- Psalmody: Psalm 27:1-2b; 3a; Psalm 79:9b-10a, 9a; Psalm 21:1; Psalm 13:3b–4a; Psalm 18:2a
- Lection: Isaiah 58:6–12; Romans 8:18–23; Luke 6:36–42
In the Name of the Father and of the ✠ Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.
Tomorrow is the feast of St. Peter and St. Paul, two apostles that have given us words of hope in successive weeks’ Epistles. It was Peter last week by whom you heard that you can lift up your eyes and see that you are not singled out in your suffering, knowing that the same sufferings are experienced by your brotherhood in the world. He spoke in particular of the sufferings wrought in constant war with our wily foe who roams about seeking whom he may devour. Satan has no taste for the ungodly, for the wicked, but for Christian prey as those of the world already rest under tooth. He seeks to devour you, dear child of God, so resist him, steadfast in the faith.
This day, St. Paul also speaks of suffering, teaching us that no matter the degree by which it comes, it is not worthy to be compared with the glory which shall be revealed in us. Take a moment and receive the comfort of Holy Writ, which validates all the suffering that you are sure to have experienced in life, whether your years be few or many; it validates it while also telling you to look higher. There is suffering in this fallen place and we do well not to let it surprise us or cause us to despair. Let us consider our suffering, all suffering, aright that we may endure it in all godliness and faith, because our suffering is not alone, but always received in the shadow of the Lord’s wings of mercy.
First, consider suffering of the highest honor, suffering for which we are not only to thank God, but to rejoice with great joy that he has allowed it to come. An example is seen in the infancy days of the Church, after Christ had ascended, and the Apostles had yet to be witnesses to Him in all Judea and Samaria, and to the end of the earth. They were still lingering about Jerusalem, but with fear increasingly falling from their eyes like scales, their teaching in the Name of Jesus bold. They were arrested multiple times for this, and after an angel of the Lord opened the prison doors and brought them out, they returned to the temple to teach all the people the words of this life. So, the chief priests had them brought before the council again admonishing them to stop teaching in the Name of Jesus, to which the Apostles refused again. So the council had them beaten before releasing them; grown men lashed, whooped like disobedient little hoodlums, all on account of talking about Jesus. So [the Apostles] departed from the presence of the council, rejoicing that they were counted worthy to suffer shame for His name. Our suffering is neither in this fashion nor to this degree, where we may see evidence upon our bodies of how we suffer for Jesus, yet there is still suffering to be had as Christians do in any ungodly era or culture, even be it from disdainful family members who see holiness and godly living as archaic, outdated traditions. But, like the apostles, let us depart from such moments of worldly shame rejoicing to be counted worthy to suffer it for the One Who bore all our shame.
Apart from such honorable suffering is all the other general suffering that is endured in this life, much of it unique within smaller groups of people, yet common to the brotherhood in all the world, for it is in the flesh in the world that we all live. Some suffering is due to our own sins, which of themselves, by their very nature as acts against God, can result in nothing good in our committal of them. Only an omniscient, omnipotent God full of mercy and truth can bring great gain from such suffering and thankfully He does. Behold the cross of our Lord! Some suffering is directly from the Lord Himself, for He, like a wise, loving, and corrective Father, administers it in order to rebuke, refine, and grow us, as it says in Hebrews, If you endure chastening, God deals with you as with sons; for what son is there whom a father does not chasten? And then, some suffering is due to the evil of others, a condition of our earthly existence. For this, too, we look to our Father’s mercy that we may endure unto the end.
It is that end to which St. Paul declares all sufferings of this present time not worthy to be compared, for glory shall be revealed there. His language is that of business terms, that of accounting, of measuring up and reconciling balances. If he, or we, were to take a set of scales or a ledger and stack up or list on one side every single thing, big, little, and in between, which we may consider to be suffering in this life, and on the other side the glory which shall be revealed, there is no reconciliation to be had; there is no equation of balances between the two. The accounts of the glory of the Lord bestowed upon us in mercy with the suffering of this present time not only do not measure out as if the void left by the suffering when it departs will be filled by equal measure of glory at life’s end. No. The two cannot be compared, yet it is the bad that receives most of our attention, most of our worry, most of our spite, most of our anxiety, most of our hopelessness.
