Suffering

      ^{I come from a generation with different expectations. In 1965, I broke my arm and was taken to the hospital. Without being told, I expected the doctor to touch my wounded arm and for the arm to be moved for an xray. I expected healing to require some pain. Things have changed in the last fifty years. There have been great strides made in healthcare. Expectations are higher; cures are available that were once unimagined. Yet, even at this advanced stage, if you go to the Emergency Room with a broken arm, the doctor will still want to touch it and the x-ray tech will still want to position it on the table to get a clear xray. The truth is, healing has always required touching where it hurts and painful manipulations. Healing hurts---it has always hurt.}

      ^{The difference is that people have come expect a different truth. I'm not sure where or when this change in expectations came about, but it is alive and well in the new century. People now imagine being whole without pain. People expect life without pain and do not realize that their expectations are unrealistic. In our imperfect world, pain is unavoidable.}

      ^{Pain is a cry for healing. Whether it is physical, emotional, or spiritual, pain is a symptom that all is not well. There is no greater truth about man than that all is not well with him. This truth is at the core of Christianity. The Bible says, “For all have sinned, and come short of the glory of God.” The transition from sinner to saint is a healing, and so, painful process. Christian maturity without suffering is unrealistic.}

      ^{“Forasmuch then as Christ hath suffered for us in the flesh, arm yourselves likewise with the same mind: for he that hath suffered in the flesh hath ceased from sin; That he no longer should live the rest of his time in the flesh to the lusts of men, but to the will of God...Beloved, think it not strange concerning the fiery trial which is to try you, as though some strange thing happened unto you...”}

      ^{Simply wearing flesh caused Christ suffering. He bore this suffering in order to identify with us. The natural inclinations of the flesh are contrary to the spirit. Separating ourselves from the desires of the flesh in order to please God is a healing process worked out in every Christian by the Holy Ghost. It's what Christianity does. We are translated from darkness to light by the blood of Christ, but it is not a painless experience. The act of coming to Christ, in and of itself, requires suffering the humiliation of repentance. Men don't refuse Christ because Christianity does not make sense. They refuse because it calls for a painful new birth. Christ suffered to make a new birth possible. His disciples suffer to appropriate it to themselves and carry it to maturity.}

      ^{“It is a faithful saying: For if we be dead with him, we shall also live with him: If we suffer, we shall also reign with him: if we deny him, he also will deny us: If we believe not, yet he abideth faithful: he cannot deny himself. “}