Glory Through Suffering

In other words, if your master suffered, if your teacher suffered, you'll suffer.

In fact, it is enough, verse 25, for the disciple that he become as his teacher and the slave as his master. In just a few moments, John's going to launch a study that shows you how Jesus set the standard for patiently enduring suffering that is unjust and how you can follow the Lord's example. The study is titled, Through Suffering to Triumph. John, we wouldn't be broadcasting this study if we didn't know that there are many in our listening family who do suffer under painful, difficult circumstances. And there is that sense Paul spoke of, the fellowship of Christ suffering. There's a fellowship in suffering. There's encouragement in it. Is offering encouragement to people who are suffering something you see as an important part of your job as pastor?

You're probably called to do this on a daily basis. Well, yeah, it's just a part of my life. Look, we live in a fallen, broken world. It's tough. Life is tough. Life is very, very challenging. I mean, we're battling the sin that's in us and the sin that's in everybody around us. And then we take on the burdens of the people that we love in our family and our circle of friends and our church. And then we, you know, we're sort of forced to take on all the issues of the world. And, you know, that's a lot to bear. And sometimes I think people who were ignorant of what was going on around the world had enough to make life tough just in their little circle.

Now we have the whole world to carry. So life is tough. And I think in order to carry the weight of life itself, we have to be encouraged.

I would say this. My encouragement comes primarily from the Lord because I know the end. I know the promises of God. I know how it all ends. I know that all things are working together for good to those that love him and are called according to his purpose.

And he's making that happen. I know that the Spirit is interceding for us. So because of my trust in God, I'm encouraged. Because of the hand of God that I've seen in my life and the life of people around me, I am encouraged. And definitely part of being a pastor is to spread that kind of encouragement. It's not a superficial kind of encouragement.

It's just another way to teach people sound teaching, sound doctrine. And when you come to somebody who's facing death or facing some severe life-shattering illness, you know, little trivial things don't work. They've got to find their way to a rock bed of conviction that they can stand on in that difficult time.

They can't be on shifting sand. So you really are comforting people with an applied theology. You need to know your God. You need to know his purposes. You need to trust God, trust his purposes.

So you're calling for people to trust. And you also need to encourage people—and this is what I've done through the years constantly—is to tell them that suffering is always the path to glory. It's always the path to greater usefulness. It's always the path to blessing, and it's always the path to joy. And you can show that from the Scriptures.

That's right, John. And thankfully, suffering is something that God prepares us for, as we're going to see in this study from 1 Peter. So, friend, follow along in your Bible if you can, as John MacArthur helps you find the path through suffering to triumph. In 1 Peter 2, 21-25, we have a section of Scripture that we could well call the suffering Jesus. Let me read it to you, beginning in verse 21. He Himself bore our sins in His body on the cross, that we might die to sin and live to righteousness, for by His wounds you were healed. For you were continually straying like sheep, but now you have returned to the Shepherd and Guardian of your souls. Now, the theme of this great, great, far-reaching text is the suffering of Jesus. Peter, in this epistle, is rather effusive in reciting two categories of truth. First one that obviously strikes you as you read this first epistle of Peter is the long list of blessings which Peter records.

In other words, as he speaks about the identity of a Christian and what it is to know Christ and what it is to possess Christ and all that we have in Him, he goes from one great privilege to another, from one great blessing to another, from one great gift of God to another. Now, you might assume based upon all of our blessings and all of our privileges and all of the promises that God has given to us and based upon our identity in Christ that we should be loved and we should be respected. In fact, we should be honored and we might even say we should be adored. We perhaps should be exalted. We should be lifted up to a high position. We should be recognized as transcending the normal people who live in the world because of such privilege.

But the fact of the matter is just the opposite is true. And so you have a very strange kind of duality because running along directly parallel to the list of privileges is the catalog of suffering. Those of us who are most eminently identified and are most greatly privileged are also told that we will suffer immensely. That is the nature of the Christian life.

On the one hand, immense privilege. On the other hand, continual suffering. Now let me sum it up. The Christian life is a call to glory through the path of suffering. The Christian life is a call to glory through the path of suffering. Those are the inevitable two sides of Christian experience.

