Hardships

Read Acts 14:19-28.

Lystra area, Turkey

It's a beautiful fall day, and I'm writing this from the back of a van. I have no idea exactly where we are, except that it's somewhere between Kansas City and Terre Haute, presumably somewhere still in Missouri at this point. The road lays out before us, but we can only see so far. Even though we are following the directions of the GPS, we still can only actually see so far ahead. We know the destination, but the road between here and there is still unseen.

Watching the miles go by makes me mindful of the journey we have been on with Paul these last few weeks, and the journey yet to come. When Paul said yes to Jesus, he could not have had any idea exactly where the road, the journey, would lead him. He knew the destination, but he did not know the twists and turns in between. I'm certain that, like most of us, Paul would never had wished for the kind of mistreatment he got in certain places, like in Lystra. Here, after being mistaken for a god, Paul is then accused by some Jewish leaders of heresy. He is drug outside the city and stoned. They think he is dead. And yet, after some time, he gets up and goes back into the city. The next morning, he departs.

On the way, he encourages believers to stay true to the faith. He tells them, "We must go through many hardships to enter the kingdom of God" (14:22). Hardships? Really? The man is not yet recovered from a stoning, a practice that normally killed the recipient. Hardships? Near death is more than a "hardship," and yet that's how Paul saw it. It was a minor inconvenience compared to the surpassing greatness of knowing Jesus.

One of our speakers this morning reminded us that we don't have to have all the answers, nor do we have to "prove" the worthiness or truth of our faith. What we must do is put Jesus alongside any other "faith system," any other belief or way of thinking, and if people are able to see the true Jesus, he will outshine them all. We don't have to demand. We don't have to prove. We might have to do through "hardship," but that's nothing compared to basking in the beauty and the light that is Jesus. So, be encouraged. Hardships will pass, but Jesus will last.