Outside the Camp

Gen­eral suf­fer­ing is a part of the human expe­ri­ence and some­thing we all have to deal with, includ­ing New Cre­ations in Christ. As Chris­tians we are not promised a trouble-free life. Even more, Jesus says that fol­low­ing him will invite addi­tional tribu­la­tion above and beyond that expe­ri­enced of the world. As he puts it, “Who­ever desires to come after Me, let him deny him­self, and take up his cross, and fol­low Me.” (Mark 8:34)

This was cer­tainly true of the early Chris­t­ian con­gre­ga­tion and it comes as no sur­prise that the writ­ings of the apos­tolic era often speak of this par­tic­u­lar form of suf­fer­ing. For instance, Peter writes:

Beloved, do not think it strange con­cern­ing the fiery trial which is to try you, as though some strange thing hap­pened to you; but rejoice to the extent that you par­take of Christ’s suf­fer­ings, that when His glory is revealed, you may also be glad with exceed­ing joy. If you are reproached for the name of Christ, blessed are you, for the Spirit of glory and of God rests upon you. On their part He is blas­phemed, but on your part He is glo­ri­fied. But let none of you suf­fer as a mur­derer, a thief, an evil­doer, or as a busy­body in other people’s mat­ters. Yet if any­one suf­fers as a Chris­t­ian, let him not be ashamed, but let him glo­rify God in this mat­ter. — 1 Peter 4:12–16

The suf­fer­ing that is in view here is not sim­ply the suf­fer­ing that is com­mon to all humans, but rather, it is the shar­ing in the suf­fer­ings par­tic­u­lar to Jesus Christ. This mes­sage of Chris­t­ian suf­fer­ing is not one that is read­ily preached in the churches of today. Yet this kind of suf­fer­ing is a neces­sity for those who have Jesus as their Lord. (See John 15:20)

When we con­sider pick­ing up our cross to fol­low Jesus we might think of our broth­ers and sis­ters who bravely gave the ulti­mate wit­ness for Christ by being tor­tured and exe­cuted for their faith.  While this is some­thing that each of us as Chris­tians must be ready to do, at this time we live in rel­a­tive peace in most nations on this earth.  We do not expe­ri­ence the severe per­se­cu­tion that marked that early church.   Because of this we might lose sight of what it means to “suf­fer as a Chris­t­ian”.  In this series we will con­sider some ways that we, as Jesus’ fol­low­ers, may be called to “pick up our cross” even now and “suf­fer as a Chris­t­ian.” We also will con­sider what helps and bless­ings that we received in our Chris­t­ian suffering.

Rejec­tion from Churches & Religions

These things I have spo­ken to you, that you should not be made to stum­ble. They will put you out of the syn­a­gogues; yes, the time is com­ing that who­ever kills you will think that he offers God ser­vice. And these things they will do to you because they have not known the Father nor Me. But these things I have told you, that when the time comes, you may remem­ber that I told you of them. — Jesus (John 16:1–4)

In time of the first Jew­ish dis­ci­ples the syn­a­gogues served a sim­i­lar pur­pose to insti­tu­tional Chris­t­ian churches of our day. They were a local cen­ter of prayer, wor­ship, and scrip­ture read­ing. Con­fes­sion of Jesus pre­sented the real pos­si­bil­ity that one would be put out of the syn­a­gogue, com­pletely sep­a­rated from their reli­gious com­mu­nity (John 9:22; 12:42) The first exam­ple of this was of a man born blind that stood up for the Truth, and con­fessed that Jesus had healed him. Unable to get him to recant his belief, the reli­gious lead­ers kicked him out of the syn­a­gogue. (John 9:34)

What of today? In a sim­i­lar way, Jews and Mus­lims who now put faith in Jesus as Christ, find them­selves sep­a­rated from their reli­gious com­mu­ni­ties and places of wor­ship. How­ever, per­haps more sur­pris­ing, many fol­low­ers of Jesus have been forcibly sep­a­rated from nom­i­nally “Chris­t­ian” churches and denom­i­na­tions for the very same faith.

