Sermon on 2 Corinthians 1:1–11: Suffering, comfort, and authentic Christian ministry
A Bible talk from Latimer church exploring how affliction marks genuine Christian ministry and how God uses suffering for his purposes.
Summary
This is a sermon delivered at Latimer church on 2 Corinthians 1:1–11, in which the preacher introduces a series on Paul's second letter to the Corinthians. The speaker argues that authentic Christian ministry is not marked by success, power, and growth — as the Corinthian church was drawn to — but by suffering, weakness, and affliction. He contends that Paul wrote 2 Corinthians both to defend his apostolic authority and to reframe suffering as a sign of genuine faith rather than divine neglect. The sermon draws on figures including Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Charles Spurgeon, Tim Keller, and Elizabeth Elliot to illustrate how God uses affliction to comfort his people and teach reliance on him.
Key Takeaways
FULL TRANSCRIPT
The appeal of successful ministry
I heard recently of a church that is growing rapidly. It was a church that started as a church plant, just a small gathering of twelve people meeting in someone's living room. Over the last decade it has grown into a church of hundreds. They have had the great joy of seeing many people come to faith in the Lord Jesus. They moved from the lounge room into a bigger venue, and then a bigger one again, and then a bigger one again, and now they own a venue, and another one is on long-term lease in another part of the city.
The pastor of that church is a very gifted and capable leader. He's a powerful preacher. He's a visionary kind of leader who knows what he would love to see under God and is able to inspire and lead people towards that. Over the years the staff team has grown with equally gifted men and women. They recently sent one of their young upcoming pastors to plant a church in a new region. The church finances over the years have struggled, been up and down, but recently they've really improved and the budget is now in the millions. The church seems to be going from strength to strength, and certainly from the outside looking in, it seems that God is blessing the ministry of this young church.
I'm sure you're aware of churches like the one I've just described. And there is something in us, isn't there, that's attracted to that kind of ministry. It's successful. It's doing great things for God. It's going somewhere. It's got strong leadership and clear direction. It's exciting to watch and it's exciting to be a part of, and we're drawn to it. It's impressive. And we should certainly praise God whenever we hear of churches bearing gospel fruit.
The church of Corinth and its culture
It seems that the church of Corinth was drawn to that kind of ministry in the first century as well. The city of Corinth was a big, thriving city in what today is southern Greece. It was located between two ports and so it thrived as a Roman centre for trade. It was rebuilt by Julius Caesar in 44 BC, and so by the middle of the first century it was only around a hundred years old — a thriving place that was growing. It was known for its education, sophistication, and philosophy. If you wanted to move to a place that was popular and hip and where everything was happening, Corinth was the place to be. It was a city of pleasure and of high living.
It was into this city that the Apostle Paul entered in the middle of the first century and began preaching this message of Jesus, who died on a cross and rose from the dead and called people to follow him. We can read about Paul's first visit to Corinth in the book of Acts, chapter 18 — I encourage you to go away and read it. As Paul preaches this message of Jesus, many people believe him, and so a church is planted. Paul stays with these new believers in the city of Corinth for over a year and a half, teaching them the word of God, before he then leaves them and moves on to other places.
When Paul moves on, it's not very long before trouble begins to arise in the church. The church is influenced by the culture around them and drawn to success. They value strong leadership. They enjoy the pleasures of the world around them. They want to be popular, powerful, and influential. Quarrels arise in the church where they start fighting over their different leaders. Sin creeps in. And they're drawn away from Paul's leadership towards apparently better, stronger, more influential leaders of their own. But those leaders start to teach a message that is very different to Paul's message of Jesus Christ.
And so a series of letters are sent between Paul the Apostle and this church, in which Paul warns the church in Corinth not to walk away from Jesus. In our Bibles we only have two of these letters preserved for us — 1 Corinthians and 2 Corinthians. But as we read these letters themselves, it's clear that there were other letters written as well that have not been preserved through history. So 2 Corinthians is actually likely Paul's fourth letter to the church of Corinth, written only about five years after Paul first planted the church.
The relationship between Paul and this young church is strained, but it is recovering. The church has started to repent and turn back to Paul, back to the teaching about Jesus. And so Paul writes in response to their change. In comparison to some of the other leaders in the church, Paul seemed pretty weak. He wasn't particularly influential or eloquent. His ministry was not marked by success and power and popularity, but rather by suffering and weakness.
