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There's no doubt that being a Christian can be a
dangerous thing in our world today. I read recently that
there have been around 40 million people who have been
put to death for being Christians in the past 2000 years
and of those something like 60% have died in the last 100
years. Now that mightn't be the case here in Australia at
the moment, but the fact is that for Christians in many
other parts of the world being a Christian means sharing
in Christ's suffering in a real and literal way. |
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Our present reality is that suffering is a
part of life |
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Let me read you a story I read this week in a
book by Robyn Claydon, called "Keep Walking" (SPCK Australia). |
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'A few months ago I had the great privilege of
ministering in Moldova which was one of the republics in
the old USSR. I stayed with a Christian family who, under
communism, had suffered for their faith. |
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The mother, Olga, had become a Christian in her
early teens and when she was fifteen asked to be
baptised. ... When Olga grew up she met a young man who
was also a Christian and they were married. They and
their family suffered persecution in a variety of ways. |
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While staying in their home, I met her children
- now grown up - and her grand children. |
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I discovered that, not only Olga and her
husband, but their children as well had suffered because
they were Christian. The children attended the local
primary school and were taught by atheist teachers. |
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On one occasion the children brought a note home
from school advertising a meeting which all parents were
expected to attend. No reason was given for the meeting.
Olga and her husband attended and found themselves part
of a very large meeting. All the parents attended and all
the staff. The Principal addressed the parents saying
that she had called them together to alert them to the
fact that there was an enemy in the school. |
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This news brought an immediate response from
parents who called out asking for more details. The
Principal said that the enemy were the Christian
children! With this news there was uproar as people were
shouting out that the children be named. |
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Olga said that she was shaking with fear, but
knew that she had to speak. She came out to the front and
said: "The Christian children are my children, but
they are not your enemies." Some parents shouted
out: "Name them. Whose class are they in?'. While
Olga was standing there wondering whether she would name
her children, another teacher came out the front. She
said: "I will name her children" and then
proceeded to do so. Once she had named them she went on
to say, "But they are wonderful children. I have
taught both of them and have found them to be
hardworking, courteous children. If all the children in
our school were like them, we would have a wonderful
school"! |
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Olga said that the meeting ended in uproar. Some
parents were calling for the expulsion of the children
and others, influenced by what the teacher had said, were
urging that they be allowed to stay. Olga and her husband
went home and no action was taken. The children continued
to attend the school although they were very anxious each
day wondering whether anything would happen to them. Olga
and her husband prayed each morning with the children
that God would be with them and give them peace and
courage. The teacher who had come to the defence of the
children was removed from the school within a few days. |
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Twelve years later, when communism had fallen in
Moldova, there was a knock on Olga's door. Here was the
teacher who had spoken up that night. She said that the
quiet witness of the children's lives at school had
impressed her greatly and that, though she had not been
free to ask questions then, she was free to do so now.
She asked: "Would you tell me how I could become a
Christian?"' |
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Robyn Claydon concludes: 'What a wonderful
question and what a consequence of the quiet witness of
two children whose lives were lights for Jesus in the
darkness of communism and atheism.' |
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Now the reason I read you that story is because
it reminded me of what we read at the end of the passage
last week: "we are children of God, 17and
if children, then heirs, heirs of God and joint heirs
with Christ -- if, in fact, we suffer with him so that we
may also be glorified with him." The assurance we
have that we'll share Christ's inheritance is a great
encouragement to us, but it doesn't take away the reality
of life in this fallen world. The reality is that the
inheritance we look forward to is still in the future. We
live in the age of the now but the not yet. Our present
life is lived in the shadow of the last day, the Day when
Jesus Christ will return in glory. Our 'now' will always
be coloured by the 'not yet'. And part of that 'not yet'
is that life may well involve suffering. |
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And that's what Paul now goes on to think about.
He says, "I consider that the sufferings of this
present time are not worth comparing with the glory about
to be revealed in us." The future hope of glory that
we will experience on the last day far outweighs any
suffering that this present life might entail. |
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In fact, he says, the suffering we experience
in this world is all part of God's long term plan for the
creation. v20: "the creation was subjected to
futility, not of its own will but by the will of the one
who subjected it, in hope 21that the creation
itself will be set free from its bondage to decay and
will obtain the freedom of the glory of the children of
God." This takes us back to that diagram I showed
you a couple of months ago. You see, it wasn't just
people who were affected by the fall. Rather the whole of
creation was affected. If you remember, when God
announced the curses that would arise as a result of Adam
and Eve's rebellion, the curse involved hardship for them,
sweat, hard work, pain in childbirth, discord between men
and women. But it also involved damage to the creation:
"cursed is the ground because of you; in toil you
shall eat of it all the days of your life; 18thorns
and thistles it shall bring forth for you." We look
back on that event and think what a terrible thing it was
for the creation. We look at the world around us and we
think how damaged the world is. And we wonder how God
could let the world get like this. But the truth is that
God has let the world get like this because he has a
greater plan for it. |
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Suffering in this world creates a greater
desire for the world to come |
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The positive thing about the suffering we
experience, whether it's suffering for our faith, like
that family in Moldova, or the suffering that comes just
from being in a damaged world, is that it stops us from
being too satisfied with our life here. It leads us to
long for the world to come, for the glory that God has
prepared for his people. It's been suggested that the
greatest problem for the Church in preaching the gospel
in the western world is the fact that people are so
satisfied with their lives. It's too easy for people to
think that they have life sewn up; that they don't need
God in their lives. Often, it's only when they realise
that life isn't perfect that some people stop to think
that there might be something more to life. |
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So the imperfection of life has its good points
after all. It leads us to long, as the rest of creation
does, for the freedom of the glory of the children of
God, for adoption, the redemption of our bodies. We're
reminded that the 'now' we live in is not the glorious
future of God's promise. So we long for the day when
we'll be released from the futility that this world is
subjected to. |
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We long for an assured future that we don't
yet see |
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And that longing is for a future that's assured.
