FAITH & SUFFERING; GOD’S GIFTS
PHILIPPIANS 1:29-30
01/19/95
When you think of Christian persecution & suffering what do you think of. Do you think of suffering for Christ is when someone called you a religious fanatic. Do think of suffering for Christ is getting up to go to church? Or perhaps you think of persecutions as something that happened in Paul’s day, you know being beaten, thrown in jail, or perhaps being feed to the lions.
Well the following statistics may come as a surprise to you. The number of Christian martyrs, those who have died for their faith in Christ, in this century alone is greater then all the other centuries combined. Every year some 156,000 Christians are killed because of their faith. Also, nearly two-thirds of the world’s population lives under governments which persecute Christians for their faith in Christ. We should realize that while being a Christian in the United States is not a live threatening thing, for the majority of the worlds Christians, it is.
Places like Sudan see the male population of Christian villages shot, mutilated, and sometimes crucified. In Egypt not one month as passed in the last ten years without the beating, torture, or murder of Christians, or the burning of their homes or churches. It is not uncommon to see open letters calling for the death of Christians.
In countries such as Iran, Saudi Arabia, Nepal, and China, is quite routine to see Christians being beaten or killed for their faith. In Nepal, which is a Hindu kingdom, if you convert to Christianity you spend a year in jail, if you are caught converting others to Christianity, you could spent six years in jail.
So begin persecuted for Christ, suffering for the sake of Christ is very much a reality in our time, just as it was in Paul’s time. And while Christians lives here in the United States may not be threatened, there are instances of being persecuted for the Lord Jesus. Many time we are persecuted simply because of our lifestyles, as 2 Tim. 3:12 tells us; "Yes, and all who desire to live godly in Christ Jesus will suffer persecution."
So there are times we are called to suffer for the Lord. And as we shall see today there are good things associated with this suffering for the Lord.
Let us turn to our passage for today, which is Philippians 1:29-30:
"For to you it has been granted on behalf of Christ, not only to believe in Him, but also to suffer for His sake, having the same conflict which you saw in me and now hear is in me." In this verse we see that God has called us not only to believe in Him, but he has also called us to suffer for his sake. Faith and suffering for the Christian is intertwined, one cannot separate the two according to the Scriptures.
There is a certain theology in Christian circle today known as the Word-Faith Movement, or Name-it-claim-it theology. Now what this particular group teaches is that God does not want any of His children to be poor or sick. In others words they say if we have enough faith, we will be rich, if we have enough faith, we will never be sick. They only thing which prevents us from realizing that, is either our lack of faith or some secret sin we have that we have not confessed.
They say the only reason we suffer is because we do not have enough faith. However in this verse Paul contradict that belief. Paul does not state here that we suffer because of our lack of faith but that we will suffer because of our faith, because we do believe in the Lord Jesus Christ as Saviour.
We see that the Word-Faith movement has it backwards. Realize that with faith in Christ comes suffering, Paul states that you can expect it.
People are under the assumption that being a Christian is easy, that when we put or faith in Christ as our Saviour, somehow life gets easier. It does not get easier, it just gets easier to handle. When we trust in Christ, God assures us that suffering and persecution will come, put God also assures us that He will give us the strength to endure it. He is not going to increase our strength, as some assume, but He gives to us His strength.
I once had a conversation with a man by the name of Mike Sullivan. I was working as a maintenance Mechanic at the time. Mike was my bosses, bosses, boss. He was the president of the branch I worked for. He was very successful business, being at the right place at the right time. As we talked about Christianity and my believes he told me that Christianity is for weak people, people who can’t handle life.
I had to strongly disagree. Christianity is not for weak people, it is for people who have been given the strength of God. Being a Christian shows strength not weakness. The weak person is that one who goes with the flow of the world. Who joins in with the immorality of the world. It takes no moral strength to partake in pornography, one does not have to be strong to give into the temptations of adultery, or violence, one does not have to be strong to come under the control of alcohol. It is quite easy to join in the immorality of our society, it takes no strength at all.
