Homecoming

For the first time in 9 days, I write to you from my own apartment. I’m sobbing with exhaustion and pain and gratitude. Tears and praise free-flowing, it is good to abandon myself before the Lord. It is good to be home!

My parents helped me move back into my apartment tonight—stockpiling food and other supplies in such a way that I, theoretically, could be self-sustaining for a couple of weeks. Any need, any want; truly they have been here to serve me. Though I have often found it difficult to accept, their care for me has been exemplary. May the Lord continue to break in me the strongholds of pride and self-sufficiency that have caused me to respond accordingly.

As I consider the past week, I realize that I have no idea what my family and closest friends are thinking or feeling about my illness; I suspect that they are similarly unaware as to what my sleepless nights have held. I believe that the Lord will use my suffering in the lives of others, so I spent some time tonight considering Colossians 1. Starting with verse 24, “Now I rejoice in my sufferings for your sake, and in my flesh I am filling up what is lacking in Christ's afflictions for the sake of his body, that is, the church, of which I became a minister according to the stewardship from God that was given to me for you, to make the word of God fully known, the mystery hidden for ages and generations but now revealed to his saints. To them God chose to make known how great among the Gentiles are the riches of the glory of this mystery, which is Christ in you, the hope of glory. Him we proclaim, warning everyone and teaching everyone with all wisdom, that we may present everyone mature in Christ. For this I toil, struggling with all his energy that he powerfully works within me.”

I had always found that passage perplexing until I read a sermon from John Piper a few months ago on it. Piper writes, “Paul's sufferings fill up Christ's not by adding anything to their worth, but by extending them to the people they were meant to bless. What is lacking in the afflictions of Christ is not that they are deficient in worth or merit, as though they could not sufficiently cover the sins of all who believe. What is lacking is that the infinite value of Christ's afflictions are not known in the world. They are still a mystery (hidden) to most peoples. And God's intention is that the mystery be revealed, extended to all the Gentiles. So the afflictions are lacking in the sense that they are not seen and known among the nations. They must be carried by ministers of the word. And those ministers of the word fill up what is lacking in the afflictions of Christ by extending them to others.”

What if this suffering is intended not only to purify me but also to reveal the mystery of Christ to people around me? Would the Lord be pleased to reveal this mystery to some of my non-believing friends and family, even through this?

I have always been a planner, and yet I cannot tell you even what tomorrow will hold. Instead, I ought to say, “If the Lord wills, I will do this or that.” For tonight, I’m in a lot of pain. If this cup of suffering can pass from me, pray that the Lord would be pleased to remove it. Yet if Christ is most glorified by its perseverance, then pray that I would receive strength commensurate to the pain. The spirit is willing, but the flesh is weak.