To this, then, let us respond by assessing what awaits us not from the starting point, from the perspective, of how bad we have it, of how horrible all this is, of how much we suffer. If the present time cannot be compared with the glory to come, let us lift up our hearts to there, resisting the devil, resisting the lies, resisting the sinfulness to obsess with present, temporary plight. Instead, brethren, whatever things are true, whatever things are noble, whatever things are just, whatever things are pure, whatever things are lovely, whatever things are of good report, if there is any virtue and if there is anything praiseworthy—meditate on these things.
For, we are children of light who are fed by Word from the Lord; a Word that speaks more often not even of the heavenly abode being our eternal hope, but of the return of Son of God in glory, a glory that shall shine within us in the adoption, in the redemption of our body from the grave seeming permanent in this present time, but ones that shall be filled in when they give us up at the last trumpet. His eternal glory shall be revealed in us, for we are His, bought with a price to be His own, redeemed from the futility of the whole creation. Beloved, now we are children of God; and it has not yet been revealed what we shall be, but we know that when He is revealed, we shall be like Him, for we shall see Him as He is.
Beloved, long for, hope in, and rejoice because of what awaits in the revealing of the sons of God. On that Last Day, we shall be revealed to be as Christ is. And the glory is so much grander than just us. As we’re able to get away from the city lights at night and look up, we peer into expanses unknown, admiring the lights that the Creator has put in place and knows by name. Yet, they, and all the majestic minutiae of this little world, were subjected to futility. All creation is in a state of decay, severed from the purpose of goodness and joy in which it was formed. It was subjected to futility, not willingly, but because of Him who subjected it in hope. We read in Genesis three Who it was Who subjected it. After man fell into sin and disobeyed God, the Lord called the man, the woman, and the serpent to account. Then, to Adam He said, “Because you have heeded the voice of your wife, and have eaten from the tree of which I commanded you, saying, ‘You shall not eat of it’: “Cursed is the ground for your sake; In toil you shall eat of it All the days of your life. Both thorns and thistles it shall bring forth for you, And you shall eat the herb of the field.” The curse of the ground rippled unto those distant twinkles in the rich black firmament. It was God Who subjected creation to futility, because of our sin. We are responsible not only for sin’s effect upon ourselves, not only for sin’s effect upon other people, but also for sin’s effect upon all creation. Nothing in that deep, dark, still-only-inspiringly-beautiful-by-God’s-mercy night sky, stands as God created it to. When you look up, see it eagerly wait for the revealing of the Sons of God, hear it groan and labor with birth pangs together until now.
The glory for which creation longs, the glory which shall be revealed in us, is not the glory of heaven, but of Christ. His glory shall bring about the final measure of His mercy in the redemption of our body. His glory shall shine as a never-setting Sun. His glory shall be revealed in us and all the heavens and the earth shall rejoice because the creation itself also will be delivered from the bondage of corruption into the glorious liberty of the children of God. Your repentance makes heaven rejoice. Your redemption make the heavens rejoice. For as by one man’s disobedience many were made sinners, and creation subjected to futility, so also by one Man’s obedience many will be made righteous and shall be raised incorruptible, abounding in all liberty, entirely free from all sin, death, and futility for all eternity to come. And our liberty, made perfect in and by the incarnate Creator in His glorious return, will reflect the glory of Christ upon the rest of creation in marvelous reversal of what our sin has done to it. It is this glory, this Christ, revealed in us against which we measure the suffering of this present time and discover that there is no comparison. May that certainty of His returning glory, which shall redeem us and all creation, cause hope to reign in our hearts, especially when we are tempted to weigh our suffering more than our merciful, glorious Savior.
In ✠ Jesus’ Name. Amen.
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