The Christian Response to Suffering, Part Two

Acts 21:27-36
P. G. Mathew | Sunday, October 24, 1999
Copyright © 1999, P. G. Mathew

We live next door to Napa Valley, home to many vineyards and wineries. Grapes are grown there for the purpose of being crushed, so that their juice can be made into the world-class wines for which this region is famous.

Great pressure must be applied to grapes in the process of making wine. In the same way, great pressure is sometimes put on Christians for various reasons. But unlike the grapes that are entirely crushed and destroyed in the winemaking process, Christians are afflicted but not destroyed. So says Paul in 2 Corinthians 4:8-9: “We are hard pressed on every side, but not crushed; perplexed, but not in despair; persecuted, but not abandoned; struck down, but not destroyed.”

An authentic Christian is indestructible. He is a miracle, a new creation, who is vitally linked and united with Jesus Christ, the Lord of the universe and the Lord of the church. In this study we want to examine the reality of trouble and suffering in the Christian life and how we can deal with it.

Pressures of the Christian Life

There are many forces in the world that exert pressure on authentic Christians. The government, the Supreme Court, and the media all want to press hard the people of God, especially in this country. Neighbors, fellow workers, professors, teachers, members of our own family, and the devil may all, at some time or another, want to press hard the people of God. All of these do so in the hope of destroying the people and the work of God in this world.

God may allow his people to be pressed hard and to suffer from all these forces. Why? To demonstrate the truth that we can be hard pressed but not crushed. An authentic Christian is indestructible because the life of God has been placed in the soul of that person.

In today’s world there is an artificial, synthetic evangelism that says, “Receive Jesus Christ as your Savior and you will be happy, healthy, and wealthy. You will never experience troubles or pressure. You will be famous and powerful. You will marry the handsome husbands or beautiful wives of your dreams.”

Such an understanding of Christianity is false, and anyone who preaches such nonsense is fraudulent. It is true that if you receive Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior, you will be saved forever and experience maximum spiritual freedom, but this freedom is not necessarily related to health and wealth. Read what the late professor John Gerstner wrote about Christian freedom in his commentary on chapter 20 of the Westminster Confession of Faith. He says that we will experience

(a) freedom from the guilt of sin–but not from the power of sin; (b) freedom from the wrath of God–but not from the chastening of God; (c) freedom from the curse of the law–but not from the effects of the law; (d) freedom from the present evil world–but not from all its allurements; (e) freedom from bondage to Satan–but not from his ability to hinder and hurt; (f) freedom from the dominion of sin–but not from its rebellions; (g) freedom from the evil of afflictions–but not from the afflictions themselves; (h) freedom from the sting of death–but not from death itself; (i) freedom from the victory of the grave–but not from the grave; and (j) freedom from everlasting damnation–but not from temporal discipline.” (John H. Gerstner, Douglas F. Kelly, and Philip Rollinson, A Guide–The Westminster Confession of Faith–Commentary, [Signal Mountain, Tennessee: Summertown Texts, 1992], 96).

I would add this: “You will experience freedom from the ceremonial laws but not freedom from God’s moral laws; you will experience freedom to love God; freedom to obey his moral laws with delight; and freedom to come to God’s presence with confidence and enjoy his fellowship, now and forever.”

That is what Christian freedom is, but notice, there is no guarantee you will be free from troubles. In fact, true Christians have greater troubles than unbelievers. But take heart: if you are not authentic, you will be crushed, but an authentic Christian is indestructible–hard pressed but not crushed.

Persecutions and troubles are part of the normal Christian life. If you receive Jesus Christ as your Savior and Lord, the world will hate you, persecute you, mock you, and speak all manner of evil against you. This is especially true today in the western world and in this country, the United States of America. If you are a true Christian who believes in the Bible, you are the most hated of all people because you stand for God and his absolute truth. You are perceived by unbelievers as a threat to the reigning moral relativism of the world, as one who is bigoted, intolerant, and extremist. As time goes on, non-Christians will see you as a problem, especially as you speak against sin. They will want to solve this problem by getting rid of you in every way they possibly can. This is what happened to Jesus, and there is no reason to think it will not happen to us as well.

If you are interested in a trouble free life in this world, I would counsel that you should not become a Christian. Christianity spells trouble for those who believe in it. However, it also gives all those freedoms I outlined.

Jesus Promises Suffering

Jesus Christ promised that his disciples would suffer. Most of us do not want to hear that because we are still interested in the artificial, synthetic, superficial gospel. No wonder when we have trouble, we are crushed. We are like Mrs. Job, who said, “Why don’t you curse God and die?”

