REMEMBER THAT OLD EXPRESSION, "I never promised you a rose garden"? I can't help but think of it when I read about followers of Jesus who weren't interested in the challenges that being a Christian sometimes bring. They may have followed him with a bed of roses in mind, but not for long. As soon as he said, "Take up the cross, and follow me," Mark 10:21 those rose-garden groupies were out of there!
No, Jesus didn't promise a rose garden but he did equip us well. He came preaching the gospel (the good news) of the kingdom of God. It's now, he taught—not waiting in the hereafter; not up in the sky, but here—within you. And his healings proved all this.
I've given a lot of thought to this because I, too, used to be a rose-garden Christian, though I didn't realize it at the time. I thought I was following Jesus' teachings. I would read the weekly Bible Lesson Found in the Christian Science Quarterly each morning, then go about my day, hoping for no waves! But it didn't work that way. I still had problems. Some of them big. For a brief while, I put my Bible and Science and Health on the shelf, thinking, "Why bother if I'm going to have problems anyway?" But troubles increased—my own, those of others near me, and throughout the world. Finally, feeling desperate and overwhelmed, I took the books down off the shelf.
