Ihave found," said a Christian once, "that when you follow Christ, three things will happen to you: First, you will be delivered from all fears. Second, you will be absurdly happy. Third, you will have trouble!"
"... you will have trouble." Jesus Himself left us under no illusion about that.
Mark 10:30, "In truth I tell you, there is
no-one who has left all for my sake and the Gospel's who will not
receive back a hundredfold, now in this time, with
persecutions."
John 15:20, "Remember the word that I spoke to you: a servant is
not above his master; if they have persecuted me, they will persecute
you."
John 16:33, "In the world, you will have tribulations."
And all the New Testament writers echo the truth of their Master's words.
"All who desire to live a godly life in
Christ Jesus will be persecuted" ... Paul in a letter to Timothy. (II
Tim. 3:13) Timothy probably heard Paul say that years before, in his
home town of Lystra at the time of Paul's second visit there. As Luke
tells us in Acts 14:22, Paul "strengthened the souls of the
disciples, exhorting them to continue in the faith, and saying that
through much tribulation, we must enter the Kingdom of God."
I Peter 4:12, "Don't be surprised at the fiery ordeal that comes upon
you to prove your faith, as though something strange were happening
to you." In fact, only a sentence or two later, Peter repeats the
beatitude almost word for word: "If you are reproached for the Name
of Christ, you are blessed." ("Blessed are you when men revile you on
my account." Matt. 5:11)
It is to be expected!
Jesus supplied the reason very simply: "If the world hates you, understand that it hated me first. If you belonged to the world, the world would love you as its own. But because I have chosen you out of the world so you don't belong to it now, the world will hate you ... They will react like this because they have no true knowledge of me or my Father." (John 15:17-18)
You are the odd one out in the herd, so the herd rejects you.
It is all very understandable. What makes you the odd one out is that you have been 'rightwised' to God and His Son - you are "persecuted for 'rightwisness' sake." Because you have been rightwised to God, your loyalties are not to the world any longer; they are now attached to Someone it does not know, and because the world is ignorant of God and a stranger to Him, it can only see Him as a threat ... and you with Him.
All this is clear enough.
What is not at all as clear is why we should be so happy about it. How can the Lord insist that those who have to suffer that sort of suspicion and rejection have in fact found the real secret of happiness? "Oh the bliss of those who are persecuted for righteousness' sake," He says, "for theirs is the Kingdom of Heaven."
Either Jesus is talking nonsense, or there is some mystery here we need to understand, because being an object of public scorn is normally nobody's idea of happiness.
(1) It is worthwhile first to see how insistent about this the New Testament is. It is really very surprising. Over and over again it tells us that suffering is to be welcomed and rejoiced in. It makes the New Testament unique in religious literature. Other faiths indeed tell us that to embrace suffering may well expose us to suspicion, even rejection, by others. But they then go on to advise a vigorous defiance of it as Islam does, or a philosophical resignation to it as Confucianism does, or a complete escape from it as Buddhism does. Only Christianity glories in it. Mark what the New Testament writers all say.
Jesus Himself first: "What happiness
yours will be when people turn on you, and ill-treat you, and say all
sorts of slanderous things against you, unfairly, on my account! Be
glad then - yes, be tremendously glad - for your reward in Heaven is
magnificent. They persecuted the prophets like that, before your
time." (Matt. 5:11-12)
Then Paul: "We rejoice in our hope that we shall share in the
glory of God; even more than that, we rejoice in our sufferings."
(Rom. 5:3) Recall too Paul's astonishing confession that he was eager
to know, not only the power of Christ's resurrection in his life, but
also the fellowship of His sufferings. (Phil. 3:10)
And Peter: "Don't be alarmed by the fiery ordeal that your
faith brings upon you, as though something had gone badly wrong.
Rather rejoice, because it means you are being given a share in the
very sufferings of Christ; and that means that when His glory is
revealed, the glory to which those sufferings are leading Him, you
will share that glory with Him too. If Christ's Name is flung in your
teeth as an insult, count yourself privileged and blessed, because
that is evidence that you have really caught His Spirit ... that you
and He are yoked together in the powerful and glorious ministry God
has given Him." (I Peter 4:12-14)
Or James: "My brothers, whenever you have to face all sorts of
trials and difficulties, count yourselves supremely happy. Reckon to
be longsuffering until the coming of the Lord." (James 1:2,
5:7)
These are just a few examples culled at random from the pages of the New Testament. Its pages are studded with statements like these.
(2) To the early Christians, suffering simply did not present the problem it does to us. They had learned not to ask, "Why has this happened to me?" They did not have to ask: they knew the answer! What is more, the answer excited them.
The readiness to suffer, the reason for it and the end result of it were all clear to them from the beginning ... so clear and unquestioned that there is no way it can be explained unless it was clear to them from the very nature of the Gospel itself, as they understood it. It is quite obvious - from the book of Acts especially, though elsewhere too - that this sort of teaching was given to Christians at the time they first responded to the Gospel. It was conveyed to them somehow as an obvious and immediate consequence of believing it. The sort of thing Paul said to the new disciples at Derbe and Lystra which we noted earlier is only one example of that; there are others.
