What to Do if You Are Disappointed with God?Sýnishorn

Suffering and Glory

And he [Jesus] said to them, “O foolish ones, and slow of heart to believe all that the prophets have spoken! Was it not necessary that the Christ should suffer these things and enter into his glory?” (Luke 24:25-26)

When the two disciples had shared so honestly, Jesus began to teach them. He called them “foolish” and “slow to believe”, and then explained what had been written about Him in the Scriptures long before. They had known these Scriptures for such a long time and heard so much preaching from Jesus Himself, but they had not yet understood this crucial part: that Jesus’ glory was preceded by suffering. Hebrews 2:9 even says that Jesus is “crowned with glory and honor because of the suffering of death”. Jesus’ suffering was part of God’s plan. It was necessary. As Jesus Himself explains in John 12:24, “a grain of wheat must fall to the ground and die before it can grow and produce much more wheat.”

That’s hard to accept and process — not just for the disciples back then, but also for us present day Christians. Especially since this does not only apply to Jesus, but to us also… We like the idea of sharing God’s glory. But we don’t like the fact that “through many tribulations we must enter the kingdom of God” (Acts 14:22). And yet, suffering may be part of God’s plan for our lives as well. If we don’t understand this, we can easily get disappointed and confused.

Does “suffering” play a part in what you expect of a life with Jesus?