When we see that word 'hope' in vs20 & 24, it's meant
to indicate something that's certain, that's sure. It's
still in the future, but it's a certain hope. It's a hope
based on the fact of Jesus' own resurrection. We know
that Jesus has conquered death, that his resurrection
body is a real physical body; that he's promised to
return to take us to be with him in his Father's house
forever. So we wait with patience for that future hope to
be revealed. |
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In the meantime the Spirit helps us |
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And in the meantime the Spirit helps us in the
weakness we experience, particularly in our relationship
to God. Do you find that there are times when you just
don't know how to pray? When you really don't know what's
the best or the right thing to pray for? Some things are
so complex that you don't know what's the right way to
go. I find that fairly often in fact. Particularly when
it comes to pastoral issues. It can be incredibly hard to
know what's the best thing to do or say. But the Holy
Spirit within us is given to help us in that situation.
At that moment the best thing we can do is to ask God the
Holy Spirit to intercede on our behalf. To turn over our
choices, our desires to him. Look at v.26: "Likewise
the Spirit helps us in our weakness; for we do not know
how to pray as we ought, but that very Spirit intercedes
with sighs too deep for words. {27}And God,
who searches the heart, knows what is the mind of the
Spirit, because the Spirit intercedes for the saints
according to the will of God." We saw last week that
life in the Spirit means an assurance of our place in
God's family. But it means more than that. It means that
not only are we in God's family but also God is living
within us. So that when our minds are set on the things
of the Spirit and we pray the Spirit does the interceding
for us, shaping our thoughts, our prayers, according to
the will of God. |
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And we can pray like that with confidence, Paul
says, because we know that the one who is guiding our
prayers has our best interests at heart. He says:
"We know that all things work together for good for
those who love God, who are called according to his
purpose." Even when we don't know what's best for
us, God does. So we can trust him to watch over us, to
guide our prayers, to bring about outcomes that will help
us in the end. |
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Even in the midst of suffering |
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The trouble with that, of course, is that we
still live in a broken world. That story I read at the
beginning ended happily for Olga and her children. But I
could equally have read you a dozen other stories with
not so happy endings. A story from Liz who works in the
middle east, of a Christian who was hung in the local
marketplace; of Pastor Li who has been imprisoned several
times in China for preaching the gospel; of the 400
people who were killed in 2000 in North Korea for owning
a Bible; of those Christian women and children in
southern Sudan who are regularly kidnapped and taken to
the north as slaves; or of Sal, a Pakistani girl who led
a school friend to convert from Islam to Christianity
and, when the girl's brother killed her, was arrested on
the grounds that if she hadn't told her friend about
Christ her friend would still be alive. She spent some
time in prison suffering regular beating and rapes, until
in 1999 the charges were dropped and she was released.
But even then she had to go into hiding in case the
girl's family tried to kill her. |
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The reality of life in this world is that things
don't always work out for good to those who love God. In
our own congregation we have a number of examples of how
things have worked out far from good, in fact tragically,
for people who are totally committed to God. So what do
we understand v28 to be teaching? Is Paul overstating the
case? Has he got it wrong? |
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Well, let me suggest that v28 has been badly
misused by Christians because it's been taken out of
context. It sounds like such a comforting thing to say to
someone who's suffering that it's hard to resist. Someone
has suffered some terrible tragedy and we glibly recite
Rom 8:28 to them. This terrible thing has happened, but
God promises to work things out for good for you in the
end! But the trouble is they've memorised v28 without
also memorising vs29&30. You see this promise is
given in the context of God's plan for his people. It's
given in the context of this passage, that begins with
suffering and ends with glory. |
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Let's read all 3 verses together and see what
they say: "{28}We know that all things
work together for good for those who love God, who are
called according to his purpose. {29}For those
whom he foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to
the image of his Son, in order that he might be the
firstborn within a large family. {30}And those
whom he predestined he also called; and those whom he
called he also justified; and those whom he justified he
also glorified." The context of this promise, you
see, is the last day, when God's people will finally be
released from the suffering of this present age. Having
been justified by Jesus' death on the cross we'll finally
experience the glorification we're longing for. |
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Now God may well bring good out of the evil we
encounter from day to day. He cares for us and watches
over us. He promises that we won't be tempted beyond what
we can bear. He promises to provide a way of escape for
us. He promises to be with us always. But this promise in
v28 isn't a promise, necessarily, for this world. This is
a promise that in the end we'll stand with that host of
witnesses around his throne crying Holy, Holy, Holy is
the Lamb; that in the end, if we persevere, he'll give us
a crown of glory. It's a promise that as we wait in hope,
God is at work, bringing us through to the last day when
that hope will at last be seen, when hope will no longer
be necessary because its fulfillment has come. |
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Let's pray that God would strengthen us to
persevere in the midst of a suffering world, in
confidence that he's bringing all things to completion in
Christ Jesus. |