But Jesus calls us to suffer with him. In Luke 9:23-24 we read, “If anyone would come after me, he must deny himself and take up his cross daily and follow me. For whoever wants to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for me will save it.” In other words, if you want to believe in Christ, you must be prepared to die.

Jesus calls us to lose our lives in this world. In Matthew 10:17-18 Jesus said, “Be on your guard against men; they will hand you over to the local councils and flog you in their synagogues. On my account you will be brought before governors and kings as witnesses to them and to the Gentiles.” And in Matthew 10:28 he said, “So do not be afraid of them. . . .” “Do not be afraid,” Jesus was saying. “Do not be afraid when they arrest you, flog you and try to kill you. Know that you are indestructible, saved by the mighty Spirit of God. You are a mighty miracle, kept by the Lord Jesus Christ himself, and nothing in all the world shall separate you from the love of God.”

In Matthew 24:9, Jesus said, “Then you will be handed over to be persecuted and put to death.” Christian, did you hear that? Preacher, did you preach that? We don’t want to hear such things, do we? We want to pick and choose, not go through the whole Bible.

We want the Christianity of the promise box. Have you seen promise boxes? Nice verses taken out of context are put on cards in a box and sold. Every day you are supposed to take out a card with a verse on it, and that is your verse for the day. But suppose you have an accident that day or go to the doctor and hear the news, “You have serious cancer.” You won’t know how to handle these things if your only resource is the promise you picked up, which may have been nice, but did not address the issue of Christian suffering.

This is our problem today. We don’t want the whole Bible; we only want a small, edited, “nice” version of God’s revelation.

Have you ever found these promises in your promise box? In Matthew 24:9 Jesus promised, “Then you will be handed over to be persecuted and put to death, and you will be hated by all nations because of me.” And in Luke 21:12-13 he said, “But before all this, they will lay hands on you and persecute you. They will deliver you to synagogues and prisons, and you will be brought before kings and governors, and all on account my name. This will result in your being witnesses to them.” Certainly, these are promises of God also, aren’t they?

Even promises of suffering have something good in them. In Luke 21:13 Jesus said that all these persecutions will result in one wonderful thing: While you are in chains, while you are being flogged, while you are being stoned, you will be able to witness about the gospel of Jesus Christ and the indestructibility of the miraculous new life he gives to those who trust in him.

We find another promise in John 16:2, where Jesus says, “They will put you out of the synagogue: in fact, a time is coming when anyone who kills you will think he is offering a service to God.” In other words, people will think they are worshiping God when they kill us. We will be like the sheep and oxen who were sacrificed during the temple worship.

That is exactly what Saul of Tarsus did. Filled with zeal for God (although not according to knowledge, as he said later on), he dragged out and arrested men and women, punishing some and murdering others. Saul forced many Christians to blaspheme, to speak against Jesus Christ. We read about this in Acts 8:3, 22:4, 26:10, 1 Timothy 1 and other places.

Saul confesses that he was a violent person, but at the time he thought he was doing these things as a service to God. Saul did his best to destroy Christians, but, as we said before, they are indestructible. “I will build my church,” Jesus said, “and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it.”

After his resurrection, the Lord Jesus Christ met with Peter and restored him, as we read in John 21. Peter had been afraid to die and so he denied Jesus Christ three times. But now Jesus restored him and gave him this promise: “When you are old you will stretch out your hands, and someone else will dress you and lead you where you do not want to go.” In other words, Jesus was saying, “Peter, you are going to be killed on my behalf, and you are going to glorify me through that martyrdom.” This promise was fulfilled later, as we read in the history of the church.

If you don’t want to believe in a Christianity with suffering, don’t become a Christian. In Acts 9 we read that Jesus Christ himself supernaturally intervened in the life of Saul of Tarsus when he was on his way to Damascus to drag out Christian men and women and bring them to Jerusalem to be punished. Jesus arrested Paul, and then he commissioned a disciple from Damascus to tell Paul something. What was it? “I will show him how much he must suffer for my name.” Jesus himself promised that Paul must suffer for the name of Christ. It was divine necessity.

This is the kind of Christianity Paul was called to and this is the kind of Christianity he taught. In Acts 14:22 he told the disciples of Lystra, Derbe and Antioch, “We must go through many hardships to enter the kingdom of God.” Is this what the preacher told you when you heard the gospel?

In 2 Timothy 3:12 we read, “Everyone who wants to live a godly life in Christ Jesus will be persecuted.” If you are an authentic Christian, you will experience persecution, as we do even in this country today. You will be marked by everyone, especially if you are Bible-believing.

Examples of Suffering from Acts

We find many incidents of suffering recorded in the book of Acts. In Acts 4:1-3 we read that Peter and John were seized by the Jewish leaders and put in jail. The apostles had been preaching the gospel and God gave a great revival. Finally the Jewish leaders became very envious, and in verse 3 we read, “They seized Peter and John, and because it was evening, they put them in jail until the next day.”

