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About Jesus Steve Sweetman Enduring
Upcoming Hardship My
friend emailed me from Guatemala. He told me of the death of
friends and destruction of property caused by the season's first
hurricane. Many people in Guatemala
are poor, and this has only made them poorer.
I've also been recently reminded of Christians in countries where
their governments are hostile towards them because of their association
with Jesus. Their suffering
and persecution is a test of their trust in Jesus, as was the hurricane
for the Christians in Guatemala. It seems to me that in
both of these situations of suffering, the affected Christians don't
spend a lot of time complaining, something not often seen in more
affluent nations. When
watching CNN, you see lots of people complaining about lots of things.
CNN is becoming more confrontational in their coverage of news
events. The
complaining, blaming, and confrontational commentary we see on CNN is
due to our fallen nature. It's
actually something CNN exploits for the purpose of ratings and
advertising dollars. CNN
says they are "keeping them honest", whoever "them"
is at any given moment. I'd
like to ask, "who is keeping CNN honest?" If
CNN films a person speaking thankfully in the midst of a crisis, it
would not surprise me if the
comments were edited out of the final video clip because they aren't
confrontational.
Christians
shouldn't emulate CNN, although many of us do.
We are to emulate the Bible.
Paul told Timothy to "endure hardships as a good soldier of
Jesus Christ". (2 Timothy 2:3, 4:5 – also Hebrews 12:7)
That doesn't leave much room for complaining, blaming, and
confrontation. Hard
times are coming to affluent Christians in western nations. One
thing I'm learning is that salvation rises out of God's judgment, and
judgment brings hardship. With
this in mind, we should decide in advance to endure hardship as good
soldiers of our Lord Jesus Christ. Soldiers
have a serious job to do, and complaining and blaming only gets in the
way. I'd
dare say that when affluent Christians begin to suffer, as many other
Christians do, and have, we will see an exit from the faith by many.
If we complain about the minor irritations of life now, how will
we survive the hard days ahead? A
soldier knows how to rough things out.
Many of us have gotten too soft in our faith.
A soft faith won't stand the tests that are coming our way.
Being
a Christian is a serious matter. It's
not a weekend hobby. It's
more than attending a Sunday meeting.
It's allowing Jesus to change the way we live. It's even allowing
Jesus to change the way we speak. But
most of all, it's allowing Jesus to change the very thoughts inside our
head, thoughts that no one else but Jesus knows about.
I wonder what President Obama would think about this kind of
change. I believe I know
what he would think. May we
all find grace to make the needed changes in our lives.
May complaining be replaced with an attitude of enduring hardship
as good soldiers of our Lord
Jesus Christ. |