The two purposes of 2 Corinthians
There are two key reasons that Paul writes this letter to the Corinthians. The first is to defend his authority as an apostle in the church. The second is to show the Corinthians that authentic Christian ministry is not necessarily marked by success and power, but rather by suffering and affliction and weakness. And these two themes are introduced for us even in these opening verses.
Paul defends his authority as an apostle and speaks about weakness being the mark of authentic ministry. Have a look at verse 1. Paul introduces himself as an apostle: Paul, an apostle of Christ Jesus by the will of God, and Timothy our brother. Christ Jesus is not so much a name as a title. The word Christ means Messiah or King. And so Paul is saying, I am an apostle of the King, King Jesus. And the word apostle means representative. He's saying, I, Paul, am a representative of the King, Jesus Christ, and I have been appointed as the representative of the King by the will of God.
You can see in the way he introduces himself what he's doing. He's defending his authority. To reject the Apostle Paul is to reject Jesus, whom he represents, and ultimately to reject God himself, who sent Paul as a representative. He writes this letter along with his co-worker Timothy.
The same God who sent Paul and appointed him to represent Jesus is the God that the church in Corinth belonged to. Notice how he addresses them: to the church of God — not the church of Corinth, but the church of God in Corinth — together with all his holy people throughout Achaia. The same God who sent Paul is the same God these people in Corinth belonged to.
Suffering as the mark of authentic ministry
Paul's defence of himself and his ministry is right here at the beginning of the letter, and it carries on through the letter as we'll see in coming weeks. But so is this theme — this idea that authentic Christian ministry is marked by weakness. In verses 3 to 11, Paul starts to show the Corinthians how affliction and suffering are used by God for his good purposes.
I think our culture today is actually pretty similar to the Corinthian culture in many ways. Like them, we tend to love success and power and comfort, and we shy away from suffering and weakness. In 2018, a book was published called The Coddling of the American Mind, written by Jonathan Haidt and Greg Lukianoff. In this book, these two authors argue that we're teaching young people today a number of untruths. The first one they argue is that we're teaching young people that suffering is always bad — there's nothing good in it, so avoid it. It used to be said that what doesn't kill you makes you stronger, but now we tell young people that what doesn't kill you will make you weaker. In other words, there's nothing good in affliction.
I think they're right. That is the message we hear, isn't it? That it's way better to live a life of comfort than a life of affliction. I think that's true not just in America but here in New Zealand. We strive towards success and comfort. It's why we're impressed by stories of churches that are just growing, that seem to have no difficulties, that go from strength to strength — big budgets, impressive buildings, strong leadership, rapid growth. We love that.
But Paul says that real, authentic Christian ministry is actually marked not by success but by suffering. Not by power but by weakness. Not by influence but by affliction. I think that's hugely comforting. It's comforting because how many of us have had the experience of Christian ministry being hard?
Take, for example, the task that is given to every follower of Jesus — to make followers of Jesus. If you follow Jesus, your job given to you by God is that you are to tell other people about Jesus so that they might follow him. It's what drives us as a church. We long to see people in our city come to know the Lord Jesus. How many of you have found that easy? Like, you've just led hundreds of people to Jesus. If that is your experience, praise God. But I reckon that's not our normal experience. The work of evangelism, which we know we ought to do, is actually really, really hard. It is full of frustration and disappointment. The people we would long to see come to know Jesus, we pray for regularly, and they just don't seem interested. Whenever we try to invite someone to church, or invite someone to a life course, or invite someone to hear something about Jesus, they laugh it off. And if we try to say something about God, we're just met with being shut down. It's hard, isn't it? It's easy to despair if we think the Christian life should all be about success. And so it's a comfort for Paul to say, no, it's actually about weakness.
Or as another example — I know many of you are wonderfully serving our church family by teaching the Bible in different contexts, whether it's our kids, our other congregations, our youth, or maybe in our growth groups where you teach the Bible. Don't you long for your Bible teaching ministry to be powerful? You do all of this hard work preparing to teach a passage to your group and you think, tonight God is going to change them. But then you just don't necessarily see it. You can meet with the same group of people for weeks, months, teach the same classroom of kids over years, and it's the same problems. Ministry is — our experience of ministry is so often marked by weakness and suffering.
And the Apostle Paul says, yes, praise God, because that is the sign of genuine, authentic Christian ministry.
