By Ajith Fernando

This article is one in a series under the Global Conversations commissioned by the Lausanne Movement to introduce some of the issues and challenges for witnessing to the world today. These are published by the Lausanne Movement in collaboration with Christianity Today leading up to the 3rd Lausanne Congress on World Evangelization in Cape Town in October 2010.


I write this shortly after returning from a week of teaching pastors in the deep south of Sri Lanka. The experience of these pastors shows that when people pioneer in unreached areas, it often takes ten to fifteen years before they see significant fruit and reduced hostility. In the early years they are assaulted and accused falsely; stones are thrown onto their roofs; their children are given a hard time in school; and there are few genuine conversions. Many pioneers give up after a few years. But those who persevere bear much eternal fruit. I am humbled and ashamed of the way I complain when I have problems that are so minute in comparison to theirs.

When I return from ministry in the West my feelings are very different. I have been able to 'use my gifts' and spend most of my time doing things I like to do. I am hit by frustration when I return to being a leader in our less efficient culture. The transition from being a speaker in the West to being a leader in Sri Lanka is a difficult one.

As a leader I am the bond-slave (doulos) of the people I lead (2 Corinthians 4:5). This means that my schedule is influenced more by their needs than mine. Vocational fulfilment in the kingdom of God has a very distinct character, quite different from vocational fulfilment in society. Jesus said, 'My food is to do the will of him who sent me and to accomplish his work' (John 4:34). If we are doing God’s will we are happy and fulfilled. But for Jesus, and for us, doing God’s will includes a cross. The cross must be an essential element in our definition of vocational fulfilment.

Young Christian workers who come back to Sri Lanka after studying in the West struggle with this. They are highly qualified, but our poor nation cannot afford to give them the recognition that they think their qualifications deserve. They cannot use their gifts to the fullest because we cannot afford pure specialists. They struggle with frustration. Some end up leaving the country after a few years. Some start their own organizations so that they can fulfil their 'vision.' Others become consultants, giving expert training and advice in their specialized field. Others pay the price of identifying with our people and ultimately have a deep impact on the nation.

I try to tell them that their frustration could be the means of developing penetrative insight. I try to explain that people like John Calvin and Martin Luther had a dizzying variety of responsibilities, so that they could only use their gifts through tiredness. Yet the fruit of their labours as leaders and writers still blesses the church.

Frustration
Paul’s theology gave an important place to the need to endure frustration patiently as we live in a fallen world awaiting the redemption of creation. Paul said that we groan because of this frustration (Romans 8:18-25). I believe we are not including this frustration in our understanding of vocational fulfilment today. A church that has a wrong understanding of fulfilment for its workers will certainly become a sick church. This may be one reason why there is so much shallowness in the church today. We have measured success from the standards of the world and failed to challenge the world with the radically new biblical way to fulfilment.

The contemporary emphasis on efficiency and measurable results makes frustration even harder to endure. In the past four centuries industrial and technological development in the West resulted in efficiency and productivity becoming high values. With rapid economic development, things once considered luxuries became not only necessities but also rights in the minds even of Christians. In this environment the Christian’s idea of commitment has taken a heavy battering.

We call our churches and Christian organizations families, but families are very inefficient organizations. In a healthy family, everything stops when family members have big needs. We are often not willing to extend this idea of commitment to Christian body life.

Commitment
The biblical model of community life is Jesus’ command to love one another as he loved us—that is, for members to die for other members (John 15:12-13). The model of Christian leadership is that of the Good Shepherd dying for the sheep without abandoning them when the situation gets dangerous (John 10:11-15). When God calls us to serve him, he calls us to come and die for the people we serve. We don’t discard people when they have problems and cannot do their job properly. We serve them and help them to come out of their problems. We don’t tell people to find another place of service when they rebel against us. We labour with them until we come to agreement either to agree or to disagree.

When people leave a church because they did not fit into the program, we communicate a deadly message: that our commitment is to the work one does and not to the person; that our unity is primarily in the work and not in Christ and the gospel. The sad result of this is that Christians do not have the security of belonging to a community that will stay by them no matter what happens to them. They become shallow individuals never having deep fellowship and moving from group to group. Churches can fulfil programs and grow numerically in this way, but they don’t nurture biblical Christians who understand the implications of belonging to the body of Christ.

Sticking with people is frustrating because it is inefficient. Taking hours to listen to an angry or hurt person seems to be a very inefficient thing. Why should we waste time on that when there are professionals who can do it? So people have counsellors to do what friends should be doing.

