Even today, I can still remember a friend of mine telling me a lesson he learned about life. “We choose our hard,” he said, repeating what he had heard. He provided me with an example. Being overweight is hard. Losing weight is hard. Then he brought the focus back to our conversation. Addiction is hard. Sobriety is hard. He told me to choose.
No matter what, life is stacked with challenges that we foresee, and others that we do not. Either way, life is hard, but the kind of hard we face is up to us.
That got me thinking. Being a Christian is hard too, but so is not being a Christian. Just as I struggle to remember my worth in God, I imagine that atheists who don’t define themselves by God are stuck chasing worth through things that are fleeting.
If you look at your own life, surely you too can relate to the challenge of things being hard. Trusting God is hard, but so is not trusting. Finding community is a challenge, but so is having no one. Whatever the case, please don’t ever think of yourself as alone. You are not. Walking the Christian life is difficult, and doing so every day requires commitment.
If you need some encouragement, then keep reading. Here are the six hardest things to do as Christians.
1. Wait
Wait for the Lord; be strong, and let your heart be courageous. Wait for the Lord. (Psalm 27:14)
Patience is a virtue, they said. Patience is impossible, that didn’t say. And for good reason. Patience is both a virtue, and possible, but very difficult to attain. Waiting on God can feel like waiting an eternity, like the boredom of watching paint dry or the agony of a baby’s prolonged birth.
Figures in the Bible waited on God to act in various ways. Abraham waited on God to have children. Job waited on God to be restored. Sometimes we know what God will do next, and sometimes we don’t. The latter makes the waiting process much more difficult. We have no idea what to expect on the other side.
Consider your own life. Are you feeling bored during your wait, angry, sad? Whatever you’re waiting for, take heart in knowing that God hears your prayers and is aware of your situation. Rather than lamenting the wait, which believe me I can understand, what else can you do to make the most of your life while you wait?
I’ll tell you what one person told me. “Worship while you wait.”
2. Trust
“Be strong and courageous; don’t be terrified or afraid of them. For the Lord your God is the one who will go with you; he will not leave you or abandon you.” (Deuteronomy 31:6)
Having faith in God when we’re on a mountaintop - easy. Having faith in God when we’re sinking low into a valley - hard. Trusting that God has our best intentions at heart is not something we want to hear, let alone believe, when life is seemingly collapsing around us.
Even when we are not the ones specifically suffering, when we see calamities happening around the world, corrupt governments running amok, we question God’s whereabouts. This is the natural human response, but as Christians we should strive for the supernatural response.
As punishment, Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego were thrown into a burning furnace by King Nebuchadnezzar. They refused to worship the king’s gods and his golden statues. Despite knowing their consequences they would not commit idolatry. They outwardly expressed their trust in God to the king. They believed that God could rescue them, and even if not, God was still the only god.
Their trust paid off big time for them and the king (Daniel 3)!
God is willing to work in our lives too, and He does all the time. We simply don’t recognize or understand everything that God does. But whether we do or don’t, we should always strive to trust.
Photo Credit: ©GettyImages/Shutter2U
3. Serve our Enemies
“But I tell you, love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you.” (Matthew 5:44)
Forgiveness is one thing, serving our enemies, well, that’s something completely different. Forgiveness is understandable, and can be easy to do, though not always. Humbly serving our enemies - I don’t usually see people electing to do that.
Whether that person is a mean coworker, a disgruntled boss, an angry neighbor, putting ourselves out there to serve others can feel like a chore. If you’re already introverted and aloof, serving an enemy is bound to feel contrary to your human nature.
Yet, despite how we feel on the inside, or what we see on the outside from others, scripture is pretty clear on this topic. We are to forgive others and bless them. We can pray and if given the opportunity, should serve them.
Now, there’s no need to take Scripture to the literal extreme. Jesus often spoke in parables, and for good reason - we can take away multiple meanings. We should be willing and ready to serve our enemies, but this does not literally mean doing anything and everything asked of us. If your enemy asks you to rob a bank on their behalf. The obvious response is no. If your enemy asks you to hand over all of your finances, the answer is again no, but if they wanted a cup of sugar, what’s the worst that could happen?
Pray for ways to serve your enemies and seek discernment for how to best do so.
4. Remember God’s Goodness
“As my life was fading away, I remembered the Lord, and my prayer came to you, to your holy temple.” (Jonah 2:7)
Speaking of enemies, trusting, and waiting, sometimes calamities stack up so much in our lives we begin wondering if God is really on our side. If God is so good, why does He let such awful things happen to us? And not just to us, but people across the world.
Whenever God’s goodness comes into question, we should do like the figures of old did in Scripture - remember. Doubt occurs because we forget the good God has done on our behalf and for other people. Our focus shifts from the positive to the negative. When we remember God’s goodness, we reverse this process. Then suddenly, the doubt fades away.
The best way to remember God’s goodness is to seek what reminds you of God. Reading Scripture, journaling, praying, and good community all help, but they aren’t the only methods. What’s something you can do today?
5. Finding Community
“Two are better than one because they have a good reward for their efforts. For if either falls, his companion can lift him up; but pity the one who falls without another to lift him up.” (Ecclesiastes 4:9-10)
One unfortunate trend that affects the church is superficiality, where people only reveal their surface-level selves, and thus, prevent any sort of deep connection. For Christians looking for community, this poses an immediate barrier for those who want depth. Scripture states that iron sharpens iron (Proverbs 27:17), but how much can we sharpen one another without being vulnerable?
Sharpening requires exposure, and exposure requires vulnerability.
And the issue of being superficial is not confined to one church or one denomination. Most churches have become much like the rest of our culture, inwardly focused even as we talk about serving others. We focus far too much on ourselves.
If community is what you’re after, know that there are people out there for you. Finding them will require effort on our part, but also praying and waiting on God. Trust Him to provide.
6. Be like Christ
“Therefore, be imitators of God, as dearly loved children, and walk in love, as Christ also loved us and gave himself for us, a sacrificial and fragrant offering to God.” (Ephesians 5:1-2)
Part of the reason people doubt the Christian faith is that they see us as hypocrites. We encourage the world to behave in one way, but we very often act just like them. Licentiousness, avarice, theft, and more. What we have to remind the outside world is that church is for broken people. We are broken people, and that is why being Christ-like is difficult. There will never be a day when we are exactly like Him. There can’t be. But the goal is to try, aiming for perfection though never arriving.
We struggle day by day with the flesh, maintaining faith, waiting, and the list goes on. We will never be perfect, but the more we are like Him, the more we live for His glory.
Conclusion
There’s no doubt being a Christian is hard, but much like the other decisions we make in life, we choose our hard. To be a Christian or to not be a Christian. To work hard at becoming a better Christian or to not work hard at being a better Christian. The choice is up to us, but the benefits are clear. Choose your hard.
Photo Credit: ©iStock/Getty Images Plus/dragana991
Aaron D'Anthony Brown is a freelance writer, hip-hop dance teacher, and visual artist, living in Virginia. He currently contributes to Salem Web Network’s Crosswalk platform and supports various clients through the freelancing website Upwork. He's an outside-the-box thinker with a penchant for challenging the status quo.
Get in touch with him at aarondanthony.com and check out his debut short story anthology Honey Dreams on Amazon and Barnes and Noble.