God as the Father of compassion and the God of all comfort
Notice what he says in verse 3: Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of compassion and the God of all comfort, who comforts us in all our troubles. If your life is marked with strength and power and success, you don't really need compassion or comfort. But Paul knows that life is not like that — that actually life is full of affliction and hardship. And so Paul reminds the Corinthians of what God is like.
Isn't it a wonderful description of the living God? The Father of compassion and the God of comfort. He's saying it is in God's very nature, it is who he is, to be compassionate. He's the God who longs to comfort people. That's what he's like. He's not distant. He doesn't withdraw from those in need. He's not blind to your affliction, but rather he draws near to people in compassion and comforts them. The word comfort doesn't just mean console — it means encourage, strengthen, and build up. That's what God does. He strengthens and builds up his people.
We all long to be comforted when life is difficult, don't we? Of course we do. And we turn to all sorts of things looking for comfort. That's why you talk about comfort food — who doesn't love an overdose of chocolate through tears? We turn to food for comfort. Or maybe we turn to friends and family. When life is really hard, we turn to those we trust and love, looking for comfort, hoping they'll say something that'll help. Or maybe we run to the professionals — we go to the doctor, hoping they'll be able to comfort us with some hope for treatment. Or we run to the accountant, hoping they'll be able to say something that will ease the financial pressure. Or we turn to our boss at work, hoping they'll be able to secure our job just a little bit longer. Or maybe we run to the screen, binge-watching television or gaming, escaping the hardship, looking for comfort. Or worse still, maybe we turn to drugs or alcohol or sex, as so many people around us do, looking for comfort.
But real comfort, lasting comfort, can only be found in the living God, the God of all comfort. And the Bible says that over and over again. All through the Bible, God is described like this. In Isaiah chapter 66, God comforts his people, and he says his comfort is compared to that of a mother. God says, as a mother comforts a child, so I will comfort you. Imagine — perhaps you don't have to imagine, perhaps it's your reality at the moment — a baby screaming, inconsolable, upset, getting more and more worked up, little red cheeks, tears streaming down. And the mother just wants to comfort the child. So she takes the little baby up in her arms and she hushes it and sings to it and she wipes away the tears and she nurses the child. She's comforting her child. And God says, that is what I will do for you. I'll comfort my people like a mother.
Or in Psalm 103 verse 13, he compares his compassion to that of a father: as a father has compassion on his children, so the Lord has compassion on those who fear him. Imagine a father, and their child — their son — comes home from school one day and he's beside himself. He's crying because he's been bullied. He doesn't want to go back to school ever again. And the father is filled with compassion. He just wants to help. He wants to defend his son, protect him, care for him, comfort him. God is like that towards his people.
Now friends, I know that in the middle of suffering, that doesn't always feel true, does it? God can feel distant. It can feel like he's doing nothing to help you, that you cry out and he stays silent. That's how it can feel. Can I encourage you not to believe what you feel, but to trust God's word? He is the God of comfort. And if you draw near to him, he will draw near to you. Rely on him, and he will comfort you.
When suffering comes to a person, they'll go one of two ways. They'll either get bitter — angry at God, running away from God, saying, why me, God? How can you allow this? What kind of God are you? They'll run away from him and become bitter. Or they'll run to him. They'll recognise that he is the God of compassion with open arms. And instead of becoming bitter, they'll become better, learning to trust him.
I think it's pretty easy for us to run to things other than God for comfort. I know that's true because that's what I'm like. As a silly example — when I have a headache, my first instinct is to pop a pill, maybe some Panadol, or if it's really bad, some ibuprofen. I don't even think about praying. Now, there's nothing wrong with Panadol, but shouldn't I be more concerned about prayer if I really believe that God is the God of all comfort? I wonder if you're like that — turning quickly to worldly comforts instead of the Father of compassion and the God of all comfort.
Comfort that comes through Christ
In the middle of suffering, Paul praises God because of who God is. Which then begs the question — if God is a God of comfort, how does he comfort us? Where does this comfort come from?
Well, it's a comfort that comes through Christ. Notice that in verse 5. Paul says, for just as we share abundantly in the sufferings of Christ, so also our comfort abounds through Christ. Without Christ Jesus, there is no comfort. But through Christ, we're told, comfort overflows — literally, it erupts, it explodes. Comfort overflows from the man Jesus.
