3740 — The Filling Up of the Afflictions of Christ
By Editor
Please explain Col. 1:24, second clause, where Paul says, "And fill up on my part that which is lacking of the afflictions of Christ." Did not Christ suffer a plenty? Did Christ leave behind all the sufferings of the 1,260 years? We have presented before us in this very chapter the fact that Christ is the head, and the church is His body; and that as He has identified Himself with the church in all things, so the church is to identify herself with Christ. Christ has suffered for the church, and not only suffered for the church, but for the whole world; and His church can not come into true relationship with Him without also suffering for others. The whole world in a way is saved by vicarious suffering, some suffering for others. And so Christ has left His church in this world, with all its sin and evil and wo and misery, in order that that church may learn the truest fellowship with Him in the sufferings which she must undergo. You will notice that he does not simply say, "Fill up the afflictions of Christ," but "the afflictions of Christ in my flesh for His body's sake, which is the church." God calls us to suffer for others. He called Paul to do that in order that Paul might know the fulness of the blessing of Christ; and Paul yielded himself, that he might take his part of that, just as every other true Christian must yield himself. The sufferings of Christ were complete for all, in order that all might be saved from sin; but in order that all may joy in the Lord throughout all eternity, and thus enter into His joy, they must have fellowship with Him. And so Paul counts all things but loss, and pleads "that I may know Him, and the power of His resurrection, and the fellowship of His sufferings, becoming conformed unto His death; if by any means I may attain unto the resurrection from the dead," or out from among the dead. See Phil. 3:8-11.