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Explain how the following statement relates to the reason that Christians must suffer: “… something deep in the soul must be disturbed or deep change won’t occur”.
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The level of change that God is taking us to – sanctification of our deepest soul – won’t happen without radical change. And radical change won’t seem necessary or good unless my discomfort with my current position is sufficient.
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All of us suffer, but the non-christian may not realize, recognize, or identify their suffering as being the result of not accepting the redemption that God has provided for all of us through His Son Jesus. When those of us who choose to accept the completed work of Christ do so, one form of suffering is alleviated until we begin to see our incongruence with the person of Christ. Holy tension and dissatisfaction with this state of being produces suffering leading to motivation and desire for change. We want to know how to be more like Christ therefore, alleviating our suffering state. This deep disturbance will put us on a path to change, helping us to yield and comply with the Holy Spirit of God.
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Suffering is helpful because I long for change inside. Change doesn’t occur without shifts and the suffering disturbs and shakes up things that I found security in outside of Jesus. Therefore suffering is a road to Jesus!
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Most people, Christian or not, live to stay clear of any tension. It seems to be a keep the peace type of attitude. The truth is that thinking can lead to a lukewarm, complacent place. The problem with this is there is no work on moving towards God-reliance versus self-reliance. For a Christian, suffering can quickly bring back the light of Christ’s binding covenant.
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Comfort leads to complacency which leads to our sleep-walking through life. We are neither happy nor unhappy, just cruising through life, from one pleasure to the next, and trying to avoid pain. This is not the best context for spiritual development as we simply do not see the need/value in changing anything. However, suffering often leads to questions. We are questioning why things are the way they are. Suffering may either lead a gloomy worldview (everything/everyone is against me; the world is so unfair), or, with the support of a SoulCare giver, it may create fertile soil for holy tension where we begin t reflect on where we are in life and where we could get according to God’s ambitious vision for our life.