The man Jesus is our comfort. Because Jesus' life was full of suffering, wasn't it? He didn't have a life of power, success, and strength. He suffered. He had no home of his own. He was hated by people. He was rejected by his friends and family. He was spat upon, mocked, and crucified. The entire life of Jesus the King was marked with suffering. But it ended in glory. Because the one who died was the one who was raised from the dead. The one who descended to death was raised to life and ascended to the right hand of his Father in heaven.
The pattern of Jesus' life was suffering and then glory. And so when we suffer in this life, it is not a sign that God has neglected us. But actually it may well be a sign that we are following Jesus — that we are walking the same road he walked, the road of suffering followed by glory. And that is especially true when our suffering is not just general suffering, like sickness or financial hardship or grief, but when it is suffering that comes as a result of us following Jesus. For that is the kind of suffering Paul has in his mind as he writes this letter. It is the suffering he faced because of his ministry of proclaiming Jesus.
Paul's suffering in Asia
Have a look at verse 8. Paul says, we do not want you to be uninformed, brothers and sisters, about the troubles we experienced in the province of Asia. We were under great pressure, far beyond our ability to endure, so that we despaired of life itself. Indeed, we felt we had received the sentence of death.
It's hard to know exactly what Paul is referring to in these verses as he speaks about this time of great trouble. But Paul's entire Christian life was marked with suffering for the sake of proclaiming Jesus. As you read about his life in the Bible, Paul was often chased out of cities by rioting mobs. He was thrown into prison time and time again. He was beaten and whipped. There were plots against his life. He was threatened. He was in constant danger because of his ministry. People didn't like what he had to say about Jesus and so they didn't like him. And here, whatever happened in Asia, we're told he thought it was the end. He thought he was going to die. He despaired even of life. That's pretty deep suffering, isn't it?
But even in that deepest place of despair, Paul is able to praise God and find comfort, because he knew that he was sharing the same suffering which Jesus faced. And friends, exactly the same is true for us. When we suffer for Jesus, we have every reason to be comforted. We are sharing in the suffering of Jesus. Whether it's the ridicule we get from mates, at work, or from family for being Christians. Whether it's the hardship of living a holy life, which means you actually have to deny yourself pleasures in order to be holy. Or whether it's the hardship of not seeing the spiritual growth we'd love to see in ourselves and those we love.
God calls his people not to a life of comfort, but to a life of being comforted by God through our suffering. And just as we share in Christ's suffering, so we share in his comfort. Suffering now and glory later. The comfort of Jesus reminds us that suffering doesn't get to have the last say. Because just as we suffer with Jesus in this life, so in the life to come, we will share in Jesus' glory and be raised with him.
I don't think there is any greater comfort than the comfort of knowing that reality — the hope of the resurrection. That suffering will not last. It has an end date. One of the things we often tell each other when someone says they're going through a difficult time is we use platitudes and say things like, don't worry, I'm sure it'll get better soon. And of course we mean well, but actually tomorrow might be worse, right? We actually don't know. And yet for a Christian, there is a wonderful truth to this reality that things will get better. Because if you are a Christian, then your best days are always ahead of you. Suffering will not have the last say. When Jesus returns, he will comfort you. He will literally wipe away the tears from your eyes and suffering will be no more.
Just as we share in the sufferings of Jesus, so we share in his comfort, his resurrection. And so praise God in the midst of suffering, for he is the Father of compassion and the God of all comfort.
Two things God does through suffering
But there is more reason to praise God. Not only does he comfort us with the promise of future glory and the end of suffering — he also comforts us with the knowledge that our suffering now in this life is not wasted. It's not just a message to the Christian who's suffering of saying, don't worry, wait for Jesus and things will get better, just grit your teeth and get through this hard life and then one day Jesus will return and make everything right. It's not just that. It's better than that. There is comfort in this life — comfort knowing that our suffering is achieving God's purposes here and now.
And there are two things that Paul reminds the Corinthians God does through affliction. Two things God uses suffering for in the lives of his people. And two things which show us that suffering and affliction is actually a marker for authentic Christianity.
First: God uses suffering to comfort us so that we might comfort others.
Verse 4: God is the God who comforts us in all of our troubles so that we can comfort those in any trouble with the comfort we ourselves receive from God. And verse 6: if we are distressed, it is for your comfort and salvation. If we are comforted, it is for your comfort, which produces in you patient endurance.
