Suffering Perfected

There’s a divine mystery in suffering, but not a mystery without direction.

Hi, I’m Joni Eareckson Tada and yeah, it’s quite a mystery, this suffering. No matter what shape or size it comes in, you know it’s hard; it’s always draining; it reveals your resentments and anger; and if your suffering squeezes you hard enough, it may even show that you’ve got a rebellious spirit. But hey, that is not bad! I mean, look, I’ve learned after years of dealing with pain and this wheelchair, that suffering – if we would but yield it to God – suffering makes us real. It makes us real with ourselves and real with the Lord. Otherwise, we’d just go on our merry way “playing” at being a Christian. We’d be posers; we’d be pretenders, playacting when it comes to picking up our cross; oh, yeah, we’d say we pick up our cross, but we would not know how to do it and do it well, were it not for suffering. You know, do it thoughtfully and seriously.

And this is why suffering is such a mystery. There’s a divine mystery in it. A strange, supernatural power in the way we engage it. It’s a mystery that’s hard to explain. Because the depth and the power of your spiritual life depends exactly on the manner in which you carry your cross. A cross is a place where your sin is nailed to death, and so, when Jesus says in Luke chapter 9, “Pick up your cross and follow me,” you’re basically agreeing to commit to crucify yourself, your sinful desires, your unruly passions, even putting to death the things you idolize. You see, Christians who are intimate with the Lord Jesus are those who, like him, pass through great suffering. And they learn to trust God well. 

You know that right at the close of 2020 and into this year, I was struggling with COVID. Being a quadriplegic, it was so hard – so hard to breathe, especially at night, paralyzed in bed. I mean, at first, when they told me that I had COVID, I thought it was a death sentence. But decades of quadriplegia has taught me how to carry even a COVID cross. Because when I yielded myself absolutely to God and trusted him to take care of my situation, I tell you, I could almost feel God take gentle, firm possession of this strange, new affliction and use it to work a true crucifixion in me. I could feel the Lord press me and push me saying, “Joni, come on, do you believe me, that I will never leave you or forsake you, even in this? That I’m ever-present help in trouble? I’m not going to abandon the work of my hands here. Do you believe it? That my grace is sufficient?” And in the dark, in bed, I cried out, “Lord, where am I going to go? You’ve got the words of life!” And then, in the ensuing hours, I felt this wonderfully strange calmness – almost an indifference as to how much it might hurt or how long this COVID would last. And I felt perfectly still under the hand of God. He became a shelter; like I was in his shadow, the shadow of the Almighty. And I felt blessed.

G.D. Watson wrote, “When the suffering soul reaches a calm, sweet carelessness, when it can inwardly smile at its own suffering, and does not even ask God to deliver it from the affliction, then suffering has wrought its blessed ministry; then patience does its perfect work; then the crucifixion begins to weave itself into a crown. When we give our suffering over to God and sink ourselves into his will, he will make every pain work its perfect purpose in our lives.” I trust this is helpful to you today, if your suffering is a mystery. And I pray that these words will give some direction to your mystery. Embrace God with willful thanks and you will find hope in your hardship.

© Joni and Friends