Grace to you and peace from God our Father and from our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. Amen.
The text this morning is from the First Epistle of Peter, the 4th and 5th chapters:
Beloved, do not be surprised at the fiery trial when it comes upon you to test you, as though something strange were happening to you. But rejoice insofar as you share Christ’s sufferings, that you may also rejoice and be glad when his glory is revealed. If you are insulted for the name of Christ, you are blessed, because the Spirit of glory and of God rests upon you. But let none of you suffer as a murderer or a thief or an evildoer or as a meddler. Yet if anyone suffers as a Christian, let him not be ashamed, but let him glorify God in that name… And after you have suffered a little while, the God of all grace, who has called you to his eternal glory in Christ, will himself restore, confirm, strengthen, and establish you. To him be the dominion forever and ever. Amen.
Thus far the text.
Dear friends in Christ,
Christ is risen! He is risen, indeed! Alleluia! And this is true and the full foundation of our sermon this morning. Peter, being inspired by the Holy Spirit to write the Word of Christ in this text tells us that suffering, that persecution, that insults, that even having to resist the devil, these are norms in the Christian life.
The Christian in this sinful world is called to suffer. Peter says it right there in the text, “Don’t be surprised at the fiery trial… as though [it were] something strange.” The word he uses here indicates that for the beloved, that is the brothers and sisters of Christ in the one true faith, for the beloved, fiery trials, suffering, are to be expected. If it happens, it’s not something strange, but it is something that was foretold by Christ in John 15, “If the world hates you, know that it has hated me before it hated you. If you were of the world, the world would love you as its own; but because you are not of the world, but I chose you out of the world, therefore the world hates you.”
When the world hates us Christians, it is because it has, since the fall of Adam and Eve into sin, hated God, it’s hated Christ. If it hates God, it will hate those who look like, who sound like, who preach, who eat, who drink, who are baptized by God. It will hate Christians. And the world does hate Christians.
Take for instance the case of Meriam Yehya Ibrahim, a Sudanese woman who was condemned to death by the Sudanese government for first having married a Christian man, and second for having converted to Christianity from Islam. Now, her sentence was delayed until she gave birth, but that happened five days ago, even while her legs were chained together. Now, our Christian sister, a brand new mother, could die if the Sudanese government doesn’t relent. The world hates her. But for Meriam, this is not entirely unexpected. The world hates Christ, it killed Him, it’s going to try to kill Meriam.
Or what of Pastor Saeed Abedini, an Iranian American, who has been jailed in Iran since 2012 for preaching the Gospel of Jesus Christ in Iran for almost a decade. He has suffered and languished in prison, getting closer and closer to death as he is beaten and diseased. But, this isn’t a surprise for Saeed. The world hates Christ, it killed Him, it’s going to try to kill Saeed.
Now, I don’t tell you those stories to shock you, though I do think they are shocking. I tell you them to show you of two individuals who are, today, suffering on behalf of the name of Christ. But this is the norm across the world and across time. Many of our brothers and sisters and suffering in this way. If they had committed murder, if they had stolen something, done something evil, or meddled in the affairs of State, then, yes, we would expect them to suffer to some extent in jail. We would expect this of any person who breaks the Law, and in fact, it’s a good thing for those people to suffer the consequences of their actions. But to suffer in the name of Christ, it’s not unexpected, but it’s not something that, according to the Holy Law of God, we should have to deal with. Yet, all the same, the world does not live according to the Law of God, but by everything that seems good in their own eyes.
For Meriam, for Saeed, and for all here and who will hear this, know this: your suffering, that which you endure for the name of Christ, is suffering that shares in the glory of Christ. Your suffering is not for nothing, but is for the sake of His kingdom. Peter even goes so far today to say that your Christian suffering is sharing in Christ’s sufferings. And where has Christ suffered? In His passion and crucifixion for you, in which He bore your sins to the cross, suffering on your behalf. This was the greatest suffering the world had ever seen, and it was all done for you.
So, why then do we still suffer? Or how is our suffering sharing in the suffering of Christ? I thought that Christ suffered for me, redeeming everything?
