Life is Hazardous: It’s In The Job Description.

In what is now accepted as an apocryphal tale, when Ernest Shackleton was assembling an expedition for his trip to The Antarctic in the early 20th Century he advertised for fellow expedition members. And he didn’t gild the lily. Here is the purported advertisement he placed in his local newspaper:

Men wanted for hazardous journey. Low wages, bitter cold, long hours of complete darkness. Safe return doubtful. Honour and recognition in event of success.

Anyone want to sign up? Now, as I said, there is doubt that such an advertisement actually was placed. It’s been as hard to find an original as it has been to find a needle in a haystack. Or a frozen explorer in The Antarctic for that matter.

But if the reports of the advertisement are not true, the facts presented within it certainly are! There was no bait and switch going on with Ernest Shackleton. His men knew what they were in for when they went. They knew it was a “suffer now - glory later” trip they were embarking upon.

Last time we looked at what our name, Life To the Full, means for our experience in the here and now. We are committed to the truth that the gospel of Jesus Christ shapes our lives in many good ways now. There is a “now” sense of living to the full.

But as we noted, it is impossible to escape the truth of Jesus’ own words - and indeed his own experiences - that suffering now (primarily for the gospel but also in the context of everyday life as a human), will be our experience also. That’s true of our lives in general, and it’s true of the Christian life in a particular way.

Like Shackleton’s men, the first disciples were under no illusions that following Jesus would have its moments! And they were under no illusions that they would also experience the same general sufferings common to us all. There doesn’t seem to be a hall pass for the Christian from suffering in this world. There is no “bus lane” that allows us to get home hassle free. There is no sense that being a Christian means we are wrapped in cotton wool.

Yet there is a huge movement - especially in the modern West - that aligns becoming a follower with Jesus with some sort of charmed experience of life. A best-life-now experience. And too much of that is wrapped up in the modern secular idea of what a best life looks like. And what does it look like? Well, watch the ads, scroll through Instagram.

In a Western world full of many pleasures and opportunities, the idea can form that the general sufferings of this age should slide off the side of our Teflon-like faith. That mental illness or recurring sickness or just the deep grief of a besetting sin or addiction should not assail those of us who follow Jesus.

And while that might sell a lot of books, it’s just not in the Bible, and nor does it accord with our experiences. I can make the claim all I like that life to the full means that nothing bad should happen to me because of my faith, but when something bad does happen to me? What then?

I am left with two choices: Either Christianity is wrong, or I am wrong. Either the faith I have committed myself to wilts under the blowtorch of reality. Or I am not the real deal. Whichever side of that equation you land on, you will not find yourself in a happy place. There’s either a problem with my faith or with the faith!

This is especially true when it comes to understanding our mental health. If Christianity says that life to the full means our faith simply banishes depression or anxiety, yet I find myself suffering these things, then maybe I am not the Christian I am supposed to be. Maybe all of the shiny, happy people around me (Hint: they are not as shiny and happy as they present) have it right, and I have it wrong.

Or maybe Jesus wasn’t telling the truth about life to the full. And if Jesus wasn’t telling the truth about that then what else was he not telling the truth about? Maybe this Christian thing is a crock.

Happily the Scriptures are much more robust about our sufferings in this age, whether these be the sufferings of following Christ in a contrary world, or the sufferings we experience in general as part of the human race.

A key passage that speaks about sufferings is found in Romans 8, and it’s a commonly read passage at funerals (certainly places that reveal suffering as a reality). You know how it goes:

I consider that our present sufferings are not worth comparing with the glory that will be revealed in us. (Romans 8:19)

Now while I do not want to take this verse out of its context any more than I want to take Jesus’ own words in John 10 out of their context, there are some helpful things we can learn.

First it’s interesting that Paul’s aim is not to belittle present sufferings, but to compare them. He’s not comparing our sufferings to the sufferings of others (Like your mum might have done when you complained about being hungry and she came up with the “kids starving in Africa” line.) He is, however, comparing our sufferings now with what is to come then. Paul looks forward to a future glory that will fully and finally overwhelm and swallow up the sufferings of this present age. They will appear insignificant looking back at them. Not now, but then.

But second, Paul points out that the glory that is coming will not simply be revealed TO us, but revealed IN us! Yes, external reality will indeed change. The life to the full that Jesus spoke of will one day be fully realised in a new creation. But it’s the internal reality he is focussing on. We will change! We will be glorified. We will be new creations ourselves.

And that’s what we need most of all is it not? Perhaps our darkest hours in this life are not those hours when we are in the most trouble circumstantially, but when the general circumstances are - on the surface at least - not too bad, yet still we are bereft or devastated or so depressed that we cannot get out of bed. “If life is okay, how come I am not?” That’s the most vexing of questions to ask of ourselves.

What’s our hope then? That circumstances external to me might change? Maybe, maybe not. But rather that something inside of me might change. By God’s grace these internal things can change in this age. Indeed at Life To The Full our mission is to walk with you towards that change, and offer guidance and pathways towards that change.

But our propensities might not change. The brokenness might sit close to the surface all our lives. In those moments God is with us and even there he can bring to us a joy that we cannot explain. A joy in Him even as we weep.

Yet the hope is that one day our propensities will change. Forever. Glory will be revealed IN us at precisely the time that glory is revealed TO us. That is God’s promise in the gospel.

And that’s what makes God’s promise more sure than any promise Shackleton could offer his men. What does he say? “Safe return doubtful”. The Bible absolutely says the opposite. God will lead us safely home. The life that has begun in us now - in the midst of trials and sufferings - will be completed on that day when glory is revealed in us and to us at exactly the same moment.