God: "I looked for someone to take a stand for me, and stand in the gap" (Ezekiel 22:30)
As God’s dear children, we, who are by grace adopted, are called into the fellowship of suffering, soon enough to be followed by stupendous glory, with the only begotten Son. The suffering precedes the glory; the cross precedes the crown, both in the order of experience of the eternal Son of God and also in that of adopted sons and daughters of God (Douglas Kelly).