It's like a chain of suffering and comfort. Jesus suffers and is comforted with the hope of glory. Paul shares his suffering and is comforted by his hope of glory. And the Corinthians share Paul's sufferings and they're comforted because Paul is comforted by Jesus' comfort. And so it's just passed on. It goes on and on. It's not a one-way street as though God pours out comfort to the person suffering and they just keep it all to themselves. They pass it on and comfort others.
God's design for his people is not to save us from suffering in this life, but to comfort us in our suffering so that we would endure patiently and then in turn comfort others in their suffering, that they too would endure.
How many of you have had the experience where you have been encouraged by the example of others going through affliction? I reckon all of us would say yes to that. We've seen people go through really difficult times and yet keep their hope in God. And it encourages us, doesn't it? As they patiently endure. I can guarantee that was not easy for that person. But God held on to them and they held on to him. And if God can use that person to encourage you, don't you think it's possible that God might also use you as you endure through affliction to bring comfort to others? Of course it is.
It's true, isn't it, that often when someone's been through a similar struggle to what you have been through or are going through, they're able to comfort you and understand you in a way that others can't. They understand a little bit of what you're going through because they've been through it. That's certainly been our experience. Many of you will know that my wife Melody has struggled with mental health over a long period of time and lives with the reality of bipolar. And through some of our darkest times, the people who have brought us great comfort have often been those who've actually been through something similar. They're able to share their struggles and share their comfort with us. And in turn, we've had the privilege over the years of being able to offer comfort and help to others as they've gone through similar struggles as well.
But it's not just shared experiences. It's more than that. It's not just sharing an experience, but sharing how God has comforted us through that experience. Sometimes I think we can be quite good at talking about shared experiences. You know how it is when you maybe tell someone the hard thing you're going through, and before you even finish speaking, they butt in and say, oh yeah, I went through something similar — and they just want to tell you their story. They're not really interested in comforting you. It's just getting the spotlight on them. That's not what Paul is speaking about here. It's not just shared experience. It is shared comfort. Because in the midst of hard times, there are parts of God's word that bring real comfort to the sufferer. There are Gospel truths that we might know in our heads, but in hardship they are impressed onto our hearts. They help us lift our eyes from our affliction to our Saviour. And those are the things that we are then to share with others — comforting each other with the truths that brought us comfort.
Dietrich Bonhoeffer's poem
Dietrich Bonhoeffer was a man who suffered greatly. He was a German pastor and theologian. While in prison, awaiting execution for his plot against Hitler, he wrote a number of letters and poems. One poem he wrote was called New Year's Eve 1945. And in the third verse of that poem, he wrote these words about being held by the loving hand of God — that even in his grief, he was in the hands of his loving Father.
He wrote that poem and then sent it to his then-fiancée, a lady named Maria, and she was comforted by his words as she grieved the prospect of losing him. He was executed a few months later.
Fast forward eighteen years to America, and another lady is grieving the death of her fiancé in a tragic accident. The letter of Bonhoeffer is passed on to her. She reads it. And it brings her much comfort — that even grief comes from the hand of her loving Father. She in turn passes the letter to the parents of her fiancé, and they're comforted as they grieve the loss of their son.
Fast forward twelve years later. The parents who have the letter hear of a lady who is sick and dying. And so they pass the poem to this dying lady. And it comforts her. And as she reads it, she says, I've read these words before. It was written by my fiancé thirty years ago. And the lady dying was Maria.
It's a beautiful story, isn't it? The comfort one person receives in their moment of affliction, and how God then uses it beyond more than Dietrich Bonhoeffer ever imagined — to comfort many, many people, and his wife-to-be thirty years later. It's true, isn't it, that when we speak words of comfort to someone and point them to the truths of God's word, we don't actually know how far those words of comfort might reach. God can use you more than you know in your affliction as you turn to him and as you comfort others with the things you learn about him.
For this to play out in our church family here at Latimer, one of the things we need is real openness — where we actually do share struggles with each other so that we can comfort each other in them. I'm very thankful for Beatrice sharing some of her struggles for that reason. I think that goes against Kiwi culture. We like to put on a good face.
I don't know how many of you have had the experience of the car park conversion — you know what I'm talking about? Where you've had a really rubbish day, maybe a rubbish week, and you're feeling pretty flat spiritually, feeling grumpy, maybe you didn't sleep very well, everything's gone bad through your day, you've had fights at the flat, fights at home, you've been arguing on the way to church — and then you park your car, you step out, you walk into church, someone says, hello, how are you? And you say, fine, thanks. It's like this conversion, it's a miracle. Life sucked and then you walk in the doors and life's awesome. It's so easy for us to be like that, isn't it? We just put on a brave face and yet deep down we're struggling and we say nothing.
