The true grace of God for your journey home is not ease and comfort, but many sorrows and suffering here — expected, designed, limited, and rewarded — endured in faith, mindful of God and Jesus Christ, and with inexpressible and glorified joy. Which leads to boundless, uninterrupted bliss when we’re finally home.

As I thought about this conference of young professionals, and the opportunity to speak to you about “what to expect on your journey home,” my mind went back twelve years.

My wife and I were deeply embedded in a community of young adults at Bethlehem Baptist Church in downtown Minneapolis. On January 10, 2013, that community gathered for the funeral of a five-month-old. His name was Henryk. His father, Michael, and mother, Emily, were our dearest friends. They had found out at an ultrasound the previous April that something wasn’t right. Henryk survived his birth in July but clearly was weak. We didn’t know how long he’d live, whether just hours, days, weeks, or even months. He made it five months and died in January.

For my wife and me, and many of our closest friends, this was our first unshielded adult encounter with the pains of life in this fallen age. Tragically, some encounter those in childhood. Others are shielded as children, and many even as teens and college students, but sooner or later, the sorrows and suffering of the real world come crashing in.

I’ll read you a small section of the eulogy I gave for Henryk:

For many of us, especially us younger adults around Michael’s and Emily’s age, this was our first (or one of our first) awakenings to how messed up things really are in this world. This was one of our first up-close encounters with what it means that the creation is cursed and subjected to futility because of sin, and that the place we live is not yet the home we long for.

For many of us who love this family, the problem of pain has gone from being theoretical to being intensely personal. We’ve caught glimpses of God’s goodness in the midst of wave after wave of disappointment and sorrow, but we are learning the tough lesson that in this world, God’s goodness toward us rarely means ease, and often means great hardship. If this world and this life were all there is, we would be on the brink of despair. The tensions God is lovingly creating in our hearts in this fallen age are meant to be resolved in an age to come.

We’ve learned that saying “God is good” doesn’t mean that he makes our lives easy, but often that he makes them hard, but not joyless.

Some of you have already had a first up-close adult encounter with deep sorrow or suffering. If you haven’t, it’s coming. And if you have, more are coming. My task this morning is to point you to what to expect on this journey home, as we live in a world that is “not yet the home we long for.”

Prepare for Suffering

Probably no book in the New Testament better prepares us for suffering than 1 Peter. I’d like to take us to several passages in 1 Peter, but I want to draw from one especially at the beginning of the letter as we seek to sketch a theology of sorrow and suffering. Turn with me to 1 Peter 1:6–9:

In this you rejoice, though now for a little while, if necessary, you have been grieved by various trials, so that the tested genuineness of your faith—more precious than gold that perishes though it is tested by fire—may be found to result in praise and glory and honor at the revelation of Jesus Christ. Though you have not seen him, you love him. Though you do not now see him, you believe in him and rejoice with joy that is inexpressible and filled with glory, obtaining the outcome of your faith, the salvation of your souls.

This message has four parts, based on 1 Peter 1:6–9 and a few related passages we’ll draw in. Here’s the summary:

Sorrows and sufferings on this journey home are expected, designed, limited, and rewarded.

1. Suffering Is Expected

You will have sorrows and suffering. You’ve had them, or have them now, or they’re coming. Peter writes to Christians who “have been grieved by various trials.” And this is not a fluke or aberration of normal Christianity; this is normal Christianity in this world, on this journey. We are grieved by various trials. We are sorrowful, and we suffer. So, Peter says, we should expect sorrows and suffering. First Peter 4:12–13 says,

Beloved, do not be surprised at the fiery trial when it comes upon you to test you, as though something strange were happening to you. But rejoice insofar as you share Christ’s sufferings, that you may also rejoice and be glad when his glory is revealed.

Because sorrows and suffering will come, Peter wants us to prepare our hearts and be sober-minded (1 Peter 1:13). Don’t assume suffering and debilitating sorrows won’t come to you. Assume they will. Expect them.

So, he says in 1 Peter 4:1: “Since . . . Christ suffered in the flesh, arm yourselves with the same way of thinking.” Arm yourselves! Christ suffered; why won’t I? We expect it on this journey home; we are not naive, not surprised. Expect opposition to a life of faith. Think it not strange to have sorrows and suffering here, but think it strange when we don’t.

Brothers and sisters, infants and children will die. Friends and family in the prime of life will be cut down. You may get cancer or a terminal disease. You will experience broken relationships, whether breakups or divorce, or estranged family and dear friends. There will be insults, opposition, and ostracism for your faith. It’s coming. Sorrows are coming. Suffering is coming. Will you be surprised?

‘Various Trials’

Did you notice that 1 Peter 1:6 says “various trials”? “You have been grieved by various trials.”

You will encounter many sources of suffering and sorrow in this life in a sinful, cursed world: disease, loss, disappointment, natural disasters. And you will experience the effects of your and others’ sin. And in and behind it all, 1 Peter 5:8 says, “Your adversary the devil prowls around like a roaring lion, seeking someone to devour.” He wants to eat up your faith, devour your soul. He’s happy to do it through comfort or pain.

In particular in 1 Peter, there is verbal opposition or persecution. Like your Savior, you too will be rejected by men (2:4, 7). You will be slandered (3:16), reviled (3:9), maligned (4:4), insulted (4:14)—which Peter sums up as when, not if, they “speak against you” (2:12).

Writing about the suffering of 1 Peter, Tom Schreiner comments,

Notice how Christians were maligned, criticized, and rejected for not following the societal ethos of their day. In the same way today, many are astonished that we have such a restrictive sexual ethic. Many contemporaries think we are detrimental to society, and many in the Roman world thought the same thing about Christians. They oppose us because we don’t approve the sin that is celebrated in many quarters.

So what did the persecution look like? The maltreatment Peter talks about consists of verbal abuse and presumably included unjust discrimination in everyday life. Even though they weren’t experiencing physical abuse, they were genuinely suffering.

If the main issue in 1 Peter is verbal abuse, why do I keep saying, more generally, “sorrows and suffering”? We’re going to see that 1 Peter 2:19 mentions “enduring sorrows while suffering unjustly.” What if you’re just enduring sorrows, with no unjust suffering? What about the many debilitating sorrows of life in this cursed, sinful world?

My answer is that anything that puts an obstacle in the way of your faith—not just verbal abuse, but any sorrow, any suffering, anything Satan would be happy to use to devour your faith, any threat to your joy in Jesus—can be addressed and overcome by how Peter would have us expect and respond to verbal opposition. He himself says “various trials.”

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