Ideally the counsellor helps to diagnose and treat difficult cases, and friends give the time that is needed to bring healing to hurting individuals through acceptance, comfort, and friendship. Hurt people usually hurt those who try to help them. Hurt and angry people whom we are committed to will hurt us too. Others who are hurt by them could get angry with us because we are committed to them. But we endure that pain because Christ called us to die for our friends.

Several people have sympathized with me, saying that it must be hard and frustrating to serve in a country wracked by war and hostile to evangelism. Indeed we have suffered because of this. A few months ago one of our staff workers was brutally assaulted to death. But I think the biggest pain I have experienced is the pain I have received from Youth for Christ, the organization for which I have worked 34 years. I can also say that next to Jesus and my family, Youth for Christ has been the greatest source of joy in my life. Whether you live in the East or the West you will suffer pain if you are committed to people. This is suffering that can be avoided. We can avoid pain by stopping the relationship or moving to something more 'fulfilling.' But then what do we lose?

Some years ago I was preparing a message on commitment while I was travelling in the West. Within the space of a few days three people told me how they or someone close to them had left a group or a person because of problems they were having. One had left an unhappy marriage, another a church and another an organization. Each of these leavings was described as a merciful release from suffering. But I could not help asking myself whether, in each of these cases, the Christian thing to do was to stay and suffer.

Drivenness or Servanthood
I have a large group of people to whom I write asking for prayer when I have a need. Sometimes my need is overcoming tiredness. When I write about this need, many write back saying they are praying that God would strengthen me and guide me in my scheduling. However, there are differences in the way friends from the East and some from the West respond. I get the strong feeling that many in the West think if when one struggles with tiredness from overwork that is evidence of disobedience to God. My contention is that it is wrong if one gets sick from overwork through drivenness and insecurity. But we may have to pay the price of tiredness when we, like Paul, are servants of people.

The New Testament is clear that those who work for Christ will suffer because of their work. Tiredness, stress and strain may be the cross that God calls us to. Paul often spoke about the physical hardships his ministry brought him. This included emotional strain (Galatians 4:19; 2 Corinthians 11:28), anger (2 Corinthians 11:29), sleepless nights, hunger (2 Corinthians 6:5), affliction, perplexity (2 Corinthians 4:8), and toiling—working to the point of weariness (Colossians 1:29). In statements radically countercultural in today’s 'body culture' society, he said: 'Though our outer self is wasting away, our inner self is being renewed day by day' (2 Corinthians 4:16); and 'For we who live are always being given over to death for Jesus’ sake, so that the life of Jesus also may be manifested in our mortal flesh. So death is at work in us, but life in you' (2 Corinthians 4:11-12). I fear that many Christians approach these texts with an academic interest without seriously asking how they should apply in their lives today.

The West, having struggled with the tyrannical rule of time, has a lot to teach the East about the need for rest. The East perhaps has something to teach the West about embracing physical problems that come because of commitment to people. If you think that it is wrong to suffer physically because of the ministry, then you suffer more from the problem than those who believe that suffering is an inevitable step along the path to fruitfulness and fulfilment. As the cross is a basic aspect of discipleship, the Church must train Christian leaders to expect pain and hardship. When this perspective enters our minds, then pain will not touch our joy and contentment in Christ. I found eighteen different places in the New Testament where suffering and joy appear together. In fact, often suffering is a cause for joy (Romans 5:3-5; Colossians 1:24; James 1:2-3).
 
The Glory of the Gospel
In a world where physical health, appearance, and convenience have gained almost idolatrous prominence, God may be calling Christians to demonstrate the glory of the gospel by being joyful and contented while enduring pain and hardship. People who are unfulfilled after pursuing things that do not satisfy may be astonished when they see Christians who are joyful and content after depriving themselves of these things for the sake of the gospel. This may be a new way to demonstrate the glory of the gospel to this hedonistic culture.

I have a great fear for the Church. The West is fast becoming an unreached region. The Bible and history show that suffering is an essential ingredient in reaching unreached people. Will the loss of a theology of suffering result in the church in the West being ineffective in its evangelism? The church in the East is growing, and because of that God’s servants are suffering. Significant funding and education come to the East from the West. With funding and education comes influence. Could Westerners influence Eastern Christians to abandon the cross by sending a message that they must be doing something wrong if they suffer in this way? Christians in both the East and the West need to have a firm theology of suffering if they are to be healthy and fruit-bearing.

Ajith Fernando has been National Director of Youth for Christ in Sri Lanka since 1976. With his wife Nelun, he also serves in a church in Colombo consisting mainly of poor, urban first generation Christians. He is the author of The Call to Joy and Pain (Crossway / IVP UK) and An Authentic Servant (Didasko Files).

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