In Acts 5:17-18 we read, “Then the high priest and all his associates, who were members of the party of the Sadducees, were filled with jealousy. They arrested the apostles and put them in the public jail.” In divine sovereignty God sent an angel and delivered the apostles, and they went back to preaching in the temple courts. They were arrested again, and in Acts 5:40-41 we learn that these apostles appeared before the Sanhedrin, who ordered them to be flogged. In verse 41 we read that they left the Sanhedrin rejoicing because they had been counted worthy by God to suffer for his name. They were not disappointed; rather, they were glad.

I am not saying that we should look for troubles, but I am saying that suffering is God’s way, God’s order, God’s ordination. It is part of the gospel we must preach, and that is why we must also preach about baptism in the Holy Spirit, because when we are baptized with the Holy Spirit, we can rejoice in the midst of suffering. Oh, this is not some kind of human joy. It is the joy of God filling your heart. The apostles understood and preached the gospel correctly; thus, they could rejoice in the midst of sufferings.

In Acts 6:7 we meet a young man named Stephen who was full of the Holy Ghost and full of faith. After Stephen preached the gospel to the Sanhedrin, they dragged him out, stoned him, and killed him. There was no angelic intervention to prevent Stephen’s death, and in God’s sweet sovereignty God ordained that he be killed. But Stephen, like us, was a child of God and therefore indestructible. Nothing in all the world could separate him from the love and life of God. We have great confidence that Stephen is alive even now in the presence of the Lord he loves.

When we are experiencing troubles, afflictions, and problems, we would like an angel to come and deliver us. In God’s sovereignty sometimes it happens, but sometimes it does not.

In Acts 12 we read about persecution coming to both the apostles James and Peter. James and his brother John were those who wanted to sit at the right and the left of Jesus Christ when he comes back again in his great power and glory. Around 44 A.D. King Herod Agrippa I had James killed by the sword. No angel showed up to deliver him, and his blood was spilled in Jerusalem. But James was indestructible, hard pressed but not crushed. God gave him strength to be killed without recanting his faith in Jesus Christ, and we have confidence he is now in the presence of God.

In verse 5 we read that King Herod Agrippa I also arrested Peter. He was put in prison awaiting execution when an angel helped him escape the night before he was scheduled to die. This was a temporary stay, and later on Peter did die the way Jesus predicted in John 21. But let me tell you, Peter, like James, was indestructible and he, too, is enjoying the presence of God.

If we are Christians, we also are indestructible. Oh, yes, throughout the history of the church, people have tried to destroy Christians. They have burned some people at the stake and thrown others to wild beasts. But the church of Jesus Christ cannot be destroyed. Why? Because it is built by Christ himself. No one can destroy us unless he is able to destroy Jesus Christ, the Lord of the church and the Lord of the universe. Think about that.

Paul Was Called to Suffer

When Paul was converted, God spoke to him through Ananias, saying, “You must suffer many things for my name.” Paul understood this promise, preached it, and experienced it throughout his life as an apostle.

In Acts 14 we read that Paul preached the gospel in southern Galatia. Stirred up by the enmity of the Jews, the people of Lystra stoned Paul, dragged him outside the city, and left him for dead. No angel came and delivered him from this treatment, but God raised him up and he continued to preach the gospel.

In Acts 16 we read that God guided Paul through a vision to go to Europe and preach the gospel. When he arrived in Macedonia, he began to preach the gospel in Philippi. One day he cast out demons from a demonized girl who told fortunes. For that reason the magistrates stripped him naked, flogged him, beat him, and thrust him into prison, as we read in verse 22. No angel intervened to spare Paul from this pain.

In Acts 20:23-24 Paul met in Miletus with the elders of Ephesus and told them, “In every city the Holy Spirit warns me that prison and hardships are facing me.” In Caesarea the prophet Agabus came and prophesied same thing, that Paul would be arrested and handed over to the Gentiles. Paul said, “That’s all right. I am not only ready to suffer but ready to die for Jesus’ sake.”

Paul was an authentic Christian who understood the real gospel, the whole gospel, including the point about suffering. Paul had figured all this in when he became a Christian. Paul did not become a Christian to get rich or powerful or healthy or live a long life in this world. In fact, he probably aged more quickly because of the afflictions he endured in his body. In 2 Corinthians 4:16 we read, “Though outwardly we are wasting away. . .” Paul took one look at himself and could see the decay already. But he also saw that his inward man was being renewed day by day.

