1 Peter 4:12-19

12 Dear friends, do not be surprised at the fiery ordeal that has come on you to test you, as though something strange were happening to you. 13 But rejoice inasmuch as you participate in the sufferings of Christ, so that you may be overjoyed when his glory is revealed. 14 If you are insulted because of the name of Christ, you are blessed, for the Spirit of glory and of God rests on you. 15 If you suffer, it should not be as a murderer or thief or any other kind of criminal, or even as a meddler. 16 However, if you suffer as a Christian, do not be ashamed, but praise God that you bear that name. 17 For it is time for judgment to begin with God’s household; and if it begins with us, what will the outcome be for those who do not obey the gospel of God? 18 And, “If it is hard for the righteous to be saved,  what will become of the ungodly and the sinner?” 19 So then, those who suffer according to God’s will should commit themselves to their faithful Creator and continue to do good.

What do you do when the rug is ripped out from under you? Do you panic and protest or praise? Do you get angry at the Almighty and doubt the Lord’s love? Do you respond with resentment or rejoicing? Do you trust God to get you through the tough times or toss in the towel? Do you believe or become bitter? Peter suffered greatly as a servant of God, and his words of wisdom come from a walk that was shaped through the school of suffering.  God allowed suffering and conflict to carve and change the stubborn, impulsive, self-confident apostle into the steady, solid rock servant that Jesus spoke about in Mathew 16. Yet many Christians are surprised, even shocked when the trials and sufferings of Christ come into their lives. There is a popular theology today, promoted by prosperity preachers, that teaches that the sun always shines upon good Christians, that our grass is always green, and that suffering doesn’t come to those who serve the Savior. This is not the preaching of Peter who in chapter 3:13-18 teaches that Christians will suffer for doing good. The problem with prosperity preaching is that it offers us the hand of happiness when we really need the hope of holiness. These false teachers proclaim a pain free life for those who have proper faith, but even Abraham the father of faith faced affliction. Sure we like the idea that there is no difficulty or distress for those who walk in the will of God, but it’s not based on the bible, and to live life expecting a problem free path is to live in a lie.  So how do we gain a proper perspective on pain and make sense of suffering? Peter teaches us how to handle hardships and keep pain in a proper, heavenly perspective by:

• Expecting Suffering

First mental and spiritual readiness for suffering is stressed in verse 12, “Dear friends, do not be surprised at the fiery ordeal that has come on you to test you, as though something strange were happening to you.” Why do we view suffering as strange today, because we are not willing to submit to the truth and teaching of scripture. Our conversion does not exempt us from calamity. We should not be surprised when fiery trials come our way because we are in a spiritual battle against Satan, an adversary that loves to afflict. Christians have faced trials for their faith from the beginning of the church and will continue to until God takes us home to heaven. Yet often when we encounter the waves and tides of tribulation we tend to whine. When the trials come we are tempted to ask why me, when maybe the right question is, Why not me? For if suffering sanctifies and loosens sin’s grip on us, if it conforms us to Christ and causes others to see us differently. If it forces us to focus on the Father, driving us to dependency on Him, with an eternal expectation as we put our hope in heaven then why wouldn’t we embrace it as a necessary part of our growth? Because we are pursuing the perishable not the permanent, living for pleasure in the moment instead of the Master. What do you crave, what are you chasing is it contentment and convenience or conforming to Christ, change or comfort? You see suffering for the Savior only makes sense when it is seen through the perspective of eternity. Are you viewing life through the long lens of eternity or the tiny lens of time? Have you ever looked at the rocks in a fast flowing river? They may differ in color, size and physical characteristics but they all have one thing in common, they are all conformed by the current. The rigors of the river round their rough edges. Suffering can smooth our sharp edges, tribulation can transform our temperaments our tongues and even our thoughts.  Do you believe that God can bring beauty out of the buffeting storms of life? That problems in the hand of the Prince of peace can purify and perfect? That God can use groaning times to grow us? That rough times can refine and allow us to reflect His glory? Even though circumstances can be devastating, God uses them to conform our character, making us into patient people with humble hearts, so we are sensitive to His Spirit. Pain can be a productive potter if we have a proper perspective, but suffering will either mold you or make you miserable.  We may wish for life’s streams to be a clear and calm so we can live undisturbed, but God sees our rough edges and acts in grace to remove and refine us. As Peter talks about trials he uses the term fiery, referring to a furnace which is used to purge metal of impurities. The trial of a believer is like a refining process, the intent is to improve its value not destroy the metal. There are things you need to learn that can only be learned in the lean times, through the school of suffering. God knows what it takes to transform you, the question is do you trust Him in the trials? It’s not a matter of surrendering to suffering but submitting to the Savior who is sovereign over your suffering.  There is a story told about a black smith who had trusted Christ as his Savior. While he was working at his anvil he was confronted by an inquiring unbeliever. “Why is it you have so much trouble the man asked?”I have watched you since you became a Christian and you have had many problems. I thought when a person gave himself to God his troubles were over.” A smile came across the blacksmith’s face as he replied, “Do you see this piece of steel? I’m going to use it for the springs of a carriage. But first it needs to be heated. Then I hammer it, bend it, and shape it the way I want it. Sometimes, however, I find that the steel is too brittle to be used, so I have to throw it on the scrap heap. As scrap, the steel is worth just a few pennies, but as a carriage spring, it is very valuable. Ever since I began applying this idea to my life, I have been saying to God, ‘Lord, test me in any way You choose, but don’t throw me on the scrap heap.” When God in His grace saves us, it is for a special purpose, to live for Him so that others may see our good works, and glorify our Father, Matthew 5:16. So He uses the testing’s and trials of life to transform us.

