Hey there,
You've probably noticed how nature loves the easy way. Water always finds the lowest spot. Electricity takes the path with the least resistance. Rivers carve around the mountain instead of through it. Even the cars we drive are shaped so the wind slides right past them instead of pushing back.
People are a lot like that, too. It's easier to keep scrolling than to get up and help a neighbor. It's easier to let the irritation with your spouse simmer than to sit down and talk it through. It's easier to binge another episode than to open your Bible and wrestle with what God's saying. The path of least resistance feels natural because, well, it is.
But there's one big difference between us and a river or a current. They don't have to stand before God and answer for where they went. We do.
That's why the Christian life keeps pointing us toward a different path—the path of greatest persistence. Not because hard is automatically better, but because the easy road often leads somewhere we don't want to go, and the hard road is where we actually grow and where we honor the Lord who called us.
Jesus talked about this in Matthew 7. The wide gate and the broad road are easy to find and easy to walk. Lots of people take them. But they lead to destruction. The narrow gate and the hard road are the ones that lead to life, and not many find them. He wasn't trying to make following Him miserable. He was being honest. Loving your enemies is harder than ignoring them. Forgiving is harder than holding a grudge. Staying faithful when it costs you something is harder than walking away. But those are the paths that shape us into people who look like Him.
Paul knew something about the hard road. Near the end of his life he wrote, "I have fought the good fight, I have finished the race, I have kept the faith." That doesn't sound like someone who always took the easiest option. It sounds like someone who kept showing up, kept trusting, kept going even when it was costly. Hebrews 12 puts it the same way: “we run with endurance the race set before us, looking to Jesus, who endured the cross for the joy set before Him.” He didn't take the path of least resistance. He took the path that led through suffering because that was the path that led to our salvation and to the Father's glory.
And the truth is, most of the good things God wants for us and through us sit on the other side of some kind of resistance. The marriage that actually gets better requires the persistence of hard conversations. The faith that goes deep requires the persistence of opening the Word when you'd rather not. The church that loves well requires the persistence of showing up for people even when it's hard or inconvenient. Galatians 6:9 says it plainly: "Let us not grow weary of doing good, for in due season we will reap, if we do not give up."
We will give an account. Romans 14:12 says every one of us will stand before God and answer. That doesn't have to be a threat that keeps us up at night. It can be a reminder that what we do with our days matters. The easy path might feel better in the moment, but the path of persistence is the one that leads somewhere worth standing before God about.
So, the next time the easier option shows up—and it will—maybe pause for a second. Ask whether this is the path of least resistance or the path of greatest persistence. Not every hard thing is the right thing, but a whole lot of the right things are hard. And the One who took the hardest path of all, is walking it right there with us.
~ Charlie
