Suffering As Christ

To be a Christian is to be in the body of Christ, to be part of Jesus himself, to do as he did, to love as he loved, and to be as distinct from the world around us as he was from his. Our calling is implicitly a way of living and being in the world which is relentlessly relational and oriented toward loving all, without exception.

Love of enemy is the divine mark of Jesus’ followers, and precisely what distinguishes disciples from the nondistinctive friend-love which is common in the world (Matthew 5:44-48). To sidestep the way of Christ is to leave Christ himself, no matter what practical reasons some might give for suspending this love.

If we can rationalize hatred, cruelty, and the mistreatment of people who are created in God’s image, because of some pragmatic “good” for society, or even worse, for self-serving economic reasons, then we simply are not of Christ in any meaningful way.

As he was traveling, it happened that he was approaching Damascus, and suddenly a light from heaven flashed around him; and he fell to the ground and heard a voice saying to him, “Saul, Saul, why are you persecuting Me?”Acts 9:3-4

Jesus didn’t ask Paul why he was persecuting his people, or the members of his church, but why he was persecuting he himself. Can we mistreat the people who were created by Christ, for Christ, in Christ, and through Christ, and not be doing the same to Jesus himself? Can we be unloving toward anyone and not be unloving toward Jesus himself?

Whatever we do “to the least of these” we do to Jesus (Matthew 25:40), whether we are speaking of acts of kindness, unthinking neglect, or deliberate harm. Jesus is telling us that he is the people who are around us. What we do to anyone, we do to him.

We see the Christ of the cross suffering in every instance of war, violence, hatred, prejudice, injustice, neglect, abuse, or action which deprives people of dignity and ignores their sacred humanity. Because the crucified One prays for forgiveness, we cannot hate those who injure Christ. We, the body of Christ, are on the cross with Jesus. We can be no where else because he is head and Lord.

What does this mean for us? We mourn the tragedy of any and all human suffering, and cannot condone any anti-Christ action. We choose to be identified with the Lord Jesus who was rejected by both the religious and governing authorities. We recognize that the brokenness of our world today is no different than 2000 years ago, and religious and governing authorities, who are beneficiaries of the world system as it is, will crucify Jesus in every age.

Love never works to build power, has no select constituents with whom to gain favor, and does not succumb to the fear of scarcity. God is the abundant love which eschews power and grants favor to all, and we have no other gods before him.