e 163 God’s Gift of Grace and Suffering (let the Holy Spirit comfort my earthly walk for Christ)

This is Faith to Witness 99, motivating us to hear God and share the Shepherd.  

Season 3 Episode 163 God’s Gift of Grace and Suffering (let the Holy Spirit comfort my earthly walk for Christ)

Here’s the gist, human. Misrepresenting Jesus is to posture about his persona instead of emulating his power. We have a choice: to reflect Jesus, or to mispresent him. God grants believers the gift of suffering for Christ. It is not a consequence of sin. It is a consequence of being a believer. That’s how I see it. Paul tells us that believing and suffering are gifts from God. The Holy Spirit is not with us to comfort us by never challenging us. He is with me; He is with you to comfort us in the struggle. I think it is a struggling toward, a suffering toward relationships that stand firm in one Spirit. And proof to adversaries that they are condemned by their behavior.

E163. Thanks for listening.

As I travel through my days with the apostle Paul in my ear, the clearer it is to me that his spiritual gift (one of) is to contain all of life, the full embodiment of the resurrected Christ in a few simple passages. And he does it again and again. Like I could take a few simple verses and be on my merry little spiritual way.

Philippians 1:27-30, for instance. Listen with me.

Philippians 1:27-30

 

Life Worthy of the Gospel

 

27 Whatever happens, conduct yourselves in a manner worthy of the gospel of Christ. Then, whether I come and see you or only hear about you in my absence, I will know that you stand firm in the one Spirit, striving together as one for the faith of the gospel 28 without being frightened in any way by those who oppose you. This is a sign to them that they will be destroyed, but that you will be saved—and that by God. 29 For it has been granted to you on behalf of Christ not only to believe in him, but also to suffer for him, 30 since you are going through the same struggle you saw I had, and now hear that I still have.

 

He prefaces his affirmations with this:  “Whatever happens.”

Paul’s life has been full of “whatever happens.” And hasn’t yours?  Isn’t this the question rumbling from deep within… that guttural sound of our thoughts imagining our worst fears, our casual worries, and all the anxiety nesting comfortably in our day to day?

Is My Life, Is Your Life Worthy of the Gospel of Christ?

Yet Paul dismisses the reality we live in, the future we will face and have to walk through because we are not what?  We are not earthly citizens, we are heavenly citizens. While we navigate an earthly life, we live as heavenly citizens.

Jesus did it first. He walked our walk, then ascended. So now we walk as he did, because we will ascend.

Paul gives us motivation for a life worthy of the gospel through relationships in one spirit, and an undeniable affirmation of why we suffer. We are each left with the Holy Spirit to accept God’s gift of suffering and the ability to balance our private and public life. Just as Jesus did.

Verse 27 says, “Whatever happens, conduct yourselves in a manner worthy of the gospel of Christ.”

Being worthy of the gospel, in other words, being worthy of the life Jesus lived.

The Greek word used for “conduct yourselves” (politeuomai – poly too oh my) implies living out one’s citizenship responsibilities. Being a citizen is not the same as a being a member of a Club, or a subscriber to a service. It is not buying a cool car that you drive around your neighborhood in all its glory, then park in a driveway of a house that is in spiritual shambles.

Being a citizen is about where we live every day.

It’s easy to fall into misrepresentation, to building a brand kit for our witness—to linger too long on or bend too many ways and times to catch the next trend. I guard my heart; no, I pray that God guards my heart against doing this. Branding cool Christianity. My witness should be authentic to how God formed my witness from my birth mother’s womb (Psalm 22:10), not to how I can stand out in the world.

Misrepresenting Jesus is to posture about his persona instead of emulating his power.

Representing Jesus in his glory is to bring to others the forgiveness he has shown you, and how you are changed, with a new identity in Christ.

We have a choice: to reflect Jesus, or to mispresent him. Jesus is the Word, so digging into the Word is how we know him, how we embrace our new identity for others to see.

To Suffer For Jesus

Dr. Tim Mackie, the Bible Project, says that suffering is “living out the story of Jesus” and that when we live worthy of the gospel, we are living a “consistent, unified life that visually represents the reality and power of the gospel to the surrounding culture.”

Mackie is talking about the power of context. The adversity Jesus faced in his walk, is the same adversity we face. So how do we suffer, when was the last time we suffered for his name?

