I was curious.
I am an excessively intellectual person. My rare experiences of emotion are the miracles I treasure most.
Well they can only turn to Him if He introduces Himself nicely in Persons. All will I’m sure.
The issue of suffering can be perverted into self-flagellation and even leads to such abuses as the selling of indulgences. It even has roots in the sin-confession cycle, and the evangelical “drunk on Saturday night, go to church on Sunday with remorse. Russell Moore had a article on that I read this morning, also relating to the Mars Hill attraction and abuses. I think a key element is something Ralphie said that Jesus suffered for us.. We suffer, but it is not for ourselves or as a poor substitution of Christ for our guilt, but because the world imposes it on us.
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Yes Paul is saying that cross is greater than someone trying to be righteous by works. The reason though the cross is greater, is because it brings about the miracle of the New Creation, being Born Again that only the Father could create.
The cross is the cutting off of the world, a spiritual circumcision for those who believe. If the cross is only the murder of Jesus and then God raises Him up, it does nothing to free mankind from his slavery to sin and the God of this age. There is no supernatural separation, circumcision of the spirit and the flesh, no dying in Christ and no actual union in His resurrection. So all that remains is our working to overcome sin. No actual, literal union with Christ =no New Birth by the Spirit of God. A man is still dead in his trespasses and sins.
It takes a miracle of God for us to be, Born Again, a New Creation.
At peace.
I was at peace, even at the first, when this happened, not knowing how imminent my death or pain might be: Nephrectomy, and during this: High Water.* (I can get frazzled sometimes when hurried, though. 
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*(Let me know if that link doesn’t work or if it loads too slowly.)
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JPM, to turn away from what my flesh craves for Christ, causes me to suffer. Not punching somebody in the face when I long to, is a form of suffering for me. Not losing my temper, praying for the one who cheated me out of a fair trial, not reminding my wife that I was right (for the first time in 30 years) over some petty issue, these are the kinds of things that can be a real pain to me. If I follow his will things always turn out better and I am closer to God as well. Everyone struggles with a million things in different ways. When I turn my will and my life over to Christ, He’s in charge. I die to the great, “me, me, me, me” which hurts, and He blesses me with himself. There is nothing on earth that compares to his presence–for me.
That is why it is mind bogglingly frustrating when people won’t even give him a real shot to prove how cool He is! He is cool beyond your wildest imaginings.
Of course, we work towards craving only that which honors Christ, and finding joy not suffering in living for Christ.
I am engaged in a war, 24/7. A terrible, life and death battle for my very Life, my essence, my soul.
“Who for the joy set before him, endured the cross…”
I fear the idea of being a Christian is pretty distorted these days. I want to warn everyone with ears to hear that being a true follower of Christ is the most challenging and strenuous and most painful way to live you can find. Not for everyone, not all the time, but for many who really mean business with God, you will become a person with a backbone made of steel forged in the crucible of the hottest flames.
Jesus was a man of sorrows.
It is very grieving to go out each day to work and see how people are slaves to sin. To see so many living their lives as if the Day of Judgment doesn’t exsist. They are controlled by love of money or just trusting in it. Proud of what they own or what they think they have made of themselves. Loving this world and not even knowing they are slaves to their fleshly passions.
And to know that when you sow the seed of the good news of Jesus, the birds can come and take that seed away. To see confessing Christians living their lives as if this is their true home. Seeing them bound by covetousness. To not see the Father and the Son honored is very grieving.
But there are times of joy.
Telling someone what sin is and seeing a light of understanding come on. Then letting them know Jesus can free them from the power of sin by His death and resurrection.
Asking my customer what he knows about Jesus and ending up having a very profitable time of fellowship with a new found brother.
Talking with a customer about lusting after women and how to overcome that, and then seeing his wife nodding her head in agreement with what I was saying. Knowing she was encouraged by what I was saying to her husband.
And thinking what it will be like to see the Father and Jesus and to hear the Father say His own name.
This is not my home. I am looking for the city whose builder and maker is God. In this world believers will be hated by the children of this age but we look to the Father for our reward, to hear Him say “Well done good and faithful servant. Enter into the Kingdom that has been prepared for you”.
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Sent you a PM.
I think it is entirely right and proper to “judge God”. STM that we have every right, even a duty, to do so.
As for St Paul’s brow-beating “But who art thou, O man, to answer against God ?”, that is the tack people resort to when they are out of arguments. If God has given man a moral sense, and wishes man to use it, St Paul has no right to complain when people use this moral sense to question, find fault with, and object to, God.
Well, humph! We certainly disagree! 
Maybe you did not understand about lèse-majesté, not to mention God’s unapproachable holiness, except through Jesus.
It’s interesing that you set yourself so far above Paul.
G’night.
I have no doubt of God’s Holiness, nor of how God is to be approached. The Prophets and Psalmists questioned God, and I think any Bible-reader is in good company in doing so. Indeed, the Bible, like everyday life, is so full of complexities that one can hardly avoid doing so.
