رومية 8:18

Christian sufferings may be great. Not unfrequently they are so. Surely none could speak more experimentally of such things than the blessed servant of Christ whose epistle is now in our hands... how does he here estimate them when weighed in the sober balances of Divine truth against the glory which is to be revealed! The comparison is of present sufferings against eternal glory. Thus weighed, the momentary trial of faith and patience is found to be as nothing, to be unworthy of all comparison with that which is to be revealed in us. This he reckons (verse 18). There is no sort of doubt in his mind: it is a deliberate measurement of truth with truth, of real suffering with most real and most certain and eternal glory.

Who ever was better able to reckon on this matter than Paul? Bonds and imprisonments awaited him in every city — a life of constant suffering with Him he so loved to serve; yet he says, "the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory which shall be revealed in us."

The words "this present time" are striking. His mind is full of the future — absorbed with to-morrow — like the boy at school looking for a holiday, who can think of nothing else. The glory is so present, that he calls it but momentary — "Our light affliction, which is but for a moment." For if you talk to one whose mind realizes eternity, about this present evil world, eternity is too big to allow of room for any thing else. We never realize eternity, till we fill it with the Father's love and Christ's glory... the present sufferings had lost their hindering power, because he saw the power of God in them and endured afflictions according to the power of God.

How much he must have had the glory present to his soul, to prefer it to "present things!" Now, he had suffered much; but it only brought the glory the brighter before him, and shows how the glory of the cross filled his soul.

God's glory is our "hope", as soon as justification is known, and sonship in its final character and manifestation in glory is largely developed in Romans 8, as well as that personal witness of the Holy Spirit "with our spirit" which makes it effectual in every believer's soul. The end and aim of it is the glory of the SON, that he may be "the firstborn among many brethren."

A great part of our deplorable weakness flows from this, that what that day of glory means for Him and for us, is practically lost for the hearts and minds of so many of His people. He comes with all His saints into the scene of His glory and theirs: the creature is expecting the revelation of the sons of God, when He is revealed they are revealed with Him. It is in view of this glorious day that the saints suffer for and with Christ in spirit: these sufferings and glories cannot be separated "If we suffer we shall reign" (not live).

This shall much more than compensate us for all the sorrows we have to pass through on our way to heaven. The sorrows of creation must continue till the sons of God are manifested, and then they shall cease for ever... May each of us be able to reckon with the Apostle, that the sufferings of the present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory that shall be revealed in us.