Paul says in Philippians 1: 29:

 

29 For it has been granted to you on behalf of Christ not only to believe in him, but also to suffer for him, 30 since you are going through the same struggle you saw I had, and now hear that I still have.

God grants believers the gift of suffering for Christ. It is not a consequence of sin. That’s how I see it. It is a consequence of being a believer. Paul tells us in verse 29 that believing and suffering are gifts: The ability to believe and the grace to suffer for Christ are both gifts from God, and believers are to prize suffering as a valuable part of their faith. 

And this: that verse 30 tells us that this gift is a shared conflict in our relationships with each other.

How do we suffer FOR Christ?

Well Paul tells us in verse 28 that suffering is a sign of salvation and a call to endure with courage:

28 without being frightened in any way by those who oppose you. This is a sign to them that they will be destroyed, but that you will be saved—and that by God.

Paul returns to his “whatever happens” mindset with “in any way” – again, denouncing even a speck of fear in the face of those who oppose you. And that our solid stance is not only a sign to us, but proof to adversaries that they are condemned by their behavior.

Why is this needed? Christ gifts us the strength to withstand persecution; that how he bore the cross, how he responded to people along the way… gives us cues to how to have conversations with others.

I am hearing a command to turn away from comfort.

What this tells me is to turn myself toward suffering and draw my comfort from the Holy Spirit.

Struggle Toward Relationships that Stand Firm in the One Spirit

What do our relationships look like if we are trying to embrace one spirit? Because this is not easy if we want our relationships to go past the programmed corporate response of reciprocal amens and shared praises. Life’s grit infiltrates our conversations, actions, and the consequences we share as humans. Yet our relationships are not defined by life’s grit, but by the living, breathing resurrected Son of God, who is always giving us the next earthly step toward our home with him.

The Holy Spirit is not with us to comfort us by never challenging us. He is with me; He is with you to comfort us in the struggle. I think it is a struggling toward, a suffering toward relationships that stand firm in one Spirit.

That we struggle toward relationships in one spirit.

In verse 28, “Stand firm” means to “stand fast”, used as a military term, calling for unity in spirit and mind, like soldiers standing shoulder-to-shoulder. I love the power of this because it shows us facing a shared direction together. We are not facing each other, opposing each other, in some self-centered battle of our spirits. No, we are turned toward a common goal. The goal of the gospel. We are turned toward the face of Jesus. That all should come to first see Jesus, then know Jesus and accept him as Lord. And Savior.

The enemy prefers we be paralyzed by internal conflict or withdrawing from each other out of confusion, fear and the pursuit of earthly comfort. Comfort that feeds our selfish emotional, psychological needs instead of our identity in Christ.

What we should turn toward, accept and welcome is the courage to deal with rejection: how to process rejection, how to recover from being wearied by rejection and how to become empowered by rejection.

And that we understand this:  Assuming everyone in your path in a day is part of God’s purpose for your witness THAT day. It involves suffering and leaning toward a unified spirit in Christ.

Jesus Showed Us a Private and Public Life

So, we have to ask ourselves this question: 

What are the signs of my salvation today? From within my private life and relationship with Jesus, and the public witness others see.

I am asked this often: how do I build my relationship with Jesus and his Word? The answer is the process I am sharing today, what we just went through. The Holy Spirit selects a passage for my heart, my mind, my soul, and lays it on me. It’s like a spiritual “stitch fix.”

Oh, yeah. That. Timely insights to clothe me for my spirit-walk.

So, I am here, and wanting to dive deeper into all of this, and I can. There’s always next week. But also germinating in my mind and heart is the message I heard from our pastor yesterday about how we have been charged to lead a ministry of reconciliation. (2 Corinthians 5:18).

Let’s set this up, human. Because I hear this as the lead question in my head all the time: When was the last time you were persecuted? Was it a human or the enemy?

It’s becoming clearer to me, more spiritually accessible maybe, that persecution comes from people, but also directly from the enemies’ sway of this world and his attempts to rule my earthly life.

(God gave this influence over the world to him, remember?)

And that is important to discern:  public persecution from humans vs private persecution from the enemy. And how we gain some spiritual clarity, or maybe just a window into our journey and share the power of the process with others. Because at the core of it is this: reconciliation.

Embracing how Jesus reconciles our earthly lives, both public and private, is key to laying down an accessible witness to others—for instance, the one who has strayed from the 99, or the one who has never had a 99. A witness that can open her or his heart, and give the courage needed to embrace that shared conflict. And believe.

Join us for e164.