Boasting in our Sufferings

Therefore, since we have been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ. Through him we have also obtained access by faith into this grace in which we stand, and we rejoice in hope of the glory of God. Not only that, but we rejoice in our sufferings, knowing that suffering produces endurance, and endurance produces character, and character produces hope, and hope does not put us to shame, because God’s love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit who has been given to us.”   Romans 5:1-5

We focused on verses 3-5 which give us three reasons why we can rejoice even in our sufferings—boast” even in our sufferings.
– The first reason is because of what has been said in vs 1-2. Even in our sufferings it is still true that we are justified by faith, we have peace with God, we have access to the grace in which we now stand, and we rejoice in the hope of the glory of God. All of that is true regardless of what is going on around us, so we can boast. It’s important to realize also that Paul does not seem to view rejoicing as contrary to, or completely independent of suffering and sorrow. Paul says in 2 Cor 6:10 “we are sorrowful yet always rejoicing.” This suggests that both experiences are possible at the same time, not only sequentially.
– Secondly, we can rejoice even in suffering because suffering produces endurance, and endurance produces (proven) character, and (proven) character produces hope! And since it is hope that causes the boasting in vs 2, then this hope in vs 4 should also produce boasting!
– The third reason we can rejoice in hope is because the type of hope suffering produces “does not put us to shame” because it is made all the more sure by “the love of God poured into our hearts by the Holy Spirit.” We will look more at this verse next week, but here at the very least we can say that by having God’s love for us in our hearts by the Holy Spirit, the hope that is in us becomes all the more sure and all the more a source of joy and boasting in the glory of God.