I've just been listening to a pastor's testimony about a trip he made where he met up with several Korean Christians who had been kidnapped by the Taliban. When all these believers had all their things taken from them, and they knew that things were going to get rough, they somehow managed to hang on to one pocket Bible. They tore that Bible into 25 parts so that each of them would have a little piece of the Word to read it and get some encouragement from it. Ultimately, a couple of them lost their lives...pastors.
Man...I can hardly choke back the emotion as I even write this now. That's life out on the radical edge...following Jesus Christ...putting yourself - your life, your livelihood - completely at risk for Him, for His Gospel...willing to die...willing to be abused, ridiculed, beat up, marginalized, ignored for His sake. It's intense.
I can't explain to you what it's like to be in a place where you fully understand and have confidence in God's sovereignty, and yet, know full well that it might be His plan and His purpose for you to suffer.
I can't explain what it's like to live through things where you are pushed absolutely to your limit...and then pushed farther...where it's just you and God and the pavement...nowhere else to turn but dependence on Him.
I can't explain what it's like to know that the next bold words out of your mouth about Christ could very well bring some kind of reprisal.
I can't explain what it's like to know that your family is fully in the hands of the Lord, depending on Him, and on His Body to meet their most basic needs, and then to see the Lord provide, faithfully through these people whose love is motivated by Christ.
The boldness, the fellowship with Him that those trials bring, are fantastic. Your life is purified. So many of the things...the affections of this world...are shaken loose. The boldness and the confidence in Him, the hatred for sin...all the changes you go through are crazy. How does that happen apart from suffering?
