to falling asleep.

The function that this faith serves is to enable us to keep living, to keep pushing, and to keep going on with the tasks of life. It is based on the idea that there is an order to the world that is predictable and that can be trusted (trust is an idea that is closely associated with faith).

What is suffering? It is a disruption to that order. Or, it is the introduction of chaos into our orderly lives. And the chaos is often unimaginable and great and lasts for years. Even something as simple as the stomach flu disrupts the order of our lives and in some way proves that our faith in the predictability of tomorrow was dead wrong.

In some other cases, suffering can be so great, that it shakes you to the very core of who you are. It is in these cases where we are presented with two choices. We can either try to find the meaning or the order in this sea of chaos that has emerged in our life, or we can give up and surrender to the waves that crash and roll over us. We can say that life is meaningless and that suffering is therefore explainable as one other meaningless and random occurrence of life.

Many of us, when faced with an enormous loss, experience a sense of denial. This means that we refuse to admit to ourselves that anything has changed. Intellectually, yes, we know it has changed. But there is a deep part of us that refuses to live life as if anything is all that different. And we carry on with our jobs and tasks and entertainments, desperately trying to hold on to the old order of things. This is a kind of faith. It is a faith in our fantasy of the past. Maybe if we pretend hard enough, it will be real. I am all too familiar with this form of faith.

Others of us cope with the pain by turning to distractions. Things like alcohol, excessive TV, video games, drugs, and other addictions consume our time and dull our senses. Again this is a kind of faith. We believe that these behaviors will help us to forget about the chaos that now so defines our life. Forgetting the chaos brings back a sense of order, though temporary.

I am a Christian. I believe that God is in control of everything that happens in my life and in the universe. At least I would say that I believe that. When I am living consistently with that faith, it gives me a response to the chaos of suffering that surpasses any other I know of. It allows me to see clearly that the chaos in my life is a small part of a grander story. I know that He is in control of my suffering and is using it for his good purposes.

This faith does not actually make the chaos in my life go away. But it does do something more profound. It takes the chaos in life, and uses it as an instrument that will bring about greater order and greater meaning. And here is the key: the good that God brings as a result of the suffering, is better than it could have been if the suffering never happened.

Since God is all powerful and can do anything and also knows everything (past present and future), this includes any and all forms of suffering from cancer, to divorce, to hurricanes, to mass shootings. All of these things, as horrible as they are, are used by God to bring about something greater.

Just like a master artist will use the darker shades to highlight and emphasize and bring meaning to the painting, so God uses the darker shades of my suffering to bring even more meaning to life.

In summary, faith is something we all do each day. When it comes to suffering, faith is not only important, it is automatic. In fact, how a person behaves in the face of suffering shows us what they are placing their faith in. What we place our faith in becomes very important, because it determines how we live.