Paul was justified by grace through faith, forgiven of all his sins, and given eternal life. He knew he was indestructible because of his union with Christ, which is the mother of all doctrines. Jesus told us, “I am the vine, you are the branches.” Because we are in Christ, it is impossible for Christians to be destroyed. Paul considered these things by faith and could suffer gladly for Christ’s name. He understood he was a new creation, a miracle of God.

Paul Arrives in Jerusalem

Paul arrived in Jerusalem and went to the temple, where some unbelieving Jews from the Diaspora spotted him in the court of women. They had tried to kill him before, as we read in Acts 20:3 and Acts 20:19. These Asian Jews hated Paul because he was preaching that salvation is by grace through faith in Jesus Christ for Jews as well as for Gentiles.

These Jews had come to Jerusalem for the Feast of Pentecost, and when they saw Paul, they stirred up the whole crowd against him. They seized him, as Agabus and others had predicted, and began to beat him, trying to kill him. They thrust him outside the temple into the court of the Gentiles, and closed the doors of the temple to him. What were they telling Paul by these actions? “No more, Paul. We didn’t put up with your Messiah, Jesus Christ, and we are not going to put up with you either. Out with you!”

Those who had rejected their own Messiah, Jesus Christ, now refused to accept his apostle and his message of salvation. They did not know that soon, in 70 A.D., the temple would be destroyed, as prophesied by Jesus himself in Luke 21:6. All they knew is that they did not want to hear the gospel.

The Charges Against Paul

The Asian Jews brought Paul before the Sanhedrin and leveled charges against him. The first charge was the same as what they had leveled against Jesus Christ and Stephen: “He spoke against this people and this temple and the law of Moses. He is an enemy of God!”

Oh, this was a standard charge, and it was also a lie. The truth is, Paul did not preach against any of these things. He preached to all people everywhere that salvation is by grace through faith in Jesus Christ alone, for the Jews first and also to the Gentiles, but he never opposed the Jewish people expressing their cultural heritage. In fact, when he was among Jews, he behaved like a Jew; when he was among Gentiles, he lived like a Gentile, and he preached the gospel to both groups.

The Asian Jews also charged that Paul had defiled the temple by bringing a Gentile, Trophimus, into the court of the women. It was a capital offense for a Gentile to move from the court of the Gentiles to the court of women in the temple. To bring a Gentile into the temple area was the same as abetting and participating in a heinous and serious crime against Jewish law. In fact, there were notices written in Latin and Greek which were posted visibly throughout the temple area. They read like this: “No foreigner may enter within the barricade which surrounds the temple and the enclosure. Anyone who is caught doing so will have himself to blame for his ensuing death.” Two such inscriptions have been discovered–one in 1871 and another in 1935.

A Riot Ensues

Trophimus had accompanied Paul from Ephesus, bringing an offering from the church there, but he had not entered the temple. The truth was, Trophimus went around with Paul in the city but never came into the temple court with him. The Jews’ charges were lies. But the Jews seized Paul, threw him out into the court of the Gentiles, and began to beat him severely in an attempt to kill him.

The Roman tribune, Claudius Lysias, who was at the Fortress of Antonia located on the northwest part of the temple, heard the disturbance and came to stop it. With two hundred soldiers, the Roman tribune raced down the two flights of stairs that connected the fortress to the court of the Gentiles to rescue Paul from death.

Claudius Lysias thought Paul might have been the false prophet who, three years before, came from Egypt to Jerusalem, proclaimed himself as the Messiah, and gathered a number of followers who were called Sicarii. These rebels would mingle with people and kill them with their knives. This false prophet took his followers–thirty thousand according to Josephus and four thousand according to Luke–first to the wilderness and then to the Mount of Olives. (PGM) From the Mount of Olives they could see the temple. This false prophet told his followers, “I am the new Joshua. When I give a command, the walls will collapse, and we will be able to go in, defeat the Romans, and take the city.”

The Roman governor at that time was Felix. Before this band of rebels had time to carry out their plan, Felix acted, killing some, scattering others, and taking some captive. The Egyptian disappeared. Now the Roman tribune, Claudius Lysias, thought that Paul might be this Egyptian. That was what he was thinking as he rushed from the Fortress of Antonia to the court of the Gentiles.

Paul Is Arrested

The Roman commander arrested Paul and had him bound with two heavy chains. He brought him to the barracks where he tried to elicit information from Paul by torture. The soldiers stretched Paul out, stripped him naked, and tied him to a post. Then they got ready to scourge him with a Roman flagellum, which is a whip made of leather thongs weighted with rough pieces of metal or bone attached to a stout wooden handle. Scourging administered to the raw flesh generally either killed the person or crippled him for life. Jesus Christ was scourged, and that is why he was incapable of carrying the beam of the cross.