I can't imagine the Apostle Paul doing that. This great spiritual leader, this preacher, this church planter — he's not out to demonstrate how wonderful he is. He doesn't keep a stiff upper lip and pretend to have it all together. He is open and honest about his struggles, even to the point of despairing of life. And he's open about it because he wants to be able to comfort others and receive comfort in return — comfort that ultimately comes from God.
Friends, we need to learn to be like that. We need to learn to be a church that is genuine, that leads people into the reality of life. I encourage you to do that here as we gather together on a Sunday, but especially in our growth groups, where we meet together as a smaller group of people to help each other grow in our love for Jesus. It will only happen if we share the struggles and comforts of life together.
Second: God uses suffering to teach us to rely on him.
Verse 9: Indeed, we felt we had received the sentence of death, but this happened that we might not rely on ourselves, but on God who raises the dead.
Affliction exposes the illusion of self-sufficiency, doesn't it? When life's going really well and there's nothing too difficult, it's so easy to think we don't need God. We can do things on our own. Why should I pray to God for my daily bread when I can just get in the car and go to the supermarket and buy it? Comfort leads us to think we're self-sufficient. But suffering and affliction cuts through that. It reminds us that actually we are deeply dependent on God.
And that is especially true in the face of death. It is possible — unusual and not very common, but possible — for someone to get through life relatively unscathed, to just be successful and happy and comfortable their whole life. But even that person, then they die. And nobody has an answer to death except Jesus. And so God teaches us in affliction, as he removes the things we love from us, to rely on God.
The late American pastor Tim Keller once said, you don't really know Jesus is all you need until Jesus is all you have. Paul the Apostle lost everything. He despaired even of life. But it is in that moment of realising he had lost everything that he realised Jesus was all he needed — and Jesus was what he had. He learnt to rely on God. And that's what suffering does.
Charles Spurgeon was a preacher in the 1800s. He knew what it was to suffer. Most of his life he battled with deep depression and physical illness. He still managed to preach up to thirteen times a week. But he writes this: I am certain that I never did grow in grace one half so much anywhere as I have upon the bed of pain. I think that's an amazing thing for someone who spends most of his life in the Scriptures, reading the Bible, praying — to say, I learnt grace upon the bed of pain.
God uses our affliction to teach us to rely on him, and our reliance on God will be seen in our prayers. Notice how Paul finishes this little section. He says in verse 11, on him we have set our hope. It is as we cry out to God for help in prayer that God helps us in our suffering and helps others in their suffering. Paul wants the Corinthians to trust God and therefore to pray — to pray for him as he suffers. And he says that God will use their prayers to deliver him, and as a result, God will be thanked. When Paul is delivered from his sufferings, people won't think, oh, look how strong he is. No — it'll be obvious that it was God. And so God will be thanked.
Prayer can seem pretty futile, can't it? I get it. It's actually not that easy. We pray to a God we can't see. We ask for things that so often we don't seem to get. We want things right now and often it doesn't happen in the time frame we want. And so it's easy to give up on prayer. But Paul wants the Corinthians — and us this evening — to be filled with confidence that the living God hears the prayers of his people. He is the Father of compassion and the God of all comfort. He longs to answer them, and he will use our prayers to help us in times of suffering.
So we must speak to each other about our suffering. We must speak to each other words of comfort. But we must also speak to God about each other and about our suffering. We must pray. Pray that we would endure through suffering.
Suffering as a marker of genuine Christianity
You can see how these two things that God does in suffering help us see how suffering and affliction are markers of genuine Christianity. A church not marked by power or success, but a church that shares the suffering of Jesus. And a church not marked by self-reliance and strength, but marked by prayerful dependence.
Elizabeth Elliot shared Paul's view of suffering. Her husband Jim Elliot was killed in 1956 as he took the message of Jesus to a remote group in Ecuador. And this is what she writes:
"Our vision is so limited we can hardly imagine a love that does not show itself in protection from suffering. The love of God did not protect his own son. And he will not necessarily protect us — not from anything it takes to make us like his son."
So friends, don't waste your suffering. Receive God's comfort deeply. And then share God's comfort deeply and abundantly, and depend on God humbly by your prayers.