Following a Suffering Savior

Here is what Hebrews 12:3-4 says, "Consider him who endured such hostility from sinful men against himself so that you do not grow weary or fainthearted.  For in your struggle agaist sin you have not yet resisted to the point of shedding your blood."  In v. 1 the Christian life is described as a "race set before us"; in verse 4 the Christian life is described as a "struggle against sin".  We run the race by looking to Jesus, we fight against sin by considering Jesus' struggle against sin. 

The whole course of Jesus' life upon this earth was a fight, a contest, a struggle against sin.  All the suffering he endured, chiefly that which he suffered at the hands of sinful men, was for the purpose of conquering sin and all its effects.  He overcame by his obedient life and by his willing death.  As the prophet Isaiah foretold about the Messiah he was a "man of sorrows and aquainted with grief". 

"Surely he has borne our griefs and carried our sorrows; yet we esteemed him stricken, smitten by God, and afflicted.  But he was wounded for our transgressions; he was crushed for our iniquities; upon him was the chastisement that brought us peace, and with his stripes we are healed.  All we like sheep have gone astray; we have turned--every one--to his own way; and the LORD has laid on him the iniquity of us all."

(Isa 53:4-6 ESV) 

The suffering of Jesus was the bearing of the punishment due us for our sins.  His suffering was in our place.  We deserve to suffer and die and be sent to hell forever for our rebellion.  But God laid on Christ all our sins and the punishment due us was laid on him so that there is no more punishment left for all who trust in Jesus. This is the good news of the gospel of Jesus.

However, we are commanded to consider this fact about our Lord Jesus so that we will not give up our fight against our sin.  The point is that just as the sufferings of Christ perpetrated against him by sinful men were necessary for his fight with and final victory over our sin, so our sufferings are a necessary part of our fight against our sin.  We do not suffer and fight for the purpose of obtaining forgiveness for ous sins.  Our sins are forgiven because of what Christ did.  Our struggle is against the present power of sin over us.  It is against the deception of sin.  We fight the fight of faith, which is to believe that Christ and his salvation is better than the pleasures of sin. 

The fact is that suffering and pain always put pressure on us to quit the fight and so we must consider the suffering Christ so that we do not give up.  We must remember that Jesus only conquered our sin by his willingly suffering at the hands of sinful men.  So our sufferings are designed by God as the means by which we will also overcome our own sin.  We trust and follow a suffering Savior and so we must also embrace the sufferings which God sends to us to aid us in our struggle against sin.

Let me close with Amy Carmichel's poem:
Hast thou no scar?
No hidden scar on foot, or side or hand?
I hear thee sung as mighty in the land,
I hear them hail thy bright ascendent star
Hast thou no scar?

Hast thou no wound?
Yet I was wounded by the archers, spent,
Leaned me against a tree to die; and rent
By ravening beasts that encompassed me, I swooned;
Hast thou no wound?

No wound? No scar?
Yet, as the master shall the servant be
And pierced are the feet that follow Me;
But thine are whole: can he have followed far
Who has nor wound nor scar?