Outside the Jewish people were shouting, “Kill him! Rid the earth of him! He is not fit to live!” This was the same thing they shouted about Jesus Christ. I assure you, no servant is above his master. And Jesus himself told his disciples, in essence, “Take up the cross daily, deny yourself, and follow me to death.” We are called to share in the sufferings of Christ.

Just before they were about to begin scourging him, Paul spoke up. He asked the Romans, “Is it legal for you to flog a Roman citizen who hasn’t even been found guilty?” (Acts 22:25). And in verse 29 we read, “Those who were about to question him withdrew immediately. The commander himself was alarmed when he realized that he had put Paul, a Roman citizen, in chains.”

Still, the crowd shouted, “Get rid of him!” So in Acts 23:2 we read that Paul was brought before the Sanhedrin, led at that time by the high priest Ananias, a very cruel man. In verse 2 we read, “Ananias ordered those standing near Paul to strike him on the mouth,” just as they had done to Paul’s master, Jesus Christ.

From this time on Paul was an ambassador of Jesus Christ in chains. He called himself a prisoner of Christ and spent much of his remaining years on earth in different prisons, from where he wrote several epistles, including Ephesians, Colossians, Philippians, Philemon, and 1 and 2 Timothy.

Hard Pressed But Not Crushed

Paul was hard pressed but not crushed because he was an authentic Christian. What about you? What type of Christianity do you want? Westernized Christianity? Comfortable Christianity? Capitalistic Christianity? Christianity in a bubble? Let me assure you, if you have truly been born of God and trust in Jesus Christ, then suffering will not move you. You will be able to say with Paul, “We rejoice in tribulations also.”

May God help us to appreciate and trust in the real gospel! Jesus Christ, the head of the church, is both Lord and Savior, and he promises to be with us, no matter what happens to us. Paul wrote to the Philippian church, “I can do all things through him who strengtheneth me,” and in 2 Timothy 4:16-17 he told Timothy, “At my first defense, no one came to my support, but everyone deserted me. May it not be held against them. But the Lord stood at my side and gave me strength. . . .”

Yes, we shall suffer, but we shall also receive power when the Holy Ghost comes upon us and we shall be Christ’s witnesses before the world. The Holy Spirit will pour into the innermost parts of our being the rule and strength of God, and we will be able to stand and live and die for the Lord.

This is authentic Christianity. A Christian is indestructible because he is a miraculous new creation of God. You may not want to believe that, but it is what the Bible says. Let us, then, say with Paul, that we may be struck down, but not destroyed; persecuted, but not forsaken; perplexed, but not in despair; beaten, but not killed; sorrowful, yet always rejoicing; poor, yet making many rich; having nothing, yet possessing everything. And may we always keep in mind what Paul told us in Romans 8:37-39, “No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us . . . . For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present or the future or any powers, neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord.”

Witnessing Results from Suffering

Paul’s suffering resulted in further witnessing opportunities. In Luke 21:13 Jesus told his disciples, “This will result in your being witnesses to them.” Persecution, suffering, and afflictions give us opportunities to witness.

That is exactly what happened in the life of Paul. As I said earlier, when Paul was traveling to Jerusalem, he was warned all along that bonds and afflictions awaited him there. What was Paul’s reaction? No doubt he told his fellow believers, “That’s all right. I am not afraid and I am ready to die for the sake of my Lord Jesus Christ.” When Paul arrived in Jerusalem, some Jews stirred up trouble against him and a riot ensued. As a result, Paul was able to declare the gospel to the mob, as we read in Acts 21:27 and following.

In Acts 22:30 we read, “The next day, since the commander wanted to find out exactly why Paul was being accused by the Jews, he released him and ordered the chief priests and all the Sanhedrin to assemble. Then he brought Paul and had him stand before them.” Here we see that Paul was able to bear witness to the entire Sanhedrin, the body of Jewish leaders who had rejected this message from Jesus, from the apostles, and from Stephen. Through the apostle Paul, God, in his great mercy, was presenting the gospel one more time to the Sanhedrin. This was a different Sanhedrin than that of Jesus’ day. The high priest was a cruel, brutal fellow by name Ananias.

In Acts 24 we see Paul brought before the governor, Felix, before whom he spoke about Christ. In Acts 25 he bore witness to the Roman governor, Festus, and in the same chapter he bears witness before Herod Agrippa II, the son of the man who had the apostle James murdered. In Acts 28 we find Paul bearing witness to the Jews in Rome.

