[24] Now I rejoice in my sufferings for your sake, and in my flesh I am filling up what is lacking in Christ’s afflictions for the sake of his body, that is, the church,
Colossians 1:24
So, Paul, you want me to rejoice in suffering and more? Not one of those verses you easily put on the kitchen wall to encourage you. So what does Paul mean? I guess a good place to start would be to clear up what Paul is not saying.
Paul is not saying that the suffering of Jesus on the cross is deficient or incomplete or at sometime will need to be added to or completed.
Paul repeatedly says the opposite that Jesus’ suffering was once and for all and was perfectly sufficient for salvation (Colossians 1:12-14, 19-20, and 2:13-14).
Jesus himself said “it is finished” (John 19:30). Every other New Testament writer agrees with Paul that nothing needs to be added to the work of the cross.
The word translated in our passage “afflictions” is never used in the New Testament to refer to Christ’s redemptive work on the cross. The word rather refers to the persecution and abuse Christ experienced on Earth due to his calling (Hebrews 2:10, 17-18). It was his suffering and death on the cross that satisfied the wrath of the Father and secured our forgiveness.
Some commentators say that Paul is referring to the afflictions he endures “for the sake of Christ” in order to glorify him and advance the cause of the kingdom. This may be true but does not explain the statement , “what is lacking in Christ’s afflictions,” nor accounts for how Paul can fill them up or complete them.
Some commentators say that Paul is identifying with Christ here. His sufferings are like that of Jesus’ sufferings and a first of many who would also suffer for Christ. This again maybe true but does not explain the “lack” in what Christ suffered or how Paul filled them up.
Now to the ‘end times view’ and one that raises much passion amongst Christians. Here, the afflictions of Christ refer not to what Jesus suffered but to those trials and tribulations that immediately precede the end of the age, what some have called the “Messianic woes.” The sufferings of the apostle, together with the sufferings of all believers, contribute to these afflictions.
To be honest the more I read, the more I vacillate between the options as everyone seems so persuasive.
John Piper says this,
“Paul’s sufferings,” he explains, “complete Christ’s afflictions not by adding anything to their worth, but by extending them to the people they were meant to save. What is lacking in the afflictions of Christ is not that they are deficient in worth, as though they could not sufficiently cover the sins of all who believe. What is lacking is that the infinite value of Christ’s afflictions is not known and trusted in the world. . . . So the afflictions of Christ are ‘lacking’ in the sense that they are not seen and known and loved among the nations. They must be carried by the ministers of the Word. And those ministers of the Word ‘complete’ [or ‘fill up’] what is lacking in the afflictions of Christ by extending them to others”
John Piper goes on to say,
“God intends for the afflictions of Christ to be presented to the world through the afflictions of His people. . . . Our calling is to make the afflictions of Christ real for people by the afflictions we experience in bringing them the message of salvation. Since Christ is no longer on the earth, He wants His body, the church, to reveal His suffering in its suffering.”
Going back to the differing views of commentators, some say it may be that in some sense Paul is experiencing afflictions in the place of Jesus, afflictions that Jesus otherwise would have endured were he on Earth. By doing so Paul is convinced that he is providing an example of endurance and faith that will encourage and be of benefit to the Colossians.
So we read of something similar in Paul’s encounter with Jesus on the Damascus Road – “And falling to the ground he [Saul/Paul] heard a voice saying to him, ‘Saul, Saul, why are you persecuting me?’ And he said, ‘Who are you, Lord?’ And he said, ‘I am Jesus, whom you are persecuting.'” Everything done to the body of Christ, the church, is done to Christ himself, and vice versa.
The afflictions of Paul were the afflictions of Christ: the latter suffered in and with the former because of their spiritual union. In a sense, the sufferings of Paul (and of all Christians) are simply the continuation of the world’s objections to Christ.
As Mark 13:13 says, “You shall be hated by all men for my name’s sake.”
In the end, the truth is Christians will have to endure suffering for the sake of Christ and his kingdom, for the sake of Christ and his church. In this way we are seen to be his own. In this way others see him, through us.
[10] that I may know him and the power of his resurrection, and may share his sufferings, becoming like him in his death,
Philippians 3:10
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