Suffering

“For God called you to do good, even if it means suffering, just as Christ suffered for you.”

These are the words of the apostle Peter, and they can be found in 1st Peter chapter 2.

Now we've all suffered at some point or another, but has that suffering been for God? Have you been suffering for being a Christian? Or have you just been suffering for being human?

All humans suffer in some way or another, at some point in their life. It's just part of life. But, if you hide your faith, you can go your whole life without suffering for being a Christian.

But how much more will you suffer in heaven if you hide your faith?

Your suffering on earth for sharing your faith glorifies God, and if you try to hide your faith you're really hiding God. And besides, God can use your suffering to do good.

For instance, in Genesis chapters 37-50 we read about a man named Joseph. Joseph was: betrayed by his brothers, sold into slavery, made to work for a man named Potiphar, framed for a crime he didn't commit, thrown in prison, forgotten about, and then finally brought before Pharaoh to interpret his dream.

But by interpreting Pharaoh's dream he ended up saving all of Egypt and his entire family from the seven year famine that was plaguing the land at that time.

I would love to tell you that after that the Egyptians were eternally grateful to Joseph and his descendants, but as it turned out they were only temporarily grateful. They actually ended up enslaving the Israelites.

But God had a reason for their suffering. He wanted them to live in the Promised Land. So he allowed the Egyptians to enslave the Israelites so they would want to leave Egypt. The only problem with this was that the Pharaoh did not want to lose all his slaves. God had to send a man named Moses to go talk some sense into Pharaoh.

If you want to read the whole story you can find it in the book of Exodus. You can also read the book of Job which is another good story about suffering. In Job's story God test Job's faith by allowing the devil to take away all of Job's riches. He even took away the lives of his children. But Job stayed faithful to God through it all.

But the most amazing story of God using someones suffering to do good, of course, is the story of Jesus Christ. Through his suffering he saved all of us from suffering the eternal fires of hell.

So if Jesus can suffer for all of us then why can't we suffer for him?

So I challenge you to do what Jesus asked you to. I challenge you to share your faith with the world, even if it means you have to suffer persecution. For as I said earlier, we glorify God through our suffering for him.