Obedience Through Suffering

. . . though He was a Son, yet He learned obedience by the things which He suffered. 
(Hebrews 5:8)

Believing God is the greatest thing any man or woman will ever do; and this cannot be learned in a day, or in a laboratory, or in any field of our choosing. The Lord will place us in impossible and dire straits, He will squeeze and strain us, He will frustrate and offend us until we surrender to Him or forsake Him. The purity of our faith makes all the training and testing worth it. Even Jesus learned obedience through suffering, and so will we.

Obedience is learned, not given; and it is learned over time and through suffering. The Lord uses hardship to press all the self-absorption and worldliness out of us, because He wants to be able to trust us with spiritual things. Even the Lord's disciples found themselves arguing over who would be the greatest, and we are no different or better. Pride is the disposition we all possess, and that disposition must die if we are to go on with the Lord. He will not force us to submit ourselves to times of testing, but we can go no farther with Him until we do.  That is the path our Lord walked, and it is the path we will walk if we want to walk with Him. "Come, follow me . . . "

Let's Pray - Lord, I am willing to learn, even when the lessons are difficult and painful. If Jesus learned obedience through suffering, who am I to complain? I will bless the Lord today, in every circumstance, in joy, or pain. Amen.