June 1 I Peter 4, 5
Years ago, I did some serious work on I Peter as it pays particular attention to the issue of suffering.Everybody suffers: physically, mentally, emotionally, spiritually. It is one of the conditions of being human, I suppose. I saw that someone posted on Facebook a bumper sticker that said Suffering ended on Good Friday: not in my world it hasn’t. I can accept the notion that sacrifice of others should end after Good Friday. Still, if the new age is inaugurated in Jesus Christ, why is life still so hard?
I Peter sees suffering as a predictable sign of being a Christian in a hostile world. He is very quick to say that we should not be punished for criminal behavior but should not expect our good deeds to be rewarded.Hear that again. instead of constantly speaking of everything being a blessing to be expected due to being a Christian, Peter says the opposite: a sign of faith was unjust suffering in a world antithetical to the message of the Suffering One, Jesus Christ.Trouble stalks us all. Troubles prowl about looking to strike.
Earlier Peter’s epistle brings out the notion that suffering disciplines, teaches, strengthens, purifies even. I do not grasp that personally, but I will grant that some people find themselves strengthened by some adversities. On the other hand, I have seen too many people crushed by the weight of suffering, especially the merciless suffering that seems to have no discernible reason.One of the needful things for suffering is to try to find some purpose, some meaning, some sense out of what often is so devoid of a reason.I am rather amazed that people so routinely survive what we undergo. At times, the only way that I find it explainable is that they receive a strength that they did not even realize they had in the face of adversity. Parents of children with special needs live out lives of such selfless service day in and day out.
Peter finds solace in this simple assertion: Jesus christ suffered. Jesus was not above suffering, so why are we so proud as to think we should be given a pass when it seems that everyone suffers in one way or another. He goes on to say that we are closer to Jesus when we share his sufferings. to tell the truth, i would often prefer some distance, but i do realize that few events drive me to prayer as easily as trouble for others in my family or church and myself.
Peter wants to make sure that suffering is not a sign that God is absent and does not care for us. I do not find it easy to be able to cast my anxieties on to God, as I seem to much rather stew over them on my own to get into a real maelstrom of trouble. I love the series of verbs at the end of our final passage:restore, support, strengthen, and establish. Three of the verbs could be taken as other ways of saying being strengthened in one form or another.Again, I am thrilled about the prospect of heaven, but its appearance at the horizon does not do much for me to be lifted up in the face of current trouble. I am not sure that heaven can somehow make up for the hells people suffer here on earth. I do appreciate the e idea that suffering will not continue in heaven as it does on earth. I like the notion that it exists in an entire new reality of wholeness and goodness.Today, perhaps the best I can do and hope for is for those four words to apply to our experience of heaven, a place where we are free from strife and have the permission and room to be our own best selves.
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