Peter said it too: "If when you do right and suffer for it, you take it patiently, you have God's approval; for to this you have been called!" (I Peter 2:20, 21) To react to unjust suffering that way is what being a Christian is all about! The Gospel made it obvious. That means that unless we so understand the Gospel that both the inevitability and the joyful worth of suffering are equally obvious to us, we have not understood the Gospel the way the Apostles did.
If we were not so dulled to the Scriptures by familiarity with them, we should find this staggering. What on earth is there in suffering that it should be so bound up with the Gospel, and that it should be such a cause for rejoicing?
As we try to get to grips with this, two things are to be observed.
Even a casual survey of the references to suffering in the New Testament will quickly reveal that it is not suffering of any and every sort that is being talked about this way. It is not sickness, or accidents, or natural disasters, or just 'hard times' that are meant; how the New Testament says we are to cope with that sort of suffering is another thing altogether. Suffering of that sort is to be faced with the three great Christian qualities of love, faith and hope.
• Some of those sorts of suffering can be alleviated by love - by the practical and down-to-earth care we show for each other.• Some can be alleviated by faith; and there are two ways at least that faith can do that:
1. Sometimes it can be cured by faith, as when the prayer of faith avails to cure the sick. But that is not always the way God means us to deal with it, because
2. Sometimes it can be transformed by faith, by accepting it as a discipline, not as a curse, so it matures us and toughens us.• Some sufferings can be borne only in hope - the hope of our final redemption.
As a summary of the New Testament teaching on the huge problem of 'natural' suffering that is admittedly cavalier. But it is not where the emphasis in the beatitude falls.
To pick up the threads again, the suffering that is bound up with the Gospel and is a mysterious cause for rejoicing in those who believe it, is suffering of a particular sort. It is the suffering that is occasioned by the illwill of others, like malice, or meanness, or slander, or ill-treatment, or even physical violence.
That is the first distinction to be made, and it is an important one for our understanding. Only of this kind of suffering ought we, strictly speaking, to use the word 'evil.' Where suffering arises through nobody's fault, we may use words like misfortune or tragedy or disaster to describe it, but we really ought not to use the word evil, because evil, in the true meaning of the word, can arise only where there is an evil will. It is suffering of that kind that Christians are to expect, and in which they are to rejoice.
Let us be clear about that first. The kind of suffering we are to welcome is the suffering inflicted on us by the illwill of others: the pain to which we are put by their jealousy, their spite, their contempt, their hatred or their rage.
If we provoke these reactions in others by our own wrongdoing, then the New Testament is quite unsentimental and forthright in telling us that we will, in that case, get no better than we deserve: "What credit to you is it," asks Peter (I Peter 2:20) "if you are patient in bearing a punishment you've richly deserved?" There is nothing to congratulate yourself about in that. That is no cause for rejoicing.
But, "if you are reproached for the Name of Christ," he goes on (4:14), "that is cause for rejoicing, because then the Spirit of glory and of God will be resting on you. But see that none of you suffers as a murderer, or a thief, or a mischief-maker, or a wrong-doer. It is when you suffer as a Christian that you are to rejoice that you have been counted worthy to suffer for His Name."
Of course, it is possible to peddle our religion in ways that are offensive, so that we are mischief-makers in the way we do that! If we are then told where to get off, we might well console ourselves that we are "suffering for righteousness' sake" when in fact we are not suffering anything of the kind. Peter's counsel on this matter is worth quoting: "Be ready at any time to give an answer to anyone who wants a reason for the hope you have within you. But do it gently and reverently. Be sure your conscience is clear, too, so that if men speak slanderously of you as rogues, they may end up ashamed of themselves for libelling your good Christian behaviour." (I Peter 3:15b-16)
But when you do it right and cop it, that is when you are to rejoice.
What we finally have to get at, now that we have cleared the ground, is why we are to be so happy about it.
"You are to count yourselves supremely happy." Jesus says. "It has been the experience of all true men of God from the beginning."
"It is what you've been called to," says Peter. This is what being a Christian is about. Not to be ready for this is not to be ready for the Christian life at all. To follow Christ is to follow Him in this; not to follow Him in this is not to follow Him at all.
The reason Jesus gave is the same reason that all the New Testament writers give, though each has his own distinctive way of saying it.
Jesus said, "Blessed are they who suffer for righteousness' sake, for theirs is the Kingdom of Heaven." Now the Kingdom of God is 'God's active Rule' - His reign. * So when Jesus says, "Blessed are they who are persecuted ... for theirs is the Kingdom of Heaven," He means that they are blessed because they are having a part in God's active rule in the life of this world. To suffer for righteousness' sake is the way to share God's rule with Him in an evil world.
From our discussion of peace-makers in the last chapter, the logic of what Jesus is saying should at once be clear. God reconciles His enemies by loving them into a change of heart, accepting suffering at their hands while He does so. You cannot conquer the illwill in another's heart by answering to it with more illwill of your own. If you let his illwill generate illwill in you, he has defeated you. The evil that is in his heart has overcome the good that was in yours. His evil has reproduced itself in you. Evil can be overcome only by good. Hatred can be overwhelmed only by love. Only by loving your enemy can you turn him into a friend.