Being a Christian is what takes strength. It takes strength to say no to immoral behavior of this world. It takes strength to rise about the society in which we live. Again it is strength given to us by God. It is easy to be bad, it is hard to obey the laws of God.
Being a Christian as our verse states is a call to suffer. A call to be persecuted. Being a Christian is far from sign of weakness. And may I add if being a Christian is something you find easy to do, you are either the most spiritual person I know, or your doing something wrong. Either you are depending on God for everything, trusting in Him fully, or you really are not that interested in obeying His laws and commands. If you find being a Christian easy I’m willing to bet it is because of the latter.
So know that being a Christian means that you have been called to suffer. I means that if you are doing the things God wants you do to you will suffer persecution.
I want you do notice that in our passage Paul states that it has been granted to you to both believe and suffer. Now the word granted here literally means "a privilege" or "a gift". So what the verse is saying the God has not only given you the gift of faith but He has also given you the gift of suffering. Now Faith is something we will take any day. We pray for more faith.
"Please God give me more faith." Faith to trust in you, faith to get through what ever it is we are going through.. Yet how many of us pray to suffer. I have heard allot of people pray but I have never heard anyone pray, "Lord please let me suffer for your sake".
But you now what? The Lord states that they are both gifts from God. Both are gifts from His grace. And we should pray for all of God’s gifts. And as I will take about in a minute, sometimes we need suffer because it is the only way we will learn things. So may I suggest, even though it may go against what our minds tells us, sometimes we should pray to suffer for the Lords sake. Not suffer just to suffer, but suffer so that He will be glorified. Now I am not saying we ought to go looking to suffer, what I am saying is that when we suffer for His sake, we will be blessed in the long run.
But before we talk to much about suffering I want to say some things about faith. Faith is a gift of God. It is something which God, through is undescribable grace gives to us. We can see that from this verse and also Eph. 2:8 which reads;
"For by grace you have been saved through faith, and that not of yourselves; it is the gift of God,"
Here we that faith is called the gift of God. Now as I stated earlier, unlike suffering faith is something we desire, it is something we want. Faith should be something we pray continuously for. We should want our faith to grow more and more. Faith is God’s gift, man’s responsibility.
Faith is that gift by which we can endure our sufferings. This is why God would not give us one with out the other. If we were called to suffer without the gift of faith we could not bear it.
The more faith we have the greater we see God’s strength at work in us. God give us this promise in Philippians 4:13, "I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me".
We can see that both these gifts bring to fullness the other. If we never suffered we would lack faith as we would have no reason to continue to put or trust in God. If we have no faith, then our suffering will overwhelm us and crush us. So God gives both these gifts to us.
Now let us turn our attention more to the suffering aspect of this passage. Again as stated before, suffering is a gift from God, it is a privilege to suffer for Christ’s sake. We do not suffer by chance, but it is God who allows it to happen to us for one reason or another.
Realize because it is a gift of God it is a good thing. Now we may not realize this as we are going through it, but God see the big picture. He sees our life as through it were on a page. The past, present and future are all right there in front of Him. So we need to accept that fact that it is good for us.
Is this easy? No. For me personally every time I suffer I want the Lord to take it away. don’t think, well I am suffer for Christ sake so I will just sit back and enjoy it. But I need to realize as we all do that it is for the best, it will at some time in the future turn out to be a blessing.
I want to just point out to you what our attitude should be concerning suffering. I want to read to you a couple of verses then I want you tell me what that attitude ought to be;
Colossians 1:24 "I now rejoice in my sufferings for you, and fill up in my flesh what is lacking in the afflictions of Christ, for the sake of His body, which is the church,"
1 Peter 4:13 "but rejoice to the extent that you partake of Christ’s sufferings, that when His glory is revealed, you may also be glad with exceeding joy."
Acts 5:41 "So they departed from the presence of the council, rejoicing that they were counted worthy to suffer shame for His name."
What is our attitude suppose to be at suffer for Christ? On of joy. We should rejoice as Peter and the apostles did. Rejoice as Paul did. Rejoice at the fact that it is a gift of God to suffer for Christ’s sake.