The truth is that, yes, Christ suffered for your sin, He suffered for your sorrow, He suffered for your grief and shame. And just as Christ has washed away your sin, so, too does He take away the evil that is in our lives. So, why then do we still suffer?
We still suffer, of course, because of our sin. Our sin has so infected our lives, it has so infected the world, that it even caused the Lord of All Creation to come into this world, to take on our human flesh, and to die on our behalf, and to be raised for our justification. You see, though our sin is washed away, we still suffer the effects of that sin. It is not to say that sin doesn’t exist in us any more, I know it does. But it is to say that our sin no longer has the eternal consequence it should as we are in Jesus Christ. Our sin should curse us, send us to hell. But it doesn’t, and that’s all because of what Christ has done for you upon the cross, saving you from that sin and declaring you righteous on His account.
Yet, our sin still has consequences here, does it not? When you disobey your parents, you get punished. When you mouth off to a police officer, you get arrested. When you lust after another person, you destroy your marriage. Sin has consequences, but none of those will follow you into eternal life and the resurrection. Christ has redeemed all those sins, He has made them His own, and He has taken the eternal punishment for them.
Yet, because we are sinful, and because we are in this sin-filled world, we will still suffer under our sin until the day we die or Jesus returns. But this is suffering that is expected, this is suffering as murderers, thieves, evildoers, and meddlers. This is not the kind of suffering that is in the name of Christ.
I do not want to minimize your suffering in this life. We suffer all kinds of things, physical, mental, emotional suffering. But these are things, again, that are expected as a consequence of our sin. However, suffering in the name of Christ, as Saeed and Meriam are doing, this is suffering that is in the glory of Christ, and how is that? Where was Christ more glorious than upon the cross as He bore our sins unto His death? Where was Christ more Godly than when He suffered on behalf of His people? Glory doesn’t necessarily look like the glowing-white, transfigured Christ. Glory looks like the Lamb who was slain, the one who was wounded for our transgressions, and bruised for iniquities.
When we suffer in Christ’s name, it is the suffering that shares in the same kind of glory Christ endured upon the cross. It is a joyful thing then for the Christian to suffer, for there we mirror our Lord and we find the blessing beyond compare that, for Christ’s name, He will have vengeance upon those who cause us to suffer. This, again, is the cry of the martyrs under the altar in John’s Revelation. But the vengeance is not the destruction of such men who cause this suffering, for that gives God no joy. He does not delight in the death of the wicked Yet, the vengeance we ask for is greater than that. It is our resurrection. We suffer, looking forward to the resurrection. And we know, that by our suffering, we will enter into our rest even sooner, so that we may await with our Lord that joyful day when He will return and bring our bodies up from the ground.
This is the point of suffering. This is how we share it with Christ. Christ’s suffering was necessary for Him to die and for Him to be resurrected. He needed to suffer, for you, so that He would bear your sins and all its effects. But He needed to suffer so that He would die, and there defeat death. For death could not keep Him in the grave. He needed to die so that He could be raised from death, be resurrected. And He did this also for you, so that you would not stay dead in your sins, in your suffering, in your grief, in your sorrow, but that all those things that He has redeemed, you would see the end of in the Resurrection.
For here, your sins have been forgiven in this place, this congregation, because of the authority and testimony of Jesus. You need not suffer in this place, for here your Lord causes you to rest, to hear His Word, to receive His washing, to eat His body and drink His blood. There is no suffering in the Church of Christ, for this is a place of rest, this is a place that preaches the goodness of Christ who will raise you up on the last day. While we suffer on behalf of Christ, in His name, out there in the world, in here there is peace, even despite the sin we all share. For where Christ’s Word is, there is Christ. And for where Christ’s Sacraments are, there is Christ. And where Christ is, there is rest. Where Christ is, there is rest. And where the rest in Christ is, there we are restored, there we are confirmed, strengthened, and established unto everlasting life. For, Christ is risen! He is risen, indeed! Alleluia! He is risen, and He is here, the one who suffered for you that we would suffer in Him unto that everlasting life. In Jesus’ name, amen.
Now may the peace of God which passes all understanding keep your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus, our Lord! Amen.
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