In the incarnation, Jesus enters into our broken world in every way. Born in a feeding trough, living his early childhood years as a refugee, growing up in most likely intense poverty and under political oppression, truly He is God with us. He is, as Isaiah says, “familiar with grief” (Isaiah 53:3).

When He comes to the end of His life, in some of his last moments with His disciples, Jesus looks into their eyes and says, “Follow me and you won’t have to deal with this broken world anymore!” – yeah right. That is perhaps what they (and we) wish He said. What He actually said was…

“In the world you will have tribulation. But take heart; I have overcome the world.” – John 16:33

To this fearful group of followers, Jesus doesn’t pull any punches. “You WILL have tribulation…” It’s a guarantee. You can bank on it. This word for “tribulation” is the Greek word thlipsis and it’s also translated as trouble, affliction, or distress. The literal meaning of thlipsis is pressure. Before David Bowie ever arrived on the scene, Jesus basically coined the phrase “under pressure” and used it to describe how His followers would feel in this world.

It’s natural for us to want to focus on the second half of Jesus’ statement – “take heart; I have overcome the world.” After all, that’s a much more hopeful message. But as believers in Jesus, the invitation for us is to believe and embrace both parts of what Jesus said.

We don’t embrace the first part by itself –“in the world you will have tribulation”. That leads to despair. No, as Paul says in 1 Thessalonians 4, “we don’t grieve like those who have no hope.” We do have a hope – Jesus has overcome the world! Through His death and resurrection, He is Lord of all. And one day every knee will bow and every tongue will confess that to be true. So, we take heart in that reality. Nothing in this world, and nothing we will ever experience, is more powerful than Jesus.

But we don’t believe and embrace the second part all by itself either – “take heart; I have overcome the world”, as counter-intuitive as that may seem. Why? Because that leads to denial. Jesus has overcome the world, and that truth anchors us in the midst of tribulation, but that does not mean that we do not have tribulation. We live in a broken world, and God never invites us to pretend that’s not the case. The power of the Gospel is NOT that we don’t have to face tribulation or feel the effects of it; it’s that the Gospel gives us strength to face our tribulation, not running away from or minimizing it, and a hope that our tribulation doesn’t have the last word. Why? Because we’re not alone. God is with us. And Jesus has overcome the world.

Any spirituality that does not make room for both of these realities – “in this world you will have trouble” AND “Jesus has overcome the world” – is not only unbiblical but useless.

Struggle, quite simply, is part of the human experience. When we accept this to be true, it allows us to face the reality of life’s brokenness and tell the truth about it… first to ourselves, then to God and to others. Instead of minimizing our pain, numbing out, or over-spiritualizing it away, we can accept and even embrace our human condition. That when we’re cut, we bleed; and when the broken edges of life come into contact with our hearts and lives, we are affected.

When we do this, we are ushered into reality, and reality is where we meet God (and also where we become a candidate for change).