While we see that we should rejoice in our sufferings for Christ we need to see what the reasons are behind this rejoicing. Why is suffering good, and what does it do for us?
The first things I wish to mention is that suffering brings us closer to our Lord Jesus Christ. Through our sufferings we can better understand the sufferings our Lord just went through on our behalf.
2 Corinthians 4:10 tells us "always carrying about in the body the dying of the Lord Jesus, that the life of Jesus also may be manifested in our body."
Though our sufferings the sufferings of the Lord Jesus are made real to us and to others. When we put our sufferings next to His we see how pale they really are. No person but the Lord Jesus alone took upon himself the sins of the world. The sins of man were not placed on any one but Christ. He suffered what we all should have. He alone has suffered as no one else could or would.
Suffering for the sake of Christ can give to us the assurance of salvation. Again this comes for the fact that through our sufferings we can better relate to the sufferings of Christ.
1 Peter 4:14 "If you are reproached for the name of Christ, blessed are you, for the Spirit of glory and of God rests upon you." Being persecuted for Christ is a blessing, for it shows that the Holy Spirit of God is in us and as Peter writes "rest upon us".
Suffering for the sake of Christ will bring with it rewards. There are numerous verse which comfort us with the fact that when we suffer for God, He will reward us.
Matthew 5:11-12 "Blessed are you when they revile and persecute you, and say all kinds of evil against you falsely for My sake. Rejoice and be exceedingly glad, for great is your reward in heaven, for so they persecuted the prophets who were before you."
2 Corinthians 4:17 "For our light affliction, which is but for a moment, is working for us a far more exceeding and eternal weight of glory,"
So know that to suffer for Christ sake, to be persecuted for God is just temporary thing, while
the rewards that it will bring are eternal.
Another reason why suffering for Christ sake is a good thing, is that through it Christ is glorified, and there is nothing greater that we as children of God can do then to bring glory to God.
Again in 1 Peter 4:14 "If you are reproached for the name of Christ, blessed are you, for the Spirit of glory and of God rests upon you. On their part He is blasphemed, but on your part He is glorified."
1 Peter 4:16 "Yet if anyone suffers as a Christian, let him not be ashamed, but let him glorify God in this matter."
This is really all we need to realize that suffering for Christ sake is a good thing, that it is indeed a gift from God. By it He is glorified. He is lifted up.
And finely through our sufferings we can comfort others.
2 Corinthians 1:3-5 "Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of mercies and God of all comfort, who comforts us in all our tribulation, that we may be able to comfort those who are in any trouble, with the comfort with which we ourselves are comforted by God. For as the sufferings of Christ abound in us, so our consolation also abounds through Christ."
Here Scripture teaches that though our suffers we are in turn able to be used by God to comfort others because we have gone through those same things. We are able to comfort others the same way in which we ourselves were comforted by God.
I know for personal experience that I have at times had difficulty in comforting those who have lost a loved one. And that is because I have never gone through that experience, I have never lost someone who was very close to me.
So when we do go through difficult times we should use those experience to help others, to give comfort to others the way God as comforted us.
So we can how suffering and persecution can in fact be beneficial to us in many ways.
Let us quickly look at verse 30 of our passage. "having the same conflict which you saw in me and now hear is in me."
What Paul is saying is that he understood the Philippians suffering. He had gone through the same thing and was going through the same thing. In fact that same people who had persecuted Paul in Philippi in Act chapter 16 were most likely the same one who were known persecuting them. So Paul understood.
Know that these same words Jesus is saying to us today. Whatever we are going through, whatever suffering, whatever persecution, know that He has gone through it before you. He understands, and He is there to give us strength when we need it. Know that you never have to go through any suffering alone.
In closing let us go from here realizing that suffering for Christ sake is gift from God, just as our faith is. Know that we are never alone in our suffering and persecution. rely on Christ’s strength and the comfort of our brothers and sisters in Christ.
SHALL WE PRAY
