One of the interesting things about the New Testament record is that suffering is hardly ever mentioned without also a mention of the blessings of suffering.

And often the blessing mentioned is joy.

I was able to locate 18 different places in the New Testament where suffering and joy are found together. The texts I found making this connection between suffering and joy were in the Gospels, the book of Acts, and the epistles. We also know that though Revelation may not mention this connection explicitly, it is implied there.

So according to the Bible, joy and pain can coexist.

Christians don’t talk about suffering unless they also talk about the joy of suffering. It is the joy that makes the cross worthwhile, for it gives us the strength to bear it. As Nehemiah said: “The joy of the Lord is your strength.” (Nehemiah 8:10)

Sharing in suffering

We looked at Paul’s statement in Philippians 3:10 that he wants to “share his [Christ’s] sufferings.” He expands this statement by going on to say, “becoming like him in his death”.

The verb translated “becoming like” here is summorphizø. It means “to cause to be similar in form or style to something else.”

When we suffer with Christ, we become like him. The same thought is given in the familiar text Romans 8:28-29: “And we know that for those who love God all things work together for good, for those who are called according to his purpose. 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 among many brothers.”

The good that comes out of all our experiences is that we will become what God intended when he predestined us: Being conformed to the image of Christ.

Paul goes on to say that when that happens, Jesus becomes our firstborn (Romans 8:29b). But was he not always “the firstborn among many brothers”? He is our elder brother; but if we do not behave like him, he does not seem to be so. We are at that time not who we are meant to be, and that would mean that we are restless, not fully experiencing what it means to be a brother of Christ.

But when we become like him, he truly becomes our brother, and we become what we were made to be. That means that we experience the shalom — the wholeness — that God intended us to have when he created us.

Oneness with Christ

Paul uses the familiar word koinønia in Philippians 3:10, and the literal translation is: “The fellowship of his sufferings.”

There is a depth of oneness with Christ that we can experience only through suffering.

Paul discovered this right at the start of his Christian life when he heard Jesus say: “Saul, Saul, why are you persecuting me?” (Acts 9:4). He was assaulting the church, but guess who was feeling the pain?

The church and Christ had become so united in suffering that when Paul hit the church, he was actually hitting Christ.

Later Paul would expound in depth about what it means to be “in Christ”. In describing our inheritance in Christ, Paul said: “ … if children, then heirs — heirs of God and fellow heirs with Christ, provided we suffer with him in order that we may also be glorified with him” (Romans 8:17, emphasis added).

When we suffer, we are suffering with Christ.

What if our greatest desire in life is to get close to Jesus and we recognise that suffering will help us achieve our ambition? If so, suffering won’t be a big deal to us. It would be something like the trouble one goes through in order to pass an exam or win a gold medal at the Olympic Games.

Toyohiko Kagawa (1888–1960) was a Japanese evangelist and social reformer about whom we will say more later. At one time he thought he was going blind (though this did not happen). He responded to this prospect by saying: “The darkness, the darkness is a holy of holies of which no one can rob me. In the darkness I meet God face to face.”

A Chinese evangelist who spent many years in prison because of his faith said: “If you accept suffering for your faith as a privilege, it becomes your friend and brings you closer to God.”

A Romanian pastor who also suffered under Communist rule said: “Christians are like nails; the harder you hit them, the deeper they go.”

Within the will of God

Few heroes in missionary history suffered as much as the medical doctor David Livingstone (1813–1873). It is said that even during the most severe periods of anti-western sentiment in Africa, people always had a good word to say about Livingstone.

He was an explorer who opened up the interior of Africa to the outside world. And he had two aims in doing that. The first was to open the interior so missionaries could take the Gospel to the people there.

The second was to open Africa to legitimate trade so the horrible slave-trading in human flesh would end. His reports had a big part to play in the abolition of slavery in the western world.

His hand was bitten and maimed by a lion. His wife died on the field. He was often alone in his travels. The one house he built was burned. And often his body would be wracked by dysentery and fever. Someone once told him that he had sacrificed a lot for the Gospel.

His response was: “Sacrifice? The only sacrifice is to live outside the will of God.”

He was asked what helped him go on despite so much hardship. He said that, always ringing in his ears, even when he was terribly sick, were the words of Jesus: “Lo, I am with you always, even unto the end of the world” (Matthew 28:20, KJV).

Livingstone once said: “Without Christ not one step; with him anywhere.”

The presence of Christ with us as we face bitterness, hypocrisy, wickedness and persecution is one of the things that helps us avoid bitterness ourselves.

Looking at Jesus refreshes us because we see a love that is greater than all the hatred in the world!

David wrote Psalm 27 when he was going through some really bad experiences. He even talked about his parents forsaking him (Psalm 27:10).

His primary solution to his problems is very enlightening: “One thing have I asked of the Lord, that will I seek after: that I may dwell in the house of the Lord all the days of my life, to gaze upon the beauty of the Lord and to inquire in his temple” (Psalm 27:4).

He wanted to wait in the presence of God and gaze at the beauty of God. This gaze cleans our life from the hurts inflicted on us and leaves it fresh with the glow of the love of God in the heart.

I have heard the statement that we must glance at our problems and gaze at Jesus. I must say that usually I end up giving more than a glance when facing a big problem.

The laments in the Bible suggest that even God’s great saints had to grapple for some time with the pain they were facing.

However, once the lament is complete and the light of God’s comfort clears our vision, we can gaze at Jesus. And that gaze refreshes us and takes away our bitterness, replacing it with the joy of knowing that God loves us so much.

Gazing at Jesus

The belief that God works for our good usually grows as we have experiences that validate this scriptural truth.

After several such validations, we learn to submit to what the Scriptures say about our painful experiences. And we affirm that even these will be used by God to become blessings to us.

We learn to believe what the Bible says about pain in the life of a Christian.

Paul said: “And we know that for those who love God all things work together for good, for those who are called according to his purpose.” (Romans 8:28) 

Paul’s affirmation of his belief – “we know” – is in the perfect tense in the Greek. This tense is used for completed actions in the past, the effects of which are ongoing.

When something terrible happens to Christians, they may weep and groan; they may get angry at the injustice of it all and even argue with God. 

But deep down in their hearts there is a truth that finally influences the way they respond to the problem — the truth that God will turn even this terrible thing into something good.

They reason: “I have read it in God’s Word. I have experienced it in my life. Now I know for sure that it will be okay.”