We must in some degree tread the path He trod

(Octavius Winslow, "The Tried Believer Comforted")

"He was despised and rejected—a man of sorrows, acquainted with deepest grief!" Isaiah 53:3

Jesus' life was one continuous trial. From the moment He entered our world He was leagued with suffering. He identified Himself with affliction in its almost endless forms. He seemed to have been born with a tear in His eye, with a shade of sadness on His brow. From the moment He touched the horizon of our earth, from that moment His sufferings commenced.

He did not come to indulge in a life of tranquility and ease.
He did not come to quaff the cup of earthly pleasures.
He came to suffer,
He came to bear sin's curse,
He came to drain the deep cup of wrath,
He came to weep, to bleed, to die!

Our Savior was a cross-bearing Savior. Our Lord was a suffering Lord. Is it to be expected that those who link their destinies with His, who avow themselves to be His disciples and followers—should walk in a dissimilar path from their Lord's?

There can be no true following of Christ as our example, if we lose sight of Him as a suffering Christ—an afflicted Savior. There must be fellowship with Him in His sufferings.

We must in some degree tread the path He trod. "To this you were called, because Christ suffered for you—leaving you an example that you should follow in His steps." 1 Peter 2:21

Here is one reason why He ordained that along this rugged path His saints should all journey. They must be like their Lord—they are one with Him, and this oneness can only exist where there is mutual sympathy.

Our great and glorious Redeemer sought not, and found not, repose here—this world was not His rest. He turned his back upon the pleasures, the riches, the luxuries, and even the common comforts of this world—preferring a life of obscurity, penury, and suffering. His very submission seemed to impart dignity to suffering, elevation to poverty, and to invest a life of suffering, need, and trial—with an air of holy sanctity.