Share the Victory
I'm a football fan.
After I graduated college and wasn't able to regularly attend my alma mater's games in person, I was fanatical about catching every game on TV. And if there was a conflict in my schedule, I would record the game, and avoid anything or anyone who might spoil it for me, so that I could watch it later, experiencing all the highs and lows of every play as if in real time.
As the years went by, though, my life evolved to include a wife and kids (with all the busy-ness that entails), and more and more games had to be experienced after the fact. And I admit, I eventually got to the point where I would occasionally sneak a glance at a final score to see how much time I wanted to spend watching every play later that night. Let's just say not every game got the full viewing.
A few years ago, during a fall Saturday, I took my 5-year-old son to a big-league baseball game that was scheduled at the same time as my alma mater's football game. I set the DVR and went for some father-son time, and between innings I checked out the scoreboard on my phone.
It wasn't good.
My team was getting hammered, and by the third quarter, it was bad enough that I gave up the self-torture and closed out that internet page. I was too busy bonding with my child to let some distant debacle get in the way. We enjoyed the baseball game, and when we got to the car afterward, I turned on the sports radio station for the day's updates.
My team had won in overtime.
I whooped out loud (yes, I'm still that guy), and later that night after my kids were in bed, I eagerly settled in to watch the game. It started out every bit as badly as the early scores had indicated. My team looked like an outmatched JV squad. It was ugly. But here's the thing I quickly became aware of – I was actually able to enjoy all that bad stuff. In fact, the worse it got, the more excited I became, because I knew what the inevitable result would be, I just didn't know how it would be achieved.
Only later did it dawn on me that I had experienced a pale imitation of one of scripture's more confounding principles – taking joy in suffering. Because as much as life's troubles can be exponentially worse than a football game, the end result is promised to be infinitely better.
"Consider it pure joy, my brothers and sisters, whenever you face trials of many kinds, because you know that the testing of your faith produces perseverance. Let perseverance finish its work so that you may be mature and complete, not lacking anything." – James 1:2-4
"And after you have suffered a little while, the God of all grace, who has called you to His eternal glory in Christ, will Himself restore, confirm, strengthen, and establish you." – 1 Peter 5:10
There are many out there who are feeling defeated by life, and can’t imagine how joy can be found in the midst of that. But victory is assured for those in Christ – we know the ending. And we are called to share that victory and bring that joy to those who are hurting. It will require more than just words - it will require getting in the trenches with them and lifting them up, bearing their burdens as if they’re our own. But we can rest assured that no matter how bleak things might look, we can't lose.