• Exulted through Suffering

Peter now calls us to praise in our pain why, because of the transformation potential that accompanies trials. Suffering and glory are twin truths woven into the fabric of faith, hardship and holiness go hand in hand. The glory of the Lord lies ahead but it runs through the refining road of suffering. We can’t have the crown without the cross. Suffering allows us to experience the glory, and Jesus gave a great illustration concerning this suffering in John 16:21. He reminded us that after a woman endures the pain and suffering of child birth, she forgets about the agony when her baby is born because the suffering is transformed into glory. It is the same baby that causes both pain and pleasure. The pleasure isn’t in the process but in the product.  Will your focus be on the brutality of the birth or the blessing of the baby?  We can have hope even in the hardships and heartaches of this life because one day the groaning’s will turn to glory. That which is breaking your heart right now will one day be a blessing. Because of His promise the saved don’t just surviving suffering, they singing in their suffering. Those who bless God in their trials are blessed by God through their trials. A proper perspective on suffering sees that everything we suffer for the sake of Christ is a privilege, not a penalty. So today don’t let suffering take you by surprise or stifle your song.

Psalms 126

1 When the Lord restored the fortunes of Zion, we were like those who dreamed.2 Our mouths were filled with laughter, our tongues with songs of joy. Then it was said among the nations, “The Lord has done great things for them.” 3 The Lord has done great things for us, and we are filled with joy.4 Restore our fortunes] Lord, like streams in the Negev.5 Those who sow with tears will reap with songs of joy.6 Those who go out weeping, carrying seed to sow, will return with songs of joy, carrying sheaves with them.

