What is the key to effective ministry? Just about every Christian wants to be used by God to transform the lives of others. So how does God use us? How does he make ministry effective in us and through us? It's a question Pastor John asked and then answered from scripture in front of an auditorium full of college students at the Passion Conference 2006 in Nashville.

His message was titled, "How Our Suffering Glorifies the Greatness of the Grace of God." Have a listen. The purpose of God in creating the universe is to display the greatness of the glory of his grace supremely in the suffering of his Son. That's yesterday. Today the summons, "Will you join the Son in displaying the supreme satisfaction of the glory of grace in joining him on the Calvary road of suffering?" Because there's no other way the world is going to see the supreme glory of Christ today except that we break free from the Disneyland of America and begin to live lifestyles of missionary sacrifice that looks to the world like our treasure is in heaven and not on the earth.

It's the only way. The prosperity gospel will not make anybody praise Jesus. It will make people praise prosperity. Of course I'll have a Jesus who will give me a car. Who wouldn't want a Jesus who gives me health, a car, a fine marriage? I'll take your Jesus if the payoff is right.

It's not the way you're going to win your campuses. Dressing the coolest, driving the coolest, typing on the coolest. It's not going to get any praise for the suffering Christ. Paul said, "If there's no resurrection, we are of all men most to be pitied." Listen to how he puts the point on his own experience.

He said, "If the dead are not raised, why am I in peril every hour? I protest, brothers, by my exaltation which I have in Christ, Jesus our Lord. I die every day." So he says two things. "I'm in peril every hour and I die every day." I choose, I make so many choices to magnify Jesus in hard places, it hurts me every day.

I would not choose this if it weren't true. If I couldn't expect a resurrection from the dead where everything would be paid back to me a thousandfold that I have laid down in the service of Jesus, I wouldn't go this way. I'm in peril every hour. I die every day.

And I want to ask, "Why, Paul? What are you up to? What's the meaning of this chosen life of risk and suffering?" And you need to ask that right now. Why would I choose to deny myself ordinary, innocent things and take risks with my life for the cause of Christ?

Why would I do that? And I want to take you to Colossians 1. If you have a Bible and you can see it, then you can look at it with me if you'd like. I'm going to read Colossians 1.24-29. Now I rejoice in my sufferings for your sake. He was a very strange man, wasn't he?

I rejoice in my sufferings for your sake. And in my flesh, his body, I am filling up what is lacking in Christ's afflictions. For the sake of his body, that is, the church. Let's just stop there. That's enough. Let's focus on that. I rejoice in my sufferings for your sake, talking to the church, and in my flesh, I am filling up what is lacking in Christ's afflictions for the sake of his body, that is, the church.

That's almost heresy. Almost. To say in my body, my fallen sinful body, I am completing or filling up what is lacking in the sufferings of Christ, that's almost heresy. It would be heresy if he meant the sufferings of Christ lack something in their atoning worth. In the death that he paid for sin, there's not enough there.

I'm going to add the rest so that the world can have an atonement that is sufficient for their sins. That's heresy. And that's not what he meant. What did he mean? What did he mean when he said, "In my body"? What would you mean if you walked out of here tomorrow and said, "All right, I am God helping me, going to fill up what is lacking in the afflictions of Christ on my campus or among the unreached peoples of the world." What would you mean?

You really should be able to say that. I hope you will. I think what you should mean is not that you add to the atoning merit or value or worth of the death of Christ, but that you add the extension of that suffering to those for whom he died in your own body and suffering.

There's a parallel statement to this, Colossians 1:24 in Philippians 2. The situation is that the Philippian church loves Paul. Paul is in prison in Rome, hundreds of miles away. Epaphroditus says, "I am willing to take the offering and the blessing that we as a church want to show, the love that we have for Paul we want to show." So Epaphroditus takes whatever it was, we're not told, it could be money, it could be books, it could be food, whatever, clothing, and he takes it to Rome and he almost dies.

He suffers in doing this. He suffers in extending the love of the Philippians to Paul. And then you have this sentence where Paul encourages people to praise such a one as Epaphroditus, "Because he came close to death for the work of Christ, risking his life to fill up what is lacking in your service to me." He said that to the Philippians.

You got almost exactly the same wording in Philippians 2.30 as you do in Colossians 1.24. Almost exactly the same wording. "I fill up what is lacking in the sufferings of Christ." Epaphroditus fills up what is lacking in the service of the Philippians. Now what was lacking in the service of the Philippians?

Listen to this commentator Marvin Vinson. I think he gets it exactly right. He says, "The gift to Paul was a gift of the church as a body. It was a sacrificial offering of love. What was lacking was the church's presentation of this offering in person. This was impossible. And Paul represents Epaphroditus as supplying this lack by his affectionate and zealous ministry." I think that's exactly what Colossians 1.24 means.

When Paul says, "I rejoice in my sufferings for you and I fill up what is lacking in the sufferings of Christ, the afflictions of Christ, in my body, in my flesh," he means Christ died for millions of people all over the world. People on your campus, people in the unreached peoples of the world.

Their debt has been paid and they don't know it. They can't taste it. They can't feel it. They can't sing that song. "I thank you for the cross, my friend. I thank you for the cross." There's something missing in this offering. It's not showing up. It's not connecting. There's something lacking in the sufferings, namely the presentation of the sufferings.

Here's the amazing thing. You might say, "Well, obviously the gospel has to be spread." It's not obvious what he's saying here. He's not saying simply the gospel has to be spread. He is saying it is through my body and my sufferings that the sufferings of Christ arrive in the unreached peoples of the world, on your campus.

How do the sufferings of Jesus arrive on your campus? They arrive through your sufferings. That's the meaning of Colossians 1.24. "I rejoice in my sufferings for your sake, filling up what is lacking in the afflictions of Christ in my own flesh." It's an amazing statement. And just think about the history of missions for a moment.

If you have any inkling of how we got to where we are today with 1.3 or 4 billion people professing faith in Jesus Christ when it started from 12, how did we get there? You know what the answer is? Suffering. There never has been a breakthrough into an unreached place or people without suffering.

If you're going to be a missionary, mark it down. Pain, loss of a child, malaria, marital strife, tensions on the team, demonic opposition, martyrdom, it's going to come. Don't think it's strange when it comes. It's the price. He paid his life for our salvation. We join him in that suffering to display the nature of it.

How are they going to see how satisfying he is in us if we look like it's the computer toy that is really satisfying? The computer toy. That's amazing. That was from a sermon preached at a college student conference in 2006, 18 months before the iPhone was announced. So if I can take the liberty to restate that last line, I'd put it like this today.

How are others going to see how satisfying God is in us if we look like the smartphone is where we're getting satisfied? That's powerful. This entire Passion Conference 2006 message is online. Search for the title, "How Our Suffering Glorifies the Greatness of the Grace of God." Whether you listen in the car, at the gym, doing chores, thank you for inviting us into your day.

And if you haven't done so yet, you can subscribe to Ask Pastor John in your favorite podcast app in YouTube or in Spotify. And to find other episodes in our archive or to send us your own question, go online to DesiringGod.org/AskPastorJohn. Well if God's will always prevails in the end, is it pointless to pray for what I want?

This is a question from a podcast listener named Andrea, and it's a good one. I'm your host Tony Reinke. We'll see you next time on Friday. 1. Is there a reason why you're not a Christian? 2. Is there a reason why you're not a Christian? 3. Is there a reason why you're not a Christian?

4. Is there a reason why you're not a Christian? 5.