"We also glory in our sufferings, because we know that suffering produces perseverance; perseverance, character; and character, hope."
— Romans 5:3-4
Nobody chooses the thorns.
You don't wake up one morning and say I want to go through this. Nobody signs up for the hard season, the broken relationship, the anxiety that won't leave, the feeling that no matter how hard you try nothing is working. The thorns just come. And when they do, they hurt exactly like you'd expect them to.
But here's what I've learned. The thorns are not the end of your story.
When Jesus wore that crown, every thorn that pressed into His head was real. The pain was real. The weight of that moment was real. And yet not a single one of those thorns had the final word. Three days later He walked out of a tomb and changed everything.
That's the picture God keeps painting over and over again throughout scripture. Joseph thrown in a pit by his own brothers. David hiding in caves from a king trying to kill him. Paul beaten, imprisoned, shipwrecked. Every single one of them went through seasons that looked like the end.
None of them were the end.
I went through my own thorns before I found Christ. Anxiety that made it hard to breathe. Depression that made it hard to get up. A version of myself I didn't recognize and didn't like. I tried everything the world told me to try and none of it worked. It wasn't until I stopped running and surrendered that things started to change.
The thorns didn't disappear overnight. But they started to mean something.
That's what God does. He doesn't always remove the thorns. Sometimes He uses them to shape you into exactly who you need to become. The perseverance you build in the hard season becomes the character that carries you through everything that comes after. And that character produces something the world can't manufacture on its own.
Hope.
Real hope. Not the kind that depends on your circumstances being good. The kind that holds on even when everything around you says let go.
If you're in a season of thorns right now, I want you to hear this. You are not finished. The crown of thorns was not the end of His story and it is not the end of yours. Keep going. Keep believing. Your resurrection is on the other side of this.
— Austin, Founder of TheRisenKing