In 2 Timothy 4 we read that Paul bore witness to Jesus Christ before Caesar. He makes an interesting statement in verse 16: “In my first defense, no one came to my support, but everybody deserted me.” It is interesting to think that the church in Jerusalem probably did not help Paul during this time, but it is probably true because we find no references to James and the elders of the church ever coming to help Paul. I have noticed this in my own life as well. In the hour of our trouble, we think someone will stand with us, but we shouldn’t count on it. Our children may not be there nor those who labored with us. We cannot count on anyone but in Jesus Christ alone. He will never leave us nor forsake us–our Lord Jesus Christ.

Notice, then, Paul’s arrest, persecution, and suffering resulted in the proclamation of the gospel to many people.

Paul’s Sufferings

There are several lists, especially in 2 Corinthians, of the sufferings the apostle Paul encountered as he preached the gospel of Jesus Christ. We find these sufferings listed in 2 Corinthians 4:7-9; 2 Corinthians 6:9,10; 2 Corinthians 11:23-27; and 2 Corinthians 12:7-10. As we read some of them, may we examine ourselves to see whether we have authentic faith, faith that is hard pressed but not crushed.

I am speaking about authentic Christians, not those who simply claim to be Christians. Do you remember what Jesus Christ said? “Many will say, ‘Lord, Lord,’ on that day. . . .” These people claimed to be Christians when they were not. Jesus said they would be in for a sad surprise on the day of the Lord. Remember the ten virgins? They all probably claimed they were Christians, but their claims were untrue. They also found out on the last day, when it was too late.

I hope and pray that you will examine yourselves now and see whether you have authentic faith. See whether you are born of God–whether you have experienced the miracle of the Spirit of the living God making you a new creation. See whether the life of God is in your soul, and whether the Spirit of the living God dwells in you.

In 2 Corinthians 11:23-28 we read of the sufferings of Paul. As you read this, think about whether you have ever experienced suffering like this. Paul writes,

Are they servants of Christ? (I am out of my mind to talk like this.) I am more. I have worked much harder, been in prison more frequently, been flogged more severely, and been exposed to death again and again. Five times I received from the Jews the forty lashes minus one. Three times I was beaten with rods, once I was stoned., three times I was shipwrecked, I spent a night and a day in the open sea, I have been constantly on the move. I have been in danger from rivers, in danger from bandits, in danger from my own countrymen, in danger from Gentiles; in danger in the city, in danger in the country, in danger at sea; and in danger from false brothers. I have labored and toiled and have often gone without sleep; I have known hunger and thirst and have often gone without food; I have been cold and naked. Besides everything else, I face daily the pressure of my concern for all the churches.

In 2 Corinthians 12:7-10 we find another mention of Paul’s sufferings:

To keep me from becoming conceited because of these surpassingly great revelations, there was given me a thorn in my flesh, a messenger of Satan to torment me. Three times I pleaded with the Lord to take it away from me. But he said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.” Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ’s power may rest on me. This is why, for Christ’s sake, I delight in weaknesses, in insults, in hardships, in persecutions, in difficulties. For when I am weak, then I am strong.

What was Paul’s reaction to his sufferings, weaknesses, insults, hardships, persecutions and difficulties? He delights in them, he exults in them, he boasts in them. He knows that they will ensure his utter weakness, which is a precondition for God to fill him with his strength and power so that he could praise God and thank God, so that he would not say, “I did it,” but “He did it.” This is real Christianity.

How to Deal with Suffering

Let us, then, look at some principles that Paul gives us in his epistles that will tell us how to deal with sufferings, persecutions, hardships, and difficulties. We must do so even if we are not suffering now, because, as we said earlier, we will experience suffering sometime in our Christian life. Through many difficulties we must enter into the kingdom of God. That is God’s order.

God’s power is made perfect in weakness. We just read in 2 Corinthians 12:9 God’s promise, “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.” We must understand that God gives grace to the humble, and sufferings, persecutions, and thorns in the flesh are designed to bring us to humility. Only when you are humble will you look to God. And when you do, God’s favor, God’s strength, God’s ability will be pumped into you exceedingly abundantly above all that you can ask or imagine.
Remember when Jesus fed the multitudes? There were always leftovers. God’s provision for us is always more than adequate. So when God tells us, “My grace is sufficient. My power is sufficient,” we can believe it. God gives us grace that is greater than all our troubles.

When you encounter difficulties, before you go to your mother or father or uncle or anyone else, why don’t you go to God? Go into your closet and cry out to God, “O God, pour out your mercy upon me! Pour out your grace upon me! Pour out your power upon me! Spirit of the living God, come upon me afresh and give me strength!” God does hear our prayers and he will give us grace. Even before you go to your doctor, why don’t you go to God? We have a habit of trusting in doctors and insurance rather than going to God. Oh, what a tragedy that is! When you are sick, why don’t you cry out to God? You may not have time for three days of fasting and prayer, but you can pray, “O God, you have to help me now.” I assure you, my God will help you.

