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In our pursuit of God’s pleasure, which is to say, our pursuit of His will, I have tried to make two important points these past two weeks. First, God’s will is not, at it’s core, about a list of predetermined decisions that we have to get right. It’s about representing Him and reflecting His character.

Second, God does not score us against some standardized scale of performance. He is not our Examiner, He is our Father, Who, through faith in Jesus, has given us His nature, and Who delights in watching us grow increasingly into His likeness.

Clearing these issues up is critical. Otherwise, the misconceptions leave us chasing a notion of God’s will that has no more substance than a truckload of post holes. For you nautical types, that’s a lot like a boatload of sailboat fuel.

This week, I was ready to look at knowing God’s will/desires at a personal level. But in my time with Him this morning, I realized that there is another common, and fatal, misconception that frequents our notions of God’s will.  I’ll let Peter introduce it –

“Therefore, those also who suffer according to the will of God…” (1 Peter 4:19 NAS95).

Did you catch that? At least for some, God’s will involves suffering.

And that’s not the only place Peter mentions it. In 3:17, he says that “… it is better, if God should will it so, that you suffer for doing what is right rather than for doing what is wrong.”

Typically, our instinct tells us that if we are doing God’s will, things will run smoothly. When they get rough, we start wondering what we did wrong. But according to Peter, not only does God’s will involves suffering, it involves suffering for doing what is right.

And a little earlier in the book he makes an even more startling statement — God finds pleasure when we suffer this way. Here’s Peter’s words:

“Servants, be submissive to your masters with all respect, not only to those who are good and gentle, but also to those who are unreasonable. For this finds favor, if for the sake of conscience toward God a person bears up under sorrows when suffering unjustly. For what credit is there if, when you sin and are harshly treated, you endure it with patience? But if when you do what is right and suffer for it you patiently endure it, this finds favor with God.”   (1 Peter 2:18–20 NAS95)

So, we are a little relieved to discover that it’s not actually our suffering itself that brings God pleasure. Instead it is our patient endurance of that suffering that finds favor with Him.

Nevertheless, the first thing that we must come to grips with is that God’s will may very well involve our suffering. And we are not talking about suffering for things done wrong. It is for things done right. We can do everything right, and God may still want us to suffer.

Now, let’s look at this issue of Him finding pleasure in our patient endurance of unjust suffering. At this point, it is worth pointing out what may already be obvious. For months now, this series of articles has been about the pursuit of God’s pleasure, and here, we discover that a primary arena in which the pursuit of God’s pleasure occurs is the arena of suffering. I say “primary” because the entire book of 1 Peter is devoted to the topic, and because that is the context of the passage which gave us the imagery of the pursuit of God’s pleasure – Hebrews 10:32-39. If we are serious about this pursuit of God’s pleasure, we are going to have to suffer, and we are going to have to handle it well.

Why? Let’s return to 1 Peter 2. Resuming with the thought that our patient endurance of suffering pleases God (v. 20), in the very next verse, we discover that this is the purpose for which we have been called. Suffering is not just an incidental part of being a Christian. It is the purpose for which we were called. We know this because of Christ’s example. He suffered, unjustly, so that we could be made righteous and be healed. If we are to be like Him, we must suffer, unjustly, and must handle it patiently (vv. 21-25).

How does this look? Well, we have already seen how this plays out in the relationship of the servant and unreasonable master, roughly equivalent to our employee/employer relationship (vv. 18-21).

Following the example of Christ, Peter applies it to marriage, addressing the wife first. She is to be submissive to her husband, even when he is wrong (3:1-7).

For husbands, it looks a little different, since God has put him in the leadership role in the marriage. He cannot lead and be submissive at the same time. Instead, he is to live out of his relative strength, and live with his wife in an understanding way. Given the context of suffering, this includes even during those times that she doesn’t treat him justly. Even then, he must grant her honor as a fellow heir of God’s grace. No put-downs, no condescension, no retribution of any kind.

This is supported by the summary instructions that follow in 3:8ff, which capture everything all the way back to 2:11-12. Simply put, this patient endurance in suffering means that all believers should be “… harmonious, sympathetic, brotherly, kindhearted, and humble in spirit; not returning evil for evil or insult for insult, but giving a blessing instead…” (3:8-9a).

This is God’s will. This is what brings God pleasure. Because when we behave this way, we look like His Son. Like one of His children.

There is another aspect of this suffering that we need to look at, but we’ll save that for next week. For now, it is enough to recognize that suffering is a part of God’s will for each of us, and that He is pleased when we handle it well.

When life starts to get rough, what questions do you begin to ask?