Somewhere along the way, a lot of us picked up the idea that if you follow Jesus, life is supposed to get smoother. Fewer problems. Less mess. A kind of spiritual upgrade, if you like. So when the hard stuff lands (which it will do - the diagnosis, the redundancy, the prayer that seems to go nowhere), it can feel like proof that something has gone wrong. Either with you, or, more likely, with God.

This week at Crowd Church, Sharon Edmundson kick started us looking at some of the tougher things Jesus said, which is not your normal Sunday sermon. Jesus doesn't promise an easy ride. He promises trouble. But He also promises something bigger than the trouble, so this isn't another "try harder and it'll all work out" message. It's honest about the fact that life is hard, and honest about where hope actually comes from.

The Verse Nobody Pins on Their Wall

Sharon started with a confession about her husband, Matt, now 28 years married. One of the things that drew her to him was that he loved digging into the Bible, hunting for answers and pinning verses up around his room. But she's fairly sure today's passage was never one of them. It doesn't tend to make it onto posters or fridge magnets.

Here it is. John 16:33, and the first half reads, "In this world you will have trouble."

Not might have. Will.

If we want to genuinely follow Jesus, we can't only keep the verses that make us feel warm and cosy and quietly ignore the rest. As Sharon put it, you can't only eat dessert and expect to stay healthy. And if you're just having a look at Christianity, wondering whether Jesus is worth your time, it's worth knowing the hard bits too, so you don't end up with a lopsided picture.

When Life Falls Apart and You Did Everything Right

Here's the fear underneath all of this. "I did what I was supposed to do, and my life still fell apart, so is my faith even working?"

Sharon was honest that following Jesus does make a lot of life fall into place. When she learned to receive God's forgiveness, the weight of guilt and shame lifted. When she learned to forgive, the anger and darkness went with it. When she started believing who God says she is, the negative voice in her head got quieter. That's real, and it's good.

And yet the trouble is still promised. So what does Jesus actually mean by it?

The Greek word is thlipsis. It means pressure, squeezing, being compressed, and it shows up 45 times in the New Testament. Sharon walked through three kinds of trouble it points to. There's the trouble we bring on ourselves through our own choices (her example was missing a motorway exit with three small kids in the car and turning a 90-minute drive into four and a half hours). That's not the kind Jesus is talking about here.

Then there's the trouble of simply living in a broken world, illness, grief, miscarriage, the endless job hunt, abuse. It hits everyone, whatever they believe or don't believe, because the world is broken and full of broken people. And finally, the trouble that comes because of faith itself. Paul wrote about beatings, prison and sleepless nights. In the UK it's usually milder, what Evangelical Focus describes as cultural pressure, workplace friction and social hostility. Ephesians 6 even reminds us that there's a spiritual battle going on behind the scenes.

Why a Promise of Trouble Is Actually Good News

Sharon argued that a promise of trouble is genuinely encouraging, for two reasons.

The first is freedom from self-blame. If you believe being a Christian should guarantee a trouble-free life, then when trouble comes you either blame yourself or start doubting God's love and power, and you can throw your faith away over something that was never a failure in the first place. Jesus actually talked about this. Just before He tells His friends, "All this I have told you so that you will not fall away." In other words, hardship doesn't mean you got it wrong, prayed too little, or that God stopped loving you. Sometimes it comes precisely because you're doing what you're meant to.

The second reason is the rest of the verse: "In this world you will have trouble, but take heart, I have overcome the world."

This isn't a distant theory. Jesus said it hours before He was betrayed, knowing His closest friends were about to scatter, hide, and in Peter's case deny Him three times.

Sharon described it as the end of a pep talk a commander gives his soldiers right before battle. Take heart. Have courage. Not because the fight isn't real, but because of who has already won. "The world" here means more than the planet. It means the human systems that leave God out, sin and rebellion, the evil spiritual forces at work. And God is greater than all of it.

Two Women, Same Diagnosis, Same God

So does that mean every time we pray, it's sunshine and rainbows from here? No. Not at all.

Sharon pointed to Acts 5, where Peter is broken out of prison by an angel. Brilliant. Then just two chapters later, Stephen, a genuinely godly man, is stoned to death for the same message. Same God, wildly different outcomes.

Then she told her own story. Last year Sharon was diagnosed with skin cancer. She had a deep sense that it wasn't her time, and whenever fear crept in and she prayed, she was met with a strong sense of peace, joy and love. It felt like God working behind the scenes, bringing her a skilled surgical team, including a Christian anaesthetist who was praying for a miracle. She came through it well.

