If you listen to many of the modern-day “Christian” media preachers, you might conclude that following Christ is a ticket to the good life. They promise you’ll have better health, more money, and fulfilling relationships. Is that true?
History doesn’t support that assumption.
Ever since Jesus was raised from the dead and returned to heaven, many honorable Christians have suffered a lot of dreadful things. It started with the very first followers of Christ. Except for John, secular history records the torture and execution of all the other Apostles. For the next three hundred years Christians continued to suffer agonizing torment at the hands of the Roman government. Many were crucified, burned alive, or torn apart by wild beasts in the Roman Coliseum.
We would like to think that things have improved since the cruelty of those ancient days. The truth is that the persecution of Christians in our generation may even be worse than it has ever been. Open Doors, a Christian watchdog organization claims that more Christians were cruelly persecuted in 2015 than any other year in the world’s history.
ISIS (the Islamic State) has publicly beheaded hundreds of people just because they were followers of Jesus Christ. They recently executed three on video, and then demanded $1 million ransom for dozens more they have kidnapped. So far, about 1.3 million Christians have been murdered, imprisoned, or have fled, leaving their homes and jobs behind. There are fears that the Christian minorities in many Middle Eastern countries may be completely wiped out.
The Middle East isn’t the only place where Christians are suffering today. The Christian minority in India is being targeted by aggressive Hindu nationalists that now have the backing of the government. Christian pastors are being murdered in parts of Latin America (usually for standing up to drug lords or different armed insurgents). It is reported that Christians are being held in prisons or slave labor camps in North Korea, Eritrea, and China.
Christians are enduring rape, torture, and slaughter in Africa as well. These atrocities are being perpetrated by organizations like Boko Haram. This is a radical Muslim group headquartered in northeastern Nigeria. They are also active in Chad, Niger and northern Cameroon.
What is often forgotten by American Christians is that persecution should never be a surprise. Jesus promised it would come: “If the world hates you, you know that it has hated Me before it hated you. If you were of the world, the world would love its own; but because you are not of the world, but I chose you out of the world, because of this the world hates you” (John 15:18–19).
No one wants to suffer, but when Christians are persecuted, it does reveal which ones really love Jesus and which ones just want a better life. What about you? If you claim to be a Christian, do you love Jesus more than anything else, even your life? Jesus is not content with half-hearted love. He said, “If anyone wishes to come after Me, he must deny himself, and take up his cross daily [i.e. be willing to die] and follow Me” (Luke 9:23).
Someone may ask (and this is a very good question!): Why should Christians continue to love Jesus when their faith seems to be ruining their lives? There are several good answers to that question, but let me share what I think is the number one answer.
Christians love and follow Jesus primarily because He suffered the wrath of God against their sin that they would have had to suffer for themselves. See Isaiah 53:11.
The Apostle Paul is a good example. He suffered much because he followed Jesus. Compared to other Christians, Paul said he suffered “… far more labors, [was] in far more imprisonments, beaten times without number, often in danger of death. Five times I received from the Jews thirty-nine lashes. Three times I was beaten with rods, once I was stoned, three times I was shipwrecked, a night and a day I have spent in the deep. I have been on frequent journeys, in dangers from rivers, dangers from robbers, dangers from my countrymen, dangers from the Gentiles, dangers in the city, dangers in the wilderness, dangers on the sea, dangers among false brethren; I have been in labor and hardship, through many sleepless nights, in hunger and thirst, often without food, in cold and exposure” (2 Corinthians 11:23–27).
Even though Paul suffered so much, it didn’t dampen his love for Jesus at all. Notice how that shows in these words from Paul, “Who will separate us from the love of Christ? Will tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword? … But in all these things we overwhelmingly conquer through Him who loved us. For I am convinced that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor any other created thing, will be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord” (Romans 8:35, 37–39).
Is Christianity fun? Most of us don’t think of it that way. Our lives are not always easy, but we always have the comfort of God’s presence. We have His strength that is always enough for every trial. “For just as the sufferings of Christ are ours in abundance, so also our comfort is abundant through Christ” (2 Corinthians 1:5). Although the Christian life can be hard, it is a way of joy that leads to peace and everlasting life. It sure beats all the alternatives.
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