When you are suffering, you don’t want a syrupy-sweet Jesus – you want a battlefield Jesus! Through him you are more than a conqueror.
God wants us – all of us – to endure hardship as a good soldier.
Hi, I’m Joni Eareckson Tada and Scripture makes it clear: you and I are in a battle. It’s a war. It’s a cosmic war. And 2 Timothy 2:3 tells us to face every hardship in this war with a resolve of a valiant soldier in the army of Christ. This means that Jesus is the captain of your salvation; he’s your Comrade-In-Arms, a strong Commander who leads and guides you into the good fight.
It’s why, here at Joni and Friends, we don’t present a picture of, oh, I don’t know, “gentle-Jesus-meek-and-mild,” a portrait that tugs at your sentiments or pulls at your heartstrings. It’s because we deal with so many people who suffer, and when you’re hurting hard—I mean, really hard—you are neither helped nor are you inspired by a syrupy picture of our Savior, like those sugary, sentimental images many of us grew up with. Jesus with His hair parted down the middle, surrounded by cherub-like children and bluebirds. And everywhere this Jesus walks, you hear strains of organ music. And if you, too, suffer hard, you’re not helped or inspired by that false picture often portrayed of Jesus.
Come on, admit it: When your heart is being wrung out like a sponge, when you feel like Morton’s salt is being poured into your wounded soul, you don’t want a thin, pale, emotional Jesus who only relates to lambs and birds and babies. You want a warrior Jesus. You want a battlefield Jesus. You want His rigorous and robust Gospel to command your sensibilities to stand at attention. When you are in a hard place, surrounded by lions, when you need strong help to rescue you from an impossibility, you don’t want “sweet.” You don’t want faded pastels and honey-suckle softness. You want mighty. You want fortress-strong. You want Rock of Ages and the unshakable grip of God who will not let you go, no matter what. When you suffer hard, this is what your soul is thirsty for.
Not so with everyone. Some people prefer a sentimental picture of Jesus. Perhaps that’s because a sugar-coated Christ requires nothing from them—no conviction, no commitment. A soft, romanticized view of Jesus is an image that lacks truth, it lacks power. But when you’re hurting, when you’re suffering hard, you need power. You need supernatural power that enables you to smile in the face of affliction. Come on, I know for me in this wheelchair, it’s all-out warfare. I need a battlefield Jesus at my side here in this dangerous, often messy trenches of daily life. I need Jesus the rescuer, ready to wade through my pain, ready to wade through death and hell itself to find me, and grasp me, and bring me safely through. I realize there will be a time in the future – perhaps not too far over the horizon – when I will enjoy a casual stroll through the garden with my Savior, admiring dew-drops on the roses. But for right now, if I am to “endure hardship like a good soldier” as it says in 2 Timothy, I need a Comrade-in-Arms, I need a strong Commander to take charge of my private war. And this is exactly who Jesus Christ is, and what He has done. He is the Captain of your Salvation; Zephaniah 3:17 says, “The Lord your God is with you, [a] Mighty Warrior who saves.” My goodness, he’s provided every spiritual resource so that you can gain the victory. It’s a hard fight, but you have the assurance today that, through him, you can be more than a conqueror. Go today to joniradio.org.
© Joni and Friends