Here in America, we have been taught that we should never be deprived of anything. We’ve been led to believe that deprivation is a “bad word.” But God might be trying to teach us something different. Perhaps deprivation can actually lead to God’s Glory. As J. I. Packer tells us:
You know what kind of life it is that Christ calls you, as his disciple, to live. His own example and teaching in the Gospels make it abundantly clear. You are called to go through this world as a pilgrim, a mere temporary resident, traveling light, and willing, as Christ directs, to do what the rich young ruler refused to do: give up material wealth and the security it provides and live in a way that involves you in poverty and loss of possessions. Having your treasure in heaven, you are not to budget for treasure on earth, nor for a high standard of living—you may well be required to forego both.
You are called to follow Christ, carrying your cross.
What does that mean? Well, the only persons in the ancient world who carried a cross were condemned criminals going out to execution; each, like our Lord himself, was made to carry the cross on which he was to be crucified. So, what Christ means is that you must accept for yourself the position of such a person, in the sense that you renounce all future expectations from society and learn to take it as a matter of course if the people around you give you the cold shoulder and view you with contempt and disgust, as an alien sort of being. You may often find yourself treated in this fashion if you are loyal to the Lord Jesus Christ.
None of this, of course, is strange to any of us. We know what kind of life Christ calls us to; we often preach and talk to each other about it. But do we live it? Well, look at the churches. Observe the shortage of ministers and missionaries, especially men; the luxury goods in Christian homes; the fund-raising problems of Christian societies; the readiness of Christians in all walks of life to grumble about their salaries; the lack of concern for the old and lonely and for anyone outside the circle of “sound believers.” We are unlike the Christians of New Testament times.
Paul tells us that there is no ultimate loss or irreparable impoverishment to be feared; if God denies us something, it is only in order to make room for one or other of the things He has in mind. Are we perhaps, still assuming that a person’s life consists, partly at any rate in the things he possesses? When it comes to cheerful self-abandonment in Christ’s service we dither. Why? Out of unbelief, pure and simple.
May we learn to say with Habakkuk in face of economic ruin or any other deprivation: “Though the fig tree does not bud and there are no grapes on the vines, though the olive crop fails and the fields produce no food, though there are no sheep in the pen and no cattle in the stalls, yet I will rejoice in the LORD, I will be joyful in God my Savior. The Sovereign LORD is my strength” (Hab 3:17-19). Happy the person who can say these things and mean them!
I hope that I can learn cheerful self-abandonment in order to exalt Jesus Christ. I hope I can learn to be joyful in Jesus even when I do not find myself “rich” in the ways of the world.
(Quotes in today’s post are from Knowing God by J. I. Packer)