The reason? Because of who we are in Christ, we are set at odds with the environment in which we live. We are a problem in our culture.

We are a problem in our society. We are strangers in a hostile environment. And since the environment in which we are strangers is run by Satan who is the prince of this world, since it is a Satan energized system and a demon activated system, we are at odds with it. That's why John says you can't love God and love the world. That's why James says if you're a friend of the world, you're the enemy of God.

The two are mutually exclusive. So here we are with this incredible identity. Here we are these children of God with privileges that are beyond even our comprehension. And rather than being exalted and honored and treated with some respect because of who we are in Christ and because of our elevated identity, we are just the opposite. We are antagonistic in the culture. We are a problem in the society and the society sets itself against us.

And the more faithfully we live out our Christian life, the more hostility we can expect. The world, frankly, is filled with injustice. It is filled with cruelty. It is filled with wickedness. It is filled with abuse.

It is filled with sin. And no single group has felt more of that than Christians down through the centuries. They have been hated, mistreated, abused, treated with cruelty, wickedness, even death. And Peter's readers are up to their ears in that very thing.

When Peter writes to these Christians scattered throughout Pontus, Galatia, Cappadocia, Asia, and Bithynia who have been chosen by God for salvation, he realizes their very, very difficult circumstances, that they are going through some very severe trials. So on the one hand, he reminds them of their privilege and on the other hand, he tells them to expect their suffering. But the real question for us to look at is this. How are we to handle that animosity? How are we to handle that hostility? How are we to deal with it? What is to be our attitude? Now, as we think about that, we are drawn into this passage.

Why? Because Jesus Christ is here presented as the model of a proper attitude in the midst of suffering that is unjust. Before we look, however, at verse 21, we can go back to verse 20. And there it says, at the end of verse 20, that suffering should be endured with patience because it finds favor with God. Whatever suffering comes your way, you must endure it because that pleases God.

All right? You are to endure it because that pleases God. In fact, let's go a step further. Look at verse 21. For you have been called for this purpose. That calling refers to the calling to salvation. You were saved to suffer.

Does that surprise you? It shouldn't. You were saved to suffer.

Why? Because you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people of God's own possession. You are proclaiming the excellencies of Him who called you out of darkness into His marvelous light and consequently the world will resent you. The system will resent you.

Now, obviously, it is more hostile at some times than others and more hostile in some places than others. But the world resents those who represent the Lord Jesus Christ. So He says, by very virtue of your salvation, you will suffer. You have been called to that.

What does He mean? He means that you have been called to glory, but as long as you're living in this world, the path to glory is the path of suffering. And that pleases God. Why does it please God? Why does it please God that we suffer? Look at chapter 5, verse 10.

In 5, 10, we have the answer. And after you have suffered for a little while, that is here on earth, after you have suffered for a little while, the God of all grace who called you to His eternal glory in Christ will Himself perfect, confirm, strengthen and establish you. In other words, what He is saying there is, suffering is part of the process of perfecting, confirming, strengthening and establishing you. It's part of your spiritual growth process. It's part of God's eternal plan.

And I'll get into more detail into what I mean and show you some really thrilling truth. But the point now is simply this. God is pleased when you suffer patiently. You are to suffer patiently because God called you to that. Because the path to glory is through suffering. It has to be that way from the viewpoint of earth because a godless, Satan-inspired world has animosity toward Christians. But not only from the world side, but from God's side.

God has a purpose in your suffering. It has an ultimately beneficial effect. It is a part of your final perfection and final glory. It is a perfecting process.

This is not foreign to us. Go back to chapter 1 of 1 Peter, verses 6 and 7. And let me show you one of the benefits of suffering and we could talk about a number of them, but just look at this one. He says in verse 6, in this you greatly rejoice, even though now for a little while, if necessary, you've been distressed by various trials. In other words, you rejoice in your future glory. You rejoice in the inheritance that is imperishable, undefiled and will not fade away, reserved in heaven for you. You rejoice in being protected by the power of God unto that day. You rejoice in the glory to come. But in the meantime, you are being distressed by various trials. But notice verse 7.