After discovering joy as we reflect on the past we now look forward in verses 4-6 to the anticipated joy of the future. One reason for our rejoicing is that His redemptive work is still being revealed and realized in us. In verse 4 they ask God to “restore” the nation’s “fortunes”, some restoration has occurred, but a fuller measure is still to be seen. An analogy is made as the singer asks that the nation be restored “like streams in the Negev.” The Negev is a desert land, and its name means “dry” referring to desert waterways, called wadis, which are bone-dry most of the year, but in the rainy season this barren land is transformed. As the wadis fill with rain they become streams of life giving water which wash over the dry parched land transforming the barren into bloom.  What was formerly arid and uniformly tan and grey becomes a carpet of color. This transformation of barren to bloom is what the singers of this psalm are looking forward to. A completion of God’s redemption in the future, which results in a lush, luxuriant landscape of life. Growing up in the Middle East I got to witness this wonderful desert transformation, as new tender green shoots emerge from the dead dry dust. What was formerly dead becomes alive and dynamic like a dream come true.  Just as the rain restores the Negev, so God will restore us, bringing rain to our drought-stricken lives.  Just as the singers of Psalm 126 looked forward to a second coming of God’s redemption, like a dead desert exploding into a dynamic blossom, so too can Christians at this season of advent also forward to the second coming when Jesus will make all things new. In Isaiah 65:17-19 17 we read “Look! I am creating new heavens and a new earth, and no one will even think about the old ones anymore. 18 Be glad; rejoice forever in my creation! And look! I will create Jerusalem as a place of happiness. Her people will be a source of joy. 19 I will rejoice over Jerusalem and delight in my people. And the sound of weeping and crying will be heard in it no more “This is not the only prophecy of the new heavens and earth in Scripture but it is one of the most familiar. It is here that we learn about the lamb and wolf dwelling together and the lion eating grass like an ox. Things that we would say feel more like a dream than reality. Some teach that these images are simply metaphors of  peace and tranquility. Yet I disagree, no more than John’s visions of the New Jerusalem are fanciful. Streets paved in gold? Gold that is as transparent as glass? A city in the form of a cube 1500 miles on each side?  Amazing, astounding, breath-taking dream like images, yet why do we suppose that the God who has made all that we see cannot do as he says? What is more real or more likely, what God does at the beginning, or what he has reserved for the end? Now these singers share some difficult truths as they remind us of the reality of living between the rescue and the redemption between the first and the second coming. When the gift of God first came into the world as a man, and the one where that man, Jesus Christ, will return back to the earth to complete his work of redemption. It is here that Psalm 126 concludes with advice for those of us living in the middle. This middle time is marked by two features, sorrow and sowing, weeping and reaping. This in-between time of sowing seed is a sorrowful and costly one. We are reminded that it will be a painful path and not the picture of pleasure that the preachers of the prosperity gospel paint. To conclude that Christians should be happy in the here and now means to carefully cut out a large bulk of the bible. It means to tear out the teachings on testing’s and trials, and carefully sweep the sorrows and sufferings under the carpet. To ignore the labors, persecutions, difficulties, dangers and discouragements. To forget about the pain that is painted all over the epistles, and hung throughout the history of the Church. Paul was absolutely correct when he wrote in 2 Timothy 3:12 these words “Yes, and all who desire to live godly in Christ Jesus will suffer persecution.” Today we seem to forget or forgo talking about the tears but tears in the Bible are apparently in order with some of God’s greatest people. Joseph wept, Hannah, David, Hezekiah, Ezra, Nehemiah, Jeremiah, Peter, Jesus, Mary, Paul, and John wept. The people in psalm 126 still had a lot of problems even after their return from exile. God’s mighty deliverance was followed by depression and disappointment as described in Haggai 1:5-11 and the local opposition in Ezra. Those that had come out of captivity were still in distress even in their own land, Nehemiah 1:3. They had to have faith in their Father that He would continue to be with them and bring them through the trials. You see all these sorrowful things are like seed sown in the ground and those who sow such things will come back with rejoicing, bringing their sheaves with them. It was Jesus who showed us how redemptive and productive suffering is to the spiritual life. Enduring the opposition, persecution, and finally crucifixion by sinners was not pleasant but painful. Because of the joy awaiting Him, He endured the cross, disregarding its shame and now He is seated in the place of honor beside God’s throne. We see it in the painful and sorrowful labors that attend the work of the gospel, and the joy of final redemption when Jesus returns. Paul wrote in 1 Thessalonians 5:14-15, “Now we exhort you, brethren, warn those who are unruly, comfort the fainthearted, uphold the weak, be patient with all. 15 See that no one renders evil for evil to anyone, but always pursue what is good both for yourselves and for all.” Most of the time living the life that Paul preached about is not fun, you invest yourself, your words, actions, money, and materials in the lives of others. It’s like taking precious seed and burying it in the dirt. Yet, Paul, like Psalm 126, sounds the other note as well. “16 Rejoice always, 17 pray without ceasing, 18 in everything give thanks; for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you. And, may the God of peace Himself sanctify you completely; and may your whole spirit, soul, and body be preserved blameless at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ. 24 He who calls you is faithful, who also will do it.” As you contemplate Christmas and prepare your heart to celebrate God’s first coming, respond to His invitation to indulge yourself in the joy of Immanuel, the God-with-us that is so wonderful it’s like a dream come true. As we live between the dream come true and the dream for which we are waiting to come true, let us serve Him by sowing the good seed with sorrow. Knowing that the One who kept His promise, coming to the cradle, will come again on the clouds. Joy is essential to our lives; it is the experience of knowing that we are loved, and that nothing in this world can take that love away. One of the rarely spoken truths is that we often discover joy in the midst of sorrow. It is as a pilgrim on these painful paths that we become most aware of a spiritual reality bigger than ourselves that helps us to hope. We may undergo hardship, but God has the last word of hope. This means we can rejoice even when our dreams are not realized, because Joy is not an escape from sorrow. How many foolishly put their hope in the thought that they can achieve joy by eliminating the things in life that hurt. We have become experts in constructing foolish and futile strategies for achieving joy. But its only when we come to the end of our resources that we realize that joy is what God gives, not what we work up. True joy reminds us that we can face reality, because we do so with the assurance that God is working in our lives, even in the things that cause us pain, to bring about His perfect will. So if your Christmas isn’t all it’s cracked up to be don’t worry, you still have Jesus and that means you have joy.