Transformation

“I want to know Christ and the power of His resurrection and the fellowship of sharing in His sufferings, becoming like Him in His death” (Phil 3:10).
Christians eagerly want to know Christ, His power, His resurrection, but the rest of the verse is the hardest to grasp. “We’ll follow Him, Joni Eareckson Tada says, “to the hillside where He turns a couple of fish and a few loves of bread into a lunch for thousands. We’ll attend a wedding where He turns water into wine. We’ll attend a wedding where He turns water into wine. We’ll follow Him to the beach, hug our knees, sit on the sand and adore His words. But nobody wants to know the fellowship of sharing in His sufferings. Yet that is where the power, the intimacy, the sweetness of knowing Him is. That is where change happens. We shouldn’t view life’s struggles as daunting obstacles to our happiness, true contentment, peace, and godly joy.”
In this time of suffering the grace that Jesus Christ pours out on us not only makes us right with God, it begins a process of transformation that will ultimately result in our saying, “Yes, Lord do the necessary work in me.” We will be shaped to the contours of God’s will.
This is what the reformers of the 16th Century meant when they said that God’s grace given through Jesus Christ both justified and sanctified.