Why? In order that the proof of your faith, being more precious than gold which is perishable, even though tested by fire, may be found to result in praise and glory and honor at the revelation of Jesus Christ. Now listen, the implication is this, that you are suffering here obviously because the world resents you and the world hates you. But God allows that because it is the validation of your faith. And it will result in greater praise, greater glory and greater honor at the revelation of Jesus Christ.

Now stick with me on this thought. This is a profound thought as we work our way sort of into this passage. When you suffer, you are not just enduring here to learn patience because you don't need to know patience for eternity because you won't have to be patient in eternity. You are suffering here to learn something, to accomplish something that is going to enhance your capacity to praise, glorify and honor God. This then that you suffer in this life is directly related to your eternal capacity to glorify God.

That is a great truth. It is directly related to your eternal capacity to glorify God. Now you can go back to James 1 and James says, you should count it all joy when you encounter various trials because the testing of your faith produces endurance and endurance has a perfect result that you may be perfect and complete, lacking in nothing. There is a sense in which going through trials causes you to become strong as a Christian. You become more mature, more perfected, more like Christ.

That's James point. But Peter's point is that what you endure of suffering here is going to have a profound effect on your function in glory, on your function in glory. Now let me take you to another passage and just track this thought for a few moments. 2 Corinthians chapter 4 verse 17.

Paul comes up with the same idea. He says in verse 17, for momentary, that is in this life, light affliction is having this effect. It is producing for us an eternal weight of glory far beyond all comparison.

Did you get that? This is a very important lesson, extremely important. Not only is suffering in this life teaching you to be more patient and thus spiritually stronger and thus more like Christ, not only does it have an effect on you here, but it produces an eternal weight of glory beyond all comparison.

Now let me follow the thought. The suffering you have here is affecting your function in eternity, not just in time. It does affect you here. It makes you stronger when you endure it with patience. It teaches you to trust God and it teaches you to be growing in your faith, getting stronger. It throws you on the Word of God. It makes you dependent on Christ. It makes you more like Him as you are strengthened by trials. But that's here and now.

That's not the point we're looking at. What I want you to understand is that the suffering in this life that we go through for the cause of Christ will bring about a change that will impact our eternal function. And what is our eternal function?

You tell me. What are we going to do forever? We're going to glorify God. We're going to honor God. We're going to praise God.

We're going to adore God. And so the capacity to do that is affected as you endure patiently the suffering here. And that's what He means in verse 18. So He says, 2 Corinthians 4 18, while we're going through these trials, we're looking for an eternal weight of glory beyond all comparison. So He says, while we look not at the things which are seen, we don't get stuck on the trial.

We don't get focused on this particular pain. But we look at the things which are not seen. For the things which are seen are temporal, but the things which are not seen are eternal. Now what is He saying? As you go through a trial, focus on its eternal impact, its eternal consequence.

You say, well, tell me more. 2 Timothy chapter 2. Let's fill up our understanding. 2 Timothy chapter 2 verse 12. Just a very simple statement, the first part of the verse. If we endure, we shall also reign with Him.

Are you getting it? We shall reign with Him if we endure with Him. What's the point? The point is simply this, beloved. The greater the endurance through suffering in this life, the greater the eternal reward. And I am convinced that eternal reward is primarily a capacity to glorify God.

Follow that? The greater the endurance in this life, the greater the eternal reward. And eternal reward is nothing more than a greater capacity to glorify God. So your eternal capacity, capability to glorify God is directly related to that which you endure in this life. Back to 1 Peter chapter 2. For you have been called for this purpose. Called for this purpose. Called to suffer.

Why? Because suffering is the path to glory. Luke 24 verse 25. Listen to the words of Jesus talking to His disciples on the road to Emmaus. O foolish men and slow of heart to believe in all that the prophets have spoken. So foolish.

Why? Was it not necessary for the Christ to suffer these things and to enter into His glory? Christ had to suffer to enter His glory. We should expect it to enter our glory. And the greater the suffering, the greater the glory.

