Who Said This Was Supposed to be Easy?

    I read the book, Radical, by David Platt, recently, and like its title this book has truly had radical effects on the way I look at my walk with God and the way I live my life. I've taken away much from reading it, but right now I wanted to focus quickly on something that I picked up from the book that's been on my heart lately.

    (Also, I know it's been over a week since I last posted; I'm not dead, however my mom's computer died, so since I've been home my computer has become the family computer, which severely limits my access to it.)

    A very profound truth that I discovered in Radical was the uncommon idea that a life lived in Christ will not be easy. Now some of you might ask, "Why wouldn't it be easy? I thought God made stuff easy for us when we follow Him."

    It's not easy because it isn't supposed to be easy.

    The biggest misconception of the life of one who follows Christ is that once you give your life to God completely, everything will fall into place and you'll never any problems ever again. Ever. Unfortunately, this isn't the case.

    Remember when Jesus says, "In the world you have tribulation, but take courage; I have overcome the world" (John 16:33b)? He's saying that we will always have struggles in this world, but to have faith in Him; He is bigger than the world.

    But the struggles we face shouldn't come as a surprise, even if we think that Jesus just sets every challenge straight for us. Jesus faced struggles in His time here as well. He was tempted, just as we are. The difference is He never sinned; He never gave in to the temptations, but instead cast them out. And just like Jesus was tempted and tried by the world, so are we.

    Because we serve and put our faith in Him, we will look different to the world, just like He did. Jesus told the world what it needed to hear, which was exactly what the world didn't, and still doesn't, want to hear. When we truly live our lives for Christ, we will look different to the world. We will sound different to the world, and we will behave far differently than the world does.

    And the world will not like it.

    But the world reacted the same way to Jesus. The world hated Jesus. So if we live our lives as Christ calls us to, the world should hate us. And being creatures that naturally long for acceptance, being hated isn't something we look forward to.

    So we will always face struggles, and people will hate us for the way we live. We will be tried, tempted, and worn down to the breaking point. It won't be easy. But it was never supposed to be. Besides, how can we truly show our love for Jesus if living for Him was easy? We have so much more to look forward to with Him than what the world can distract us with. This life will bring struggles, but at the end is a heavenly reward.

    "I have overcome the world."