FWIW, I don’t. But his experience of God is not a rule for me. The Bible is canonical - the Christian experience of St Paul, is not. I disagree with what he said, because what he said was illogical, and no solution to the difficulty raised.
Bad logic from an Apostle is no more valid than bad logic from anyone else, and giving bad logic a pass because it is in the Bible, risks weakening one’s ability to reason correctly. No one has a duty to reason badly, merely because an inspired book contains unsound reasoning.
If reason is truly a gift of God, it cannot be turned off merely because one is discussing the phenomena within the Bible. If we are allowed to reason about the unity of Isaiah, about the theological implications of evolution, about the date of Revelation, or about the Biblical doctrine of the Atonement, then I think we are allowed to criticise unsound reasoning in Romans by St Paul. To criticise his reasoning, implies sufficient respect for him to take an interest in his argumentation.
Goodnight to you 
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Maybe you are giving a one-sided picture of being a believer?
In perfect love there is no fear. Living with God is mostly inner peace, comforting trust in Him and lack of fear, at least after you learn to trust in God through experience. Knowing that He is with you and knows what you need even before you ask can give comfort and courage, if you truly seek His will. Of course, if what I want is clearly against His will, then it’s not so comforting.
One cannot be on two roads simultaneously. All of us, believer or not, have to make choices - you cannot get everything. Following Jesus means that you get something and cannot get something else. My opinion is that what we gain by following Jesus is more valuable than what we lose.
It’s true that sometimes following Jesus may lead to social exclusion from certain groups, losing a job, mockery or even violence. In certain countries, it may lead to losing everything, even your life. This may cause suffering. Yet, because Jesus died for us, we don’t have to suffer to save ourselves. There is no need to inflict unnecessary fear and suffering in our lives. If we face one day persecution, God will give us strength and comfort in that time. In western societies, most of us don’t need to face hard persecution during our life. The hardest decision for us is often deciding every morning to follow Jesus, even if we feel that we will lose something because of it.
1 Cor 9:27 No, I beat my body and make it my slave so that after I have preached to others, I myself will not be disqualified for the prize."
1 Peter 4:1-2 Therefore, since Christ suffered in his body, arm yourselves also with the same attitude, because he who has suffered in his body is done with sin.
Knor, I believe what Ralphie may have been expressing was the fight against the flesh that so often rises up. It’s the crucifying of the flesh that is a battle, though we overcome it by the blood of the Lamb, the word of our testimony and not loving our lives to the death. Our spirits have been crucified with Christ, Born Again and are New Creations in Christ, but the battle with the flesh still remains. Also, our minds were under the control of the flesh for the years that we were slaves to sin, so they must be renewed so that the whole person can be transformed into the very image of Christ, in the here and now.
There are also the struggles we have in our labor of love for the lost.
2 Cor 6:4-10
Rather, as servants of God we commend ourselves in every way: in great endurance; in troubles, hardships and distresses; 5 in beatings, imprisonments and riots; in hard work, sleepless nights and hunger; 6 in purity, understanding, patience and kindness; in the Holy Spirit and in sincere love; 7 in truthful speech and in the power of God; with weapons of righteousness in the right hand and in the left; 8 through glory and dishonor, bad report and good report; genuine, yet regarded as impostors; 9 known, yet regarded as unknown; dying, and yet we live on; beaten, and yet not killed; 10 sorrowful, yet always rejoicing; poor, yet making many rich; having nothing, and yet possessing everything.
We rejoice in the Lord though, knowing our labor of love is not in vain. The Lord knows those who are His and let all who call on the Lord depart from evil.
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These things may be said in many ways. Although using words picked from the Bible and Christian jargon may feel more accurate, I try to express these thinks in a way that is more common in everyday discussions. Those who know the Bible don’t need long citations, those not familiar may misunderstand or feel that the ‘preaching’ is not friendly discussion. Sometimes I get myself a better understanding of something, if I word it in a way that is more common for most of us.
Deciding to follow Jesus every morning is a good start. As everybody, we must make decisions in everyday life, select what we believe is right and drop what is wrong. This is not always easy as we may be tempted to act in a selfish way. Some things may seem so important to us or promising that making the right decision may not feel easy. I guess this is what the expression ‘fight against the flesh’ means. For Christians, this may be a bit more challenging than for others as also our thinking matters, not just acts.
Following Jesus is a process with gradual growth. Although we are clensed when we receive the new life with Jesus, changing towards ‘the image of Christ’ happens slowly. We are like seedlings that need to grow first roots, then branches and then develop fruit. It may be frustrating to notice that we are far from perfect and growth is slow, but luckily God is prepared to forgive our failures if we ask forgiveness and continue to follow Jesus. Our repeated failures may be disappointing and frustrating to us but if we spend time with Jesus and feed ourselves with right kind of input, growth happens.
My attitude is that it is better to look at Jesus and remember the great things we have received and will receive, rather than to look at myself and churn the thought that oh, this is so difficult.