Who wants to make suffering harder in the new year? Not me. Yet, many times we unintentionally make our suffering harder than what it should be or what it could be. In this post, I will explain both how you can make suffering harder in the new year and the opposite of how not to make suffering harder in the new year. Let’s begin.

Anna challenged me

In a recent study in the Gospel of Luke at Christmas, I read over again the story of Anna. Remember, Anna was the aged prophetess who met Joseph, Mary, and Jesus as they received a blessing from Simeon (Luke 2:36-38). Luke describes her as a widow of possibly over 60 years. When she saw Jesus in the Temple as an infant, Luke says she was eighty-four years old. She had lived as a widow for over sixty of those years. Remember that in this time, there was no governmental safety net for widows. They often were some of the poorest people, especially when they were not around family. Anna lived in Jerusalem at the Temple; her family was from far away in northern Israel.

Yet, Luke describes her as serving God with fastings and prayers night and day. In addition, she shared with anyone who would listen the good news of the Christ.

Think about this for just a second. A widow of 60+ years. An aged lady. Poor. A significant sufferer. However, how did she respond to her suffering? Instead of allowing her suffering to dominate her life, she chose a life of faithfulness to God striving to practice the spiritual disciplines while serving others selflessly.

Let me suggest that she embodies the way a person can respond to suffering without making life harder.

 

How do you make suffering harder?

How do you make suffering harder? You make suffering harder when you respond ungodly to it. Let me use two illustrations – one purely from experience and the other from the Biblical text.

Stovetop Burners

We have had a coupe of stoves with smooth top electric burners. Thankfully, a light alerts to their heat before you touch them. However, more than one person has at least brushed them not realizing they were still hot or that someone else had been using the stovetop. As you know, you can get burned quickly.

For illustration purposes, let’s assume that you placed your hand on a mildly hot burner surface and immediately recognized that it was warm and could get painful quickly. Recognizing the discomfort and potential for real harm, you respond. Rather than moving your hand (best) or making sure the burner is off (next best), you leave your hand and turn the heat up higher.

Now you realize that this is just a simple illustration because no one would choose to do this. Both life experience and our logic scream at us to remove your hand and turn off the burner – not leave your hand and turn up the burner.  This would only increase the negative results, discomfort, pain, and hurt.

Let’s apply this simple illustration to responding to our suffering in life. Often when we undergo suffering, we respond in ways similar to the one who keeps the hand on the stovetop surface and turns the heat up. Instead of responding godly in the moment and after-moments of suffering, we respond ungodly to our circumstances. As we do, we turn up the heat and increase the pain rather than help it.

Fruit of the Spirit

The Apostle Paul uses a different illustration to explain this. In Galatians 5-6, he uses the fruit of the Spirit versus the works of the flesh. For someone who walks in the Spirit, this person should experience greater and greater evidences of good, spiritual fruit. Paul mentions nine (love, joy, peace, longsuffering, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control); however, anytime you honor Christ in life is fruit of the Spirit. The nine are only examples, such as the beautiful apples in the basket above are only examples of what great fruit looks like.

As you undergo pressure-filled circumstances in life of any sort, the person who walks in the Spirit manifests the fruit of the Spirit versus the works of the flesh. Paul also gives a sample list of works of the flesh (adultery, fornication, uncleanness, lewdness, idolatry, sorcery, hatred, contentions, jealousies, outbursts of wrath, selfish ambitions, dissensions, heresies, envy, murders, drunkenness, and revelries); however, anytime one does not honor Christ in life, it would be considered works of the flesh.

Therefore, Paul provides two categories of response to life: fruit of the Spirit or works of the flesh. Good fruit or bad fruit. The fruit response, of course, always comes from within the person. What a person wants and who a person lives for produces the fruit. In other words, whatever a person treasures in his or her heart produces the fruit. Good fruit represents one who walks in the Spirit; bad fruit reflects one who walks in the flesh.

Applied to our discussion today, if you respond to your suffering with good fruit, your circumstance will be better. Your suffering will be less intense, less complicated, and less burdensome. The situation itself may not change; however, your response to it will make it more pleasant. If, however, you respond with works of the flesh or bad fruit, your circumstance and suffering will grow worse, harder, and more intense. The pain and hurt will become greater.

Paul proves this when he writes, “Do not be deceived, God is not mocked; for whatever a man sows, that he will also reap. For he who sows to his flesh will of the flesh reap corruption, but he who sows to the Spirit will of the Spirit reap everlasting life. And let us not grow weary while doing good, for in due season we shall reap if we do not lose heart” (Gal 6:7-9).

 

How we can make suffering harder in the upcoming year – or not!

How do you make your suffering harder? By responding ungodly to it. Or, in other words, by responding in works of the flesh rather than walking in the Spirit.

Consider Anna. As a very young widow she chose to walk in the Spirit and respond to her circumstances by practicing the spiritual disciplines and selflessly serving God and others around the Temple. For. Over. Sixty. Years. What was her secret? Her response to suffering.

When we go through deep suffering (and, sometimes, not so deep), our temptation can be to respond in the flesh. As we do, we make our suffering worse. Our suffering gets harder, more intense, and increases our pain/hurt whenever we respond in the flesh.

However, if we will respond in faith and trust God, our faithfulness to Him will provide easier suffering – even though it is still suffering!

In suffering, we must be committed to the spiritual disciplines. Read the Word. Meditate. Pray. Pray more. Include lament prayers. Preach the Gospel to yourself. Read spiritual material to challenge you and help you grow. Practice the one-anothers. Participate in your church body. Selflessly serve others.

As we do these things, even in the midst of suffering, we lessen the intensity of our suffering. We can make suffering harder or not depending upon our response to it. As we walk in the Spirit and the Spirit produces His fruit in us, our suffering lessens, God is honored, we become more like Jesus Christ, and we demonstrate the power of the Gospel to both the saved and unsaved around us. In this process, God will use us. Additionally, our suffering will lessen.

 

Image Credit Giuseppe CUZZOCREA

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