One of the trustees at the charity she works for was diagnosed with the same cancer at the same time. Her colleague's cancer spread, caused a great deal of pain, and she died a few months ago. Same God. And yet within the suffering, her colleague carried a peace, and a settled sense that death wasn't the end of her story, that something better was waiting.

Two women, similar situations, God clearly at work in both, and it looked completely different.

There's real mystery here. We don't get the full answer to "why" this side of eternity. Why a miracle for one and strength for another. Why an innocent child suffers. The partial answers in the Bible don't fully satisfy us in the moment. But we know that Jesus dying on the cross looked like total failure, but it turned out to be the rescue plan all along. So even when we can't see it, we can take His advice and have courage, because He has overcome the world.

Conversation Street

After the talk, Anna Kettle and Dave Connolly opened it up with Sharon, and the community waded in through the comments.

Does trouble mean God sent it?

Dave was clear that this verse never says God sends the trouble. His sharper point was that the real question isn't whether suffering will come, it's how we respond when it does, because that reveals where we actually are. He took it back to Daniel 3, where Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego face the fiery furnace and say their God is able to rescue them, "but if not," they still won't bow. That "even if not" is the heart of trust. God can, God will, but should He not, He still has a bigger plan.

Why do people walk away when it gets hard?

Anna shared something from Tyler Staton, a pastor she heard at Wildfires this summer. Even when God does step in and fix something now, it's a temporary fix, because we all still die eventually. The permanent fix, the eternal one, is salvation, and believers already have it. That reframes the panic of "why won't God fix this now", because God is often more interested in the long-term than the immediate. Sharon and Anna both linked this to the parable of the sower, where shallow roots wither the moment trouble comes. The question becomes, how do we grow deeper roots?

Dave's answer was blunt about what he called a "cheap gospel", the version that says come to Jesus and everything gets better. Following Jesus isn't an upgrade to your current life, it's handing your life over. His advice for anyone wanting deeper roots was simple, read Matthew, Mark, Luke and John, and then read them again, until you know the Father's heart. Anna added the practical on-ramp, the Alpha course, which she did herself at university even after growing up in church, just to be sure her own foundations were solid.

What keeps you holding on to God in the pain?

Dave said he sometimes only has strength to grab hold of God and His promise, "I will never leave you or abandon you." Anna was more pragmatic. Trouble comes whether you walk with God or without Him, so why face it alone? For her it's a twofold hope, God's presence carrying you now, and the promise that one day the trouble ends for good.

The community joined in too. Alicia wrote that being able to bring our frustrations to God is an underrated ability, and that even when she's angry, she feels Him with her. Ellis raised the honest struggle of the "what if", when God never promised a specific outcome. Talita shared the opposite experience, that hardship has actually grown her faith rather than shrunk it, which is exactly what deep roots make possible.

Dave closed with the story of their friend Ruth Richardson, who died of cancer as a young mum of two. In her final year she said it was the best year of her life as a Christian, a deeper prayer life, a closer family, a greater intimacy with God. Her story has since brought real comfort to others facing the same road. As Dave put it, our stories of walking through hard things can carry hope to someone else.

One Important Thing to Hold On To

Trouble coming against you does not automatically mean it's God's will. Jesus taught us to pray that God's kingdom would come "on earth as it is in heaven", which means His will isn't always being done here yet. So if you're in an unsafe or abusive situation, please don't read this and conclude God wants you to stay. He doesn't. Getting out can absolutely be part of Him overcoming the world in your life.

Something to Carry Into the Week

• Read the whole passage, not just the verse. John 16 is Jesus preparing His friends for hard times on purpose. Sharon said preparing a talk taught her loads, and honestly, reading a chapter slowly does the same thing.
• Notice the "even if not." When you're praying for something specific, try holding it the way Daniel 3 does. God can, God will, but even if He doesn't, you can still trust He has a bigger plan.
• Do something about your roots. If your foundations feel shaky, whether you've followed Jesus for years or you're just curious, the Alpha course is a good place to think it through. Crowd runs it on Wednesdays at 7:30pm, and it's not too late to jump in.
• If you're carrying something heavy right now, you don't have to do it alone. That's exactly what the Live Lounge is for.

You Don't Have to Face It on Your Own

This life will have trouble. That's true whether you follow Jesus or not. The question Sharon leaves us with isn't how to avoid it, it's who you want beside you in it.

If any of this stirred something, come and keep the conversation going. You can watch Sharon's full talk back, join us in the Live Lounge (a Zoom room to actually meet other people watching), or come along to Alpha on a Wednesday and bring your hardest questions. No pressure, no performance. Just space to figure this out together.

Whatever you're walking through this week, take heart. He has overcome the world.