Joyful In Suffering
Passage: Romans 5:1-5
Rejoice in our sufferings. Could Paul have said anything more unamerican? Who wants to rejoice in our sufferings? What could be more counter-intuitive? Who would be so crazy as to put those two words together in the same sentence? Rejoice and suffering. Isn’t that an oxymoron?
You know, like act naturally, deafening silence, original copy, accurate estimate, virtual reality, crash landing, awfully good, seriously funny. And now we can add joyful sufferings.
Rejoice in our suffering.
Paul knows this point is hard to understand, so he expands on it to help us know why and how we can rejoice in our sufferings. He states three truths to show us why and how we can rejoice in our sufferings.
Suffering produces endurance, endurance produces character, character produces hope, which does not put us to shame.