Additionally, don’t ever say that God didn’t give you grace when you asked him. To say that would be pouring contempt upon our God. God always gives grace to the humble. And God will give us trouble to make us humble, if we haven’t been coming to him. He will say, “All right. I haven’t seen them lately, but I have a way of getting them to come to me. Let me give them some trouble.” When you begin to experience difficulties, all of a sudden, if you are an authentic Christian, you will come to God, saying, “O God, you have to help me.” “Yes,” God will say, “I was waiting to see you, and I will give you all the grace you need.”
I can do everything through him who gives me strength. The second principle is found in Philippians 4:13, where Paul says, “I can do everything through him who gives me strength.” In the Greek he begins with panta ischuô, which means “all things I am able.” In other words, “All things I have strength for, to bear or to do. “All things” means all things in the path of our duty to God. If God has called you and placed you on the path to heaven, in his sovereign ordination you will encounter troubles and problems. But Paul is saying, “I have strength for all things,” or simply, “I can do all things” and then he addsen tô endunamounti me, meaning “in the one who continually empowers me.”
Never say that God will not give us the power to do his will! God will always help us to walk in the way he has outlined for us. Yes, we will encounter all kinds of problems and troubles, like Bunyan’s pilgrims did when they were traveling to the Celestial City, but we must not worry. We can do all things in the one who continually pumps divine strength into us. This is not the power of positive thinking. This is an alien power–the supernatural power of God.

We read something about this power in Philippians 2:13, where Paul writes, “For it is God who works in you”–Theos gar estin ho energôn en humin, meaning it is God who energizes you, who pours his energy into you– “to will and to act according to his good purpose.” He who called you will strengthen you, in other words.
We can receive comfort and mercy from God. In 2 Corinthians 1:3-4 we read, “Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of compassion and the God of all comfort, who comforts us in all our troubles so that we can comfort those in any trouble with the comfort we ourselves have received from God.
God the Father is interested in comforting us. He is the Father of mercies, which means he surrounds us with mercies, and the God of all comfort, which means he comforts us in all our troubles. We must understand, believe, and meditate upon this truth. As we live our lives, we will have troubles, but our God will comfort us in all of them. As a father shows compassion to his children, our God will show compassion to us.

We recently read the story of the prodigal son recorded in Luke 15. What did the father do when he saw his son coming home? He ran to meet him. He was an old man, but he ran. That is what the Father of compassion and the God of of all comforts does for us. He is ever-ready to meet us and comfort us. We cannot experience even one trouble outside of God’s comfort.

May we learn to come to God and receive the mercy and comfort he offers us! Don’t tell me how terrible your trouble is; I cannot do anything for you. But tell God, and he will send you comfort–exceeding, abundantly, above all that you can ask or imagine. God’s mercy is disproportionately greater than our troubles. He gives you grace so that you may rejoice in the midst of sufferings. Oh, what a mighty God we serve!

This comfort from God will also cause us to rejoice. In 2 Corinthians 7:4 Paul writes, “I have great confidence in you; I take great pride in you. I am greatly encouraged; in all our troubles my joy knows no bounds.” This is authentic Christianity. Paul says, “In all our troubles my joy overflows,” meaning it gushes out–out of the depth of my being–because the life of God is in the soul of man. He is not speaking about a little bit of joy. “In all our troubles my joy,” means the joy that I experience deep within my soul, the joy which was placed there by the Spirit of the living God, “knows no bounds.” That is God’s provision for us in suffering.

In 1 Peter 1:7-8 we read, “These have come so that your faith–of greater worth than gold, which perishes even though refined by fire–may be proved genuine and may result in praise, glory and honor when Jesus Christ is revealed. Though you have not seen him, you love him; and even though you do not see him now, you believe in him and are filled with inexpressible and glorious joy.”

Peter was writing this to believers in the ancient church who were going through great suffering and trials, probably more severe than most of us have experienced. But just as Paul could say, “In all our troubles, my joy knows no bounds,” Peter is saying to them, “In the midst of these troubles, you are rejoicing with inexpressible joy.”

