Brothers and sisters, let the Holy Spirit open the eyes of our understanding..

Now let us consider this verse- 1Peter 2:20

For what glory is it, if, when ye be buffeted for your faults, ye shall take it patiently? but if, when ye do well, and suffer for it, ye take it patiently, this is acceptable with God.

This verse reveals that

a) there are suffering that does not glorifies God

b) there are suffering that glorifies God



a) there are suffering that does not glorifies God

'For what glory is it, if, when ye be buffeted for your faults, ye shall take it patiently?'

There is no glory when we suffer due to our own faults. The greek word for 'faults' -hamartanō- from Strong's Concordance ; indicates the following;

1) to be without a share in

2) to miss the mark

3) to err, be mistaken

4) to miss or wander from the path of uprightness and honour, to do or go wrong

5) to wander from the law of God, violate God's law, sin

This means that the Lord is not glorified if we suffer due to our lack of knowledge, ignorance, mistakes, missing the mark. Thank God our Father that He is always merciful towards us even when we have done terrible mistakes. Just think about how our Lord Jesus treats Peter even after Peter denied Him 3 times... Our Lord Jesus is indeed full of mercy and knows our weakness..

However, the Lord does strongly rebuke us if we do not learn to have faith because there is no glory in it. He is not glorified through our lack of faith, through our mistakes... Therefore we have a responsibility to learn to walk by faith by the knowledge of Jesus.

The verse also reveals that it is in vain to suffer PATIENTLY if the suffering is cause by our ignorance of the Lord's instructions. The Lord Jesus gave a command to 'heal the sick, cleanse the lepers, raise the dead'. This implies that we are required to learn how to use the Lord's authority given to us to heal the sick, cleanse the lepers.

Often there are unnecessary suffering that occurs in our life- which are caused by ourselves not knowing how to exercise authority over sickness and disease and over the devil. Bear in mind that there are NO GLORY in this and the Lord is not glorified if we suffer unnecessarily because we do not learn to exercise our faith.


b) there are suffering that glorifies God

'but if, when ye do well, and suffer for it, ye take it patiently, this is acceptable with God.'


The suffering that glorifies God is this- if we preach the Word, heal the sick, cleanse the lepers, and we overcome our problems by faith, and somehow we are hated by many, rejected and scorned because of all these good works, and yet we take this patiently; this suffering is indeed acceptable before God.

'when ye do well'- this words indicate that the christian's faith is now exercised well into actions of good works which is blameless, not missing the mark, and in accordance with the Lord's instructions. And suffering because we 'DO WELL', this is ACCEPTABLE before God.

Therefore, brothers and sisters, God does not call us to suffer things that are because of our own mistakes and ignorance, but He requires us to DO WELL, in all things. And if we have to suffer for doing well in our faith, then ask for Wisdom from the Holy Spirit. It is normal for the Spirit to lead us OUT of unnecessary hardship. Even our Lord Jesus hid Himself and escape the Pharisees as necessary as possible. And if we go through hardship armed with our faith and the Holy Spirit's Wisdom, hardship becomes an opportunity for faith to release the demonstration of God's power.

It is futile to go through hardship without DOING WELL, using our faith to achieve results. This is one of the fruit that our Lord Jesus seek..

Luke 18:8b Nevertheless when the Son of man cometh, shall he find faith on the earth?