It’s Not About Me! - Paul

Because I preach this Good News, I am suffering and have been chained like a criminal. But the word of God cannot be chained. So I am willing to endure anything if it will bring salvation and eternal glory in Christ Jesus to those God has chosen.

2 Timothy 2:9-10

In July 2006, Chinese police arrested four Christian missionaries in China’s Yunnan province, charging them with “superstitious activity.” They tortured these believers for more than six hours. One female missionary had much of her hair torn out, and police threatened to turn two others over to a local tribe to be raped.

Despite all that, the police couldn’t prove any wrongdoing on the part of the missionaries and released them after confiscating their Bibles, computer disks containing hymns, and the U.S. equivalent of four hundred dollars.

Though most American believers don’t suffer this kind of persecution, such events remind us that taking the message of Christ to a needy and sometimes hostile world can involve suffering.

The apostle Paul freely chose to suffer for Christ. Despite being arrested, chained, imprisoned, and beaten, he refused to stop preaching. He faced opponents, many of them violent, wherever he went, yet he gladly continued to speak the name of Jesus Christ.

Paul actually considered it an honor to suffer for Christ’s name. Was he a masochist? Hardly. He didn’t enjoy his chains, beatings, or jail cells, and he actively tried to win his release from incarceration whenever possible (see Acts 26:29). Yet he wrote that he would endure anything if that would help to get the gospel message preached to those who needed to hear it.

Paul’s life revealed the driving force behind his incessant missionary activity: “So I am willing to endure anything if it will bring salvation and eternal glory in Christ Jesus to those God has chosen.” Paul gladly suffered because he had the humility to know that everything is about “Jesus Christ, the one who was crucified” (1 Corinthians 2:2).

Living and speaking for Christ are bound to attract opposition. “Yes,” Paul wrote, “everyone who wants to live a godly life in Christ Jesus will suffer persecution” (2 Timothy 3:12). Remember that nothing you endure is really about you. Rather, it’s about making sure that people hear the name of Jesus.