But to go on loving someone in the teeth of their hostility is to render yourself vulnerable, to expose yourself to the hurt they do you, because you cannot fight back. So it is only by steadfast endurance of that hurt that love wins through.
In the face of evil, suffering is love's only path to victory. That is what makes the Cross of Jesus the triumph of His love. "God shows His love for us, in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us. It is while we were still His enemies that we were reconciled to God by the death (at our hands!) of His Son." (Rom. 5:8, 10) The Cross is God's way of meeting evil, and overcoming it.
If the path of love through suffering is the path Christ treads to victory, then that is the path Christ's disciple must tread with Him. At the risk of tedium, I repeat: In the face of evil, suffering is love's only path to victory.
It is by the suffering He has endured at our hands that He overcame our enmity against Him. That is the only way love under attack ever wins. Suffering is love's mighty, all-prevailing weapon. That is why to suffer with Christ is a joyful thing - it is the way to share His triumph with Him. That is what Peter said: "If you are reproached for the name of Christ, you are blessed, because then, in that suffering, the Spirit of glory and of God rests upon you." Suffering of this sort is both inevitable, and to be rejoiced in because it is Christ's way of winning.
We must not try to do it in our own strength, of course; we have to do it in His. But that is what we have to do. If we are men and women 'in Christ', His method of meeting evil has to be our method also, or we are not men and women in Christ but men and women outside of Christ - out of sympathy with Him altogether.
That brings us to the final point.
It has been said that men can bear almost any amount of suffering so long as they are convinced that their suffering has meaning. What demoralises us is to feel that our suffering is pointless or meaningless. So long as we believe that what we are suffering serves a true and worthy purpose, we can endure ... the way a father will endure the flames if he believes that by venturing into them he can save his baby son.
And this is true of the New Testament attitude to suffering with which we have been occupied. It is to be endured - even with a fierce and secret joy - because it serves a purpose high enough to command the total dedication of our lives, even unto death. That purpose is the rescue of men for God. A 'man in Christ' will suffer, and rejoice to suffer, because he will know that he is fighting side by side with the King of Love Whose way it is to bear the sinner's sin that He might conquer it in him. To suffer for righteousness' sake is to be caught up - with Him - into God's age-long conflict with evil, so as ultimately to share His victory with Him. Suffering of the sort the New Testament defines serves God's purpose in the lives of men.
This is the way we shall become the salt of the earth - as Jesus went on to say in His Sermon. We may leave a bitter taste in men's mouths, but by our willingness to suffer evil rather than do it, we shall prevent corruption spreading. We shall also be - again as Jesus said - "the light of the world." Our good deeds - our refusal to grow weary in well-doing when we get no thanks for it, our persistent kindness in the face of ill-treatment - will shine the light of God's love into a world made dark by all sorts of hatreds and jealousies and animosities, until, as Jesus said, "they see your good works, and recognising that they have been wrought in God, will glorify your Father Who is in Heaven." The good works Jesus still has in mind in Matt. 5:16 are the sort of good works we have been talking about.
We should not leave all this theory unclothed in the flesh of some real-life example; it would all be 'T.E.W.T.', as a man in my Cambridge congregation used to say - a "Tactical Exercise Without Troops". So I quote a paragraph - one of his finest - from the pen of that Man of the Way, Martin Luther King. He suffered for righteousness' sake in the way of love (perhaps not least from the vicious smears of Mr Herbert Hoover), and won more ground for the liberation of the blacks in his generation than any man had done since that other Man of the Way, Abraham Lincoln. This was written while he was in a Georgia gaol, then preached shortly after the bus protest in Montgomery, Alabama. It is, if you like, a contemporary 'prison epistle,' as so many of the Apostle Paul's epistles were.
"To our most bitter opponents we say: 'We shall match your capacity to inflict suffering by our capacity to endure suffering. We shall meet your physical force with spiritual (soul) force. Do to us what you will, and we shall continue to love you. We cannot in all good conscience obey your unjust laws, because non-cooperation with evil is as much a moral obligation as is cooperation with good. Throw us in jail and we shall still love you. Send your hooded perpetrators of violence into our community at the midnight hour and beat us and leave us half dead, and we shall still love you. But be ye assured that we will wear you down by our capacity to suffer. One day we shall win freedom, but not only for ourselves. We shall so appeal to your heart and conscience that we shall win you in the process, and our victory will be a double victory." (Martin Luther King, 'Strength to Love' [Fontana] p. 53)
That is what Jesus meant.
* The phrase 'The Kingdom of Heaven,' which Matthew favours, is the same as 'The Kingdom of God' in the other Gospels. Matthew wrote for Christians who had all been Jews; and the Jews were so afraid of breaking the third commandment, "You shall not take the Name of the Lord your God in vain," that rather than risk it, they would not say His Name at all; they used substitute phrases like "the Holy One," or "Him up there, Blessed be He," or, as in this case, "Heaven." Matthew's phrase means exactly the same as 'The Kingdom of God.'
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