Can you now understand why troubles come to us? God has a design for trouble in the lives of his people. We are living in God’s universe, which means it is a meaningful, not purposeless, universe. God operates purposefully in his universe, especially in the lives of his people. Nothing is accidental in God’s universe. Everything has a purpose and everything we experience has a purpose.
Troubles cause us to rely on God. In 2 Corinthians 1:9 we find another purpose for suffering in the lives of Christians. Paul writes, “Indeed, in our hearts we felt the sentence of death.” He was speaking about troubles he endured in Asia. Then he gives the meaning, the interpretation, the theology, the divine design behind the troubles. “But this happened that we might not rely on ourselves but on God, who raises the dead.”
What is God’s purpose in suffering? He wants to introduce us to himself. He wants us to learn to believe in him. God is a God who raises the dead and calls into existence things that are not by mere command. This same God wants us to grow in faith and come into greater faith in him, that we may have fellowship with him and know the riches of his mercy toward us in Christ. That is why Paul could make these paradoxical statements in 2 Corinthians 4 and 2 Corinthians 6: “hard pressed . . . but not crushed; perplexed, but not in despair; persecuted, but not abandoned; struck down, but not destroyed,” and “sorrowful, yet always rejoicing; poor, yet making many rich; having nothing, and yet possessing everything.”
Afflictions produce character and hope in the glory of God. In Romans 5:3 we read, “Not only so, but we also rejoice in our sufferings, because we know that suffering produces perseverance; perseverance, character; and character, hope.” Paul is saying, “You see, I know something. What is it? Troubles and afflictions are designed by God to produce character, which then produces hope in the glory of God’s coming again.
Afflictions bring about this amazing hope within us, and we do not have to trust in anything in this world. I was talking about money to one of our brothers. I said, “You know, money doesn’t do much good. We must come to have this treasure in heaven, which is to be with God. That is true happiness.” So afflictions produce endurance, which produces character–a character that always looks above. When we know that God is coming, and that we will be like him forever, we can rejoice in troubles.

You may say you don’t like afflictions; I don’t like them either. But we know that we are going to be afflicted, whether we like it or not, and these afflictions will produce endurance and character in our lives. They will strip us away from everything temporal and enable us to focus on God. Then we will be able to fix our eyes on Jesus, the author and finisher of our faith.
Afflictions bring about glory. In 2 Corinthians 4:17 we read, “For our light and momentary troubles are achieving for us an eternal glory that far outweighs them all.” In the Greek it says afflictions bring about, produce superabounding, eternal glory.
Are you interested in glory? It is a by-product of the God-ordained afflictions. When God afflicts us, we are brought face to face with our own weakness, but that is not the end of it. God afflicts us so that we may look to him who is life, strength, and glory. Afflictions produce glory in disproportionate amounts.
Afflictions cause us to commune with Christ. In 2 Timothy 4:16-17 Paul wrote about a trial he had faced, perhaps before Caesar or Caesar’s court. He begins, “At my first defense, no one came to my support.”
We are all nice to each other when everything is all right. I wonder where Luke and Timothy were when Paul was writing this. I wonder where the Roman church was. I wonder what happened to all his friends.

So Paul says, “At my first defense no one came to my support,” and then he says, “but everyone deserted me.” Isn’t that what happened to Jesus Christ? His disciples all abandoned him. From the Greek word we learn that this was a deliberate abandonment. No doubt Paul’s friends were afraid. That is what happened in the case of Jesus Christ himself. The disciples were afraid they were going to be apprehended and probably destroyed, so they left.

But in verse 17 Paul reveals who was with him: “The Lord stood at my side.” That is why we should trust in the Lord, not in men. What do we do to be saved? Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ. And Jesus said that he would be with us always, even unto the end of the age. It is our Savior Jesus Christ who will be with us at the hour of our death, when no one else is around. He will never leave us or forsake us.

We will never experience anything like Jesus experienced. As he hung on the cross, everyone forsook him, just like everyone forsook Paul. But Jesus endured something far worse than the abandonment of his friends–his own Father abandoned him. He endured the wrath of God alone on the cross in our behalf to ensure that we will never be alone.

Suppose you are going through a trial. Your daughter said she would be there, but she had other things to do. Your wife really wanted to be there, but, again, it somehow didn’t work out. You look around, but no one is with you. But then you look again, and you see the Lord.

Paul says everyone abandoned him, “but the Lord stood with me.” And not only did Christ stand with Paul, but he strengthened him by his communion with him.

Learning to Handle Sufferings

May God help us to learn how to handle our sufferings! I hope we will stand with our brothers and sisters in their troubles, but even so, we may not be able to do much. We don’t know what to say, or we seem to say the wrong things. But the Lord Jesus Christ is always standing with us whenever we suffer. He knows what to say and he knows how to strengthen us in our inmost being. That is why Paul could say, “My outward man is decaying, but my inward man is being renewed day by day.”

If you have not trusted in Jesus Christ, I beseech you to do so today. He will never leave you nor forsake you. When everyone else leaves you–mother or father or children or spouse or friends–he will be with you to comfort you, encourage you, and strengthen you. You will be vitally united to him, and nothing in the world will be able to separate you from his love. That is the hope of the Christian faith. I pray that you will experience it also. Amen.