The Fellowship Of Suffering
By Wong Pei LinPhilippians 3:10-11 (NKJV)
“. . . that I may know Him and the power of His resurrection, and the fellowship of His sufferings, being conformed to His death, if, by any means, I may attain to the resurrection from the dead.“
Since receiving Christ in the nadir of my youth, I have, at several junctures of my life, wondered why my loved ones and I are subjected to suffering despite of our faith. This would certainly be one of the top five most frequently asked questions in Heaven’s billboard charts.
In fact, my husband is wrestling with yet another cycle of bodily pain at the time of this writing, and its ripple effects are palpable. In the state of pain, distress and hardship – the very definition of ‘suffering’ in the dictionary – my initial reactions nearly always stem from self-righteousness: “Why us? What now?”
Over the years, God has never failed to meet me in my sufferings, but it is not without challenges. It is admittedly not a comfortable position to be in, having to confront the causes of my afflictions, for I am only human. However, I recognise that my futile attempts of self-justification and rationalisation – such myopia of mind – would have robbed me of growth opportunities that are permissible by God. As C. S. Lewis posits in The Problem of Pain, “. . .pain insists upon being attended to.” If not for the demands of pain, any prompt of self-examination would probably be ignored.
Since suffering is ultimately inevitable, I need a strategy. I remember the moments when I first said ‘yes’ to our Lord and Saviour: I accepted not only the power of His resurrection, but also the fellowship of His sufferings through the shedding of His blood and the resulting death, without which the work on the cross would not have been complete. Since the Incarnation accomplished the impossible by triumphing over death, should I not, as a believer, at least have a shot at overcoming my comparatively trivial sufferings? By first acknowledging the pain, I could then make the best out of it as a springboard to propel myself forward. Surely no one fancies any acquaintance with suffering, but I know better than to avoid it by now; in my experience, it is bound to persist until it is overcome.
To know the fullness of the power of Christ’s resurrection, we need to understand the fellowship of His sufferings through the embracement of our own. As we press on heavenward (v14), the road from glory to glory may be marked by failures and struggles, but take heart in knowing that we are not alone in our sufferings (1 Peter 5:9). Indeed, echoing Apostle Paul, our present sufferings are incomparable to the glory that shall be revealed in us. (Romans 8:18).
Prayer: Heavenly Father, grant us strength, courage and conviction to face and overcome our sufferings instead of running away. We surrender our thoughts and ways in exchange for Your guidance in Your thoughts and ways.
Amen