Francis Harper Message for 1/26/2018

From: Francis Harper
wbfrmsup@iowatelecom.net


Francis Harper Message for 1/26/2018

Dear Ones,

Have we entered “the fellowship of his sufferings?” We cannot expect to be numbered with the joint heirs of Christ unless we have also suffered with him. Paul wrote: “The Spirit beareth witness with our spirit, that we are the children of God; and if children, then heirs; heirs of God, and joint heirs with Christ; if it so be that we suffer with him, that we may be also glorified together. For I reckon that the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be named with the glory which shall be revealed in us” (Romans 8:16-18).

Are we willing to cramp our style in doing for others? Are we seeking first to build up the kingdom? Are we living by the golden rule; doing unto others as we would have them do unto us? Are we willing to go the extra mile? Turn the other cheek? Give until it feels good? Give extravagantly as the one who gave the two mites? Give full measure, pressed down and running over? Forgive those who trespass against us? Pray for those who despitefully use and persecute us? Feed his sheep and lambs? Present our bodies as a living sacrifice?

Are we willing to lay down our lives for our friends and for others we may not know? I have been inspired by the martyrdom of Maximilian Kolbe at Auschwitz, 1941.

“Auschwitz, 1941. The sergeant, a tough professional soldier, has just been fingered by an SS man for one of the cruelest deaths here. He is to be shut up naked in an empty, subterranean cell and left without food or water until he dies. Grown men, not too numbed by terror, weep and wail at such a sentence. This victim is no exception. He is sobbing over his wife and children, and saying he doesn’t want to die. The SS ignore him.

Suddenly another prisoner, breaking ranks, asks to take the condemned man’s place. Even the SS are stunned. Having reduced the personal identities of twenty thousand Poles to numbers, for once they want to know more about a victim. “Who are you?” one SS man asks number 16,670. “A Catholic priest,” the prisoner replies. “I have no family,” he adds, as though that explains everything. An undercurrent runs through the camp: “It’s Father Kolbe.” Even those who are not his friends recognize the name – the famous Franciscan, the editor, publisher, and opinion-molder whose publications were so influential in prewar Poland.

What is he thinking of? Even the Bible of his faith says only, “Greater love than this has no man – that he lay down his life for a friend.” The doomed man is not even a friend of Kolbe’s. “Well, you see,” one of Kolbe’s intimates interjects, “to Father Kolbe everyone is a friend.” “Now there’s a Polish hero for you!” someone exclaims. “A real saint,” murmurs another. “A fool, you mean,” mutters a third.

“Pray that I will love without any limits,” Maximilian Kolbe had written his mother when still in his twenties. That prayer, feel those who knew him, has been abundantly answered. They point to Kolbe’s turning the Franciscan friary he founded into a hospice for displaced Polish Jews, gentiles, and German invaders alike, with a sense of brotherhood that simply did not include the words “enemy” or “unlovable” in its vocabulary.

Those who can say, “I was a friend of Maximilian Kolbe,” insist he was not only a hero and “another St. Francis” but so down to earth, so simple, so fully, joyously human in his laughter and jokes, his heartaches and sufferings, his problems and pains, that he was the most approachable of friends.

He was a flesh-and-blood man who gave his life totally to God in service to humanity long before he sealed that gift by bearing the burden of another man’s death.” (A Man for Others, Patricia Treece.)


Love to All,
Francis Harper

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The Fellowship of His Sufferings

Paul wrote: “That I may know him, and the power of his resurrection, and the fellowship of his sufferings, being made conformable unto his death” (Philippians 3:10).

Peter also wrote of suffering: “For even hereunto were ye called; because Christ also suffered for us, leaving us an example [a pattern, a prototype], that ye should follow his steps” (1 Peter 2:21).

John agrees with Peter and Paul: “Hereby perceive [understand] we the love of Christ, because he laid down his life for us; …we ought to lay down our lives for the brethren” (1 John 3:16).

Jesus adds: “Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends” (John 15:13).

The natural man does not relish the thought of sufferings and dying. But this is precisely what Jesus asks of us.

There is a great difference between the life of the self-seeking natural man and the self-denying life of those who follow Jesus. Jesus says to every would-be follower: “If any man [person] will come after me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross and follow me” (Matthew 16: 25 I.V.; 16: 24 KJV).

The cross reminds us of the One who suffered for us. He has said if we are not ready and willing to take up our cross we cannot be his disciple. That means we are called to enter the fellowship of his sufferings. Note the word is sufferings, plural. Did Jesus suffer more on Calvary than he did in Gethsemane where “…he sweat as it were great drops of blood falling down to the ground”? (Luke 22:44). There are many kinds of suffering.



It is not likely that many of us will be crucified on a cross, or be physically tortured. It is more likely that we will suffer as did Jesus when he wept over Jerusalem, saying, “O Jerusalem! Jerusalem! Ye who will kill the prophets, and will stone them who are sent unto you; how often would I have gathered your children together, even as a hen gathers her chickens under her wings and ye would not.” (Matthew 23:37). Those who love much, suffer much.

Luke’s account of the Lord’s calling of his disciples to the way of the cross adds a very significant word the other gospel writers omitted. Luke included the word daily: “…the Son of Man must suffer many things, and be rejected of the elders, and chief priests, and scribes, and be slain, and be raised the third day. And he said to them all, If any man will come after me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow me” (Luke 9: 22-23).

Jesus suffered many things. Entering into the fellowship of his sufferings is much more than a once in a lifetime matter. It is the daily exercise of self denial and self discipline of putting the purposes of God and the needs of others ahead of our own.

At first glance this does not seem to be a joyous route to take. But “Looking unto Jesus the author and finisher of our faith; who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross…and is set down at the right hand of the throne of God” (Hebrews 12:2).

Peter assures us of the glorious rewards which will accrue for those who enter the fellowship of his sufferings. “Beloved, think it not strange concerning the fiery trial which is to try you, as though some strange thing happened unto you; But rejoice, inasmuch as ye are partakers of Christ’s sufferings; that, when his glory shall be revealed, ye may be glad also with exceeding joy. If ye be reproached for the name of Christ, happy are ye; for the Spirit of glory and of God resteth upon you…” (1 Peter 4:12-14).