In many ways the insti­tu­tional church has strayed from the mes­sage of Jesus and has become increas­ingly worldly and cor­rupt.   Stand­ing up for the val­ues of Jesus may put us at odds with reli­gious lead­ers who are inter­ested in pro­tect­ing the sta­tus quo.   I’ve seen it hap­pen time and again, where some­one has a life-altering expe­ri­ence with the Lord Jesus and quickly becomes a tar­get even by those in their own con­gre­ga­tion.  Oth­ers are beat up and abused by false shep­herds and hired men. I’m per­son­ally con­vinced that the true Jesus is more and more an unwel­come guest in the reli­gious houses of today just as he was rejected by the Jews and that reli­gious system.

There are a vari­ety of ways that we may find our­selves pushed out of a “syn­a­gogue” because of fol­low­ing Jesus.    Some are forcibly excom­mu­ni­cated, oth­ers are sim­ply made to feel unwel­come and per­se­cuted until they leave.   If this is your expe­ri­ence take heart!   This was not unex­pected.   Jesus him­self encour­ages us that this very thing will hap­pen.  In this, you are only fol­low­ing the steps of innu­mer­able saints before you and most impor­tantly that of Jesus Christ.

The author of Hebrews in writ­ing to a group of believ­ers who had started to lose faith after being per­se­cuted encour­aged them with these words, There­fore let us go forth to Him, out­side the camp, bear­ing His reproach. For here we have no con­tin­u­ing city, but we seek the one to come. (Hebrews 13:13,14)   We must be ready today to leave behind the grandeur of the lofty, com­fort­able reli­gious insti­tu­tions to fol­low Jesus, “out­side the camp”.   In doing so we are not leav­ing Jesus.  No, we are actively seek­ing him!

Rejec­tion from Fam­ily & Friends

“Do not sup­pose that I have come to bring peace to the earth. I did not come to bring peace, but a sword. For I have come to turn a man against his father, a daugh­ter against her mother, a daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law, a man’s ene­mies will be the mem­bers of his own house­hold. — Jesus (Matthew 10:34–36)

This form of suf­fer­ing tends to go hand and hand with los­ing your reli­gion.   Leav­ing your reli­gion or church often includes leav­ing behind your fam­ily.    Some reli­gions actively encour­age fam­ily mem­bers to shun or oth­er­wise limit inter­ac­tion with fam­ily mem­bers that leave the reli­gion.   Other times, fam­ily mem­bers may feel slighted that we have left behind the reli­gion of our her­itage to pur­sue a richer rela­tion­ship with Jesus.   This cre­ates unwanted division.

Your fam­ily may con­sider you crazy for the choices you have made.  It may be help­ful to remem­ber that Jesus fam­ily thought he was crazy too.   There is an account recorded in the gospel of Mark, where Jesus’ fam­ily goes to seize him for they said he was, “out of his mind” (Mark 3:21, NIV)  It is also encour­ag­ing to know that this was not unex­pected.   Jesus fore­told how fol­low­ing him can make our own fam­ily begin to view us as enemies.

We have pre­vi­ously con­sid­ered the story of the man born blind, healed by Jesus, and thrown out of the syn­a­gogue.   If you look at this account in John chap­ter nine, you can observe that not only was this man stand­ing before a reli­gious coun­cil but his own par­ents as well.  Sadly, rather than stick up for him, his par­ents insisted he tes­tify for him­self, “because they feared the Jews, for the Jews had agreed already that if any­one con­fessed that He was Christ, he would be put out of the syn­a­gogue.” (John 9:22)  We may find our­selves in this vary sit­u­a­tion where our own par­ents reject us in sub­mit­ting to false reli­gious authorities.

If this is your sit­u­a­tion, take heart!  The account of the man born blind in John con­cludes with Jesus look­ing for this man. (John 9:35)  In the same way Jesus will not leave you alone.  He will seek actively seek you out!   He will bring you into the care of his own Father, just as King David sings, “When my father and my mother for­sake me, Then the LORD will take care of me.” (Psalm 27:10)   You will be in a posi­tion to receive much more than then you have left behind.  Jesus him­self promises,  “no one who has left home or broth­ers or sis­ters or mother or father or chil­dren or fields for me and the gospel will receive a hun­dred times as much in this present age (homes, broth­ers, sis­ters, moth­ers, chil­dren and fields—and with them, per­se­cu­tions) and in the age to come, eter­nal life.” (Mark 10:29)

To be continued …