From This Point Forward

Rocky Roads

by David Jeremiah

 “The heavier the load, the rockier the road.”

Don’t go looking for that quote on the Internet or in any of my books since I’ve just thought of it for this article. But it seems to me to express a principle that stands true in the physical world as well as the spiritual—and I hope you’ll take it with you after reading this article. Let me explain what’s behind this little truism.

Where would we be without roads? They are to the health of the human race as veins and arteries are to the human body. As veins and arteries transport the nutrients our body needs, so roads transport the goods and services the human race needs for commerce. Yes, it’s possible for every family to produce everything it needs solely on its own, receiving nothing from other parts of the world. But history shows us that such a subsistence level of living is not satisfying to most people. Thus, from time immemorial, people have built roads.

Rivers were the first roads, of course, and civilizations developed first along their banks. But when the desire to explore and settle the interior arose, footpaths became bridle paths and bridle paths became roads. The need to make roads passable in inclement weather necessitated paving. Cobblestones, paving stones, and even trees (“corduroy” roads) were used to pave roads in ancient times; and it was the Romans who perfected the art. The saying, “All roads lead to Rome,” was entirely accurate in its day. At its height, the Roman Empire had nearly 53,000 miles of paved roads linking its cities and regions. And they were excellent roads, some of which still exist today. There were mile markers, way stations, rest stops, inns—it was a system not unlike our own Interstate Highway System.

In America, we are fortunate to have a vast artery of roads (veins) connected to its interstate highways (arteries). You have to be going somewhere rather remote not to be able to get there on a pretty good road of one kind or another. Our interstate system came about for many of the same reasons that the Roman road system did: military concerns. The Romans needed the ability to move their troops quickly throughout the Empire. America, during the height of the Cold War (1950s), needed the ability to move civilians quickly out of major metropolitan areas, and move military supplies to those same areas, in case of an attack. So President Eisenhower, former commander of the Allied Forces that invaded Europe on D-Day, ordered the development of the Interstate Highway System.

But remember what I said earlier: The heavier the load, the rockier the road. Here’s what that means: If a society is going to pursue serious commercial growth, it’s going to have to move heavy loads. But if a society moves heavy loads, it’s going to have to live with rocky roads. Growth and road maintenance go hand in hand.

Heavy Loads

Getting from Point A to Point B in the spiritual life is not easy. Think about the people in history who built roads where none existed, oftentimes hacking them through the wilderness, one felled tree at a time. That’s what the frontiersman Daniel Boone did when he and thirty-five axmen cut the Wilderness Trail through the dense Appalachian forests in 1775. They were hired by a land speculation company to create a road from southwest Virginia, over the Appalachian mountains via Tennessee’s Cumberland Gap, and into Kentucky. Two hundred miles after starting, they reached what is today Boonesborough, Kentucky. The trail eventually became a road suitable for wagons and was the primary artery of growth and transportation beyond the thirteen original colonies into the heartland.

Were there costs? Absolutely, not the least of which were the lives lost in Boone’s party from attacking Indians. The heavy load of responsibility they carried necessitated the reality of a bumpy road along the way.

My hope for you is that you are planning and undertaking serious growth in your life, that you are not settling for the status quo, spiritually or in any other realm. It is the nature of life in our fallen world that striving for and achieving growth takes serious work on our part. New paths have to be cut, and new roads have to be paved. Previous roads that led to undesirable places have to be torn up and rerouted. But the goal for which we are striving—“the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus” (Philippians 3:14)—is a serious goal. It will require the best of our heart, soul, mind, and strength (Mark 12:30).

Rocky Roads

If you have lived in a part of your community where new construction is taking place, whether commercial or residential, you know what happens to the roads. Huge trucks—flatbeds hauling earth-moving equipment, dump trucks hauling dirt, rocks, and trees, semis hauling lumber and steel, concrete trucks with their spinning backpacks—the roads get torn to pieces! Often, after a new development or construction project is complete, the access roads have to be repaved because of how rocky and bumpy they became in the process of building.

Like I’ve said, the heavier the load, the rockier the road. Rocky roads are part of the territory when it comes to accomplishing great things for God in this life.

Sometimes the rocky roads are a result of the decisions we’ve made to serve God or reach a new plateau in our personal or vocational life. The apostle Paul experienced an assortment of bumps in the road as he sought to obey Christ, as has every faithful saint since. Missionaries get lonely on the mission field. Parents agonize over their children’s choices. Marriages operate on faith and loyalty alone as they pray for the once abundant emotions of joy and excitement to return. Young people endure the scorn of their peers for being a “religious freak.” Full-time Christian workers pray for God to bring a harvest from the seeds of faith they have faithfully sown over the years.

And then there are the cracks, bumps, and rocks in our personal roads: We pray for more patience, we try to lose weight, we struggle to love an unlovely one, we are tempted by the world, the flesh, and the devil, we agonize over decisions that have to be made, we mourn the loss of a loved one, we despair when tragedy strikes, we try to reconcile our failures with God’s grace and forgiveness—and the bumps in the road go on and on. Sometimes the road gets so rocky we’re knocked off track—we’re in the hospital with an illness, in the counselor’s room seeking guidance, or on our knees pleading with God to get us back on the road.

Divine Crossroads

Every bump in every rocky road represents a divine crossroad in our life—an opportunity to decide whether we will grow in grace and deepen our faith, or not. We can choose to take what might appear to be a wider, smoother road but which ultimately leads to a less noble place. Or we can take the narrower, harder road, the one to which God has clearly called us (Matthew 7:13-14).

Why would we choose the rocky road? Because, “[We] know that all things work together for good to those who love God, to those who are the called according to His purpose” (Romans 8:28). There is no bump in the road that is able to separate us from “the love of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord” (Romans 8:31-39).

If you are on a rocky road right now, I pray you will not turn aside when you reach the next crossroad. God is with you on that road. Jesus Christ has felt every bump and bruise you have felt, and He knows what you need in order to continue on (Hebrews 2:18; 4:15). Remember: The heavier the load—the greater your aspirations for your life in Christ—the rockier the road. But the sweeter the destination!

Do you see where I’m going with this? If you and I are going to experience serious and meaningful growth in our lives (spiritually, emotionally, familiarly, vocationally, educationally), we’re going to have to move some heavy loads. And if we are going to move heavy loads, we’re going to have to live with rocky roads. The same thing that’s true in the physical world is true in the spiritual world: Spiritual growth and spiritual road maintenance go hand in hand.