Sanctified by the Cross

24  Now I rejoice in my sufferings for your sake, and in my flesh I am filling up what is lacking in Christ’s afflictions for the sake of his body, that is, the church, 25  of which I became a minister according to the stewardship from God that was given to me for you, to make the word of God fully known, Colossians 1:24-26 Does anything seem odd about the verses you just read? You did read them didn’t you? Two things stand out to me. First, Paul rejoices in his sufferings.  To us this seems odd.  Most Christians throughout the world, however, get this. See the article from last week.  Just once I’d love to see a Christian endure suffering for the gospel, painful or difficult and go on U.S. TV and instead of gaining a bunch of glory talking about how hard it was or about all the books they plan to write, say instead “You know, Jesus said there would be days like this.  What’s the big deal? This is normal.”  The second thing that actually start...

24 Now I rejoice in my sufferings for your sake, and in my flesh I am filling up what is lacking in Christ’s afflictions for the sake of his body, that is, the church, 25 of which I became a minister according to the stewardship from God that was given to me for you, to make the word of God fully known. Colossians 1:24-25 What happens when you cut a butterfly out of its cocoon?  You ultimately render the butterfly no better off than before it entered.  In the desire to shield the butterfly from the pain, struggle and suffering, you took away from it the very thing that it needed to go through to develop properly.  Without the struggle, the butterfly’s internal juices don’t flow to its wings and they never become flight ready.  In removing its suffering, you have removed its flight. Suffering, pain, difficulty and hurt are all things we generally do all we can to avoid. So why does Paul say this? How does he rejoice in his sufferings?  The answer is i...