That's the principle. Listen to Hebrews 2 10. For it was fitting for Him, that is Christ, for whom are all things and through whom are all things in bringing many sons to glory, listen to this, to perfect the author of their salvation through what? Sufferings.

Now listen to that. Who was perfected through sufferings? Jesus. Jesus was perfected through sufferings. You see that's why Peter says back to 1 Peter 2 21. For you have been called for this purpose, listen to this, since Christ also suffered. If the path to glory for Christ was through suffering, the path to glory for you is through suffering.

There's no escape. And the greater the suffering, the greater a loving God will give the glory. In Hebrews chapter 5 verse 8, it says of Christ, And though He was a Son, He learned obedience from the things which He suffered. And having been made perfect, He became to all those who obey Him the source of eternal salvation. He suffered.

He learned obedience. And He gained eternal glory through His suffering. In Matthew's gospel in that marvelous 10th chapter where Matthew records the instruction of Jesus to the 12th, it says in verse 21, Matthew 10, Brother will deliver up brother to death. The father his child and children will rise up against parents and cause them to be put to death and you will be hated by all on account of My name. But it is the one who has endured to the end who will be saved.

But whenever they persecute you in this city, flee to the next for truly I say to you, you shall not finish going through the cities of Israel until the Son of Man comes. In other words, expect to be persecuted, expect to suffer and you're suffering for righteousness sake because the next verse gives the principle, a disciple is not above his teacher nor a slave above his master. In other words, if your master suffered, if your teacher suffered, you'll suffer. In fact, it is enough, verse 25, for the disciple that he become as his teacher and the slave as his master. Christ suffered, you suffer. That's the principle. And also in John's gospel, chapter 13 alludes to the same thing in verse 16, truly, truly I say to you, a slave is not greater than his master, neither is one who is sent greater than the one who sent him. And again, he reiterates that what is characteristic of me is going to be characteristic or should be characteristic of you. Now, the path to glory for Christ was the path of unjust suffering.

Follow that thought. The path to glory for us is the path of unjust suffering. Christ endured it perfectly and therefore He is our example.

And that's exactly what Peter wants to say. You have been called for this purpose since Christ also suffered for you, leaving you an what? Example. Christ is an example of this great truth. He is an example of suffering unto glory. He is the model of the one who suffered the most with perfect patience and is therefore glorified at the highest level.

And He is our example. You say, did Christ die only as our example? No.

No. Because verse 24 says He is not only our example, He is our substitute. He died more than just an example. He died bearing our sins. And then verse 25 says, more than an example, more than a substitute, He is the Shepherd who gathers His sheep. Now next time we're going to look at Christ and see exactly how He modeled endurance in the midst of His suffering and how He became our perfect substitute and our loving Shepherd.

That's John MacArthur here on Grace to You. Today John launched a series we call Through Suffering to Triumph. Well, friend, as this series makes clear, God has a purpose for your suffering, and what's more, He provides what you need to deal with the pain and to grow spiritually as a result. Related to that, we have a new study guide that can help you see God's purposes in your trials, particularly the trials you face because of your faith in Christ. The title of the study guide, How to Handle Persecution.

Order your copy today. Call us here at 855-GRACE or go to our website, gty.org. The How to Handle Persecution study guide includes a question and answer section in each chapter, and it's great material to go through with someone you're discipling or with your Bible study group. And again, you can get this by calling us at 855-GRACE or go to gty.org. And to download the messages in John's current series titled Through Suffering to Triumph, go to gty.org. There you'll find dozens of other topical studies as well as hundreds of sermons that you've never heard on radio. In fact, all of John's sermons, more than 54 years' worth, are free to download in audio and transcript format at gty.org. The website is also the place to purchase John's New Testament commentaries or the MacArthur study Bible or the systematic theology book called Biblical Doctrine and much more.

Our website again, gty.org. Now for John MacArthur, I'm Phil Johnson. Thanks for starting your week with Grace To You and be back tomorrow when John shows you why you probably will eventually be persecuted for your faith and how you should respond when that happens. It's another half hour of unleashing God's truth one verse at a time, on Grace To You.