「原來萬有因祂而有，藉祂而造的那位，為著要領許多的兒子進榮耀裡去，就藉著苦難成全他們救恩的創始者，這對祂本是合宜的。」－希伯來書2:10
世界不會忘記一些顯赫的偉人，但這些偉人不是生長於安逸，他們乃是成形於患難。
母親有一天帶了一個既瘸且駝的孩子，回到家中作兒子的玩伴。她警告兒子謹慎和殘缺朋友的相處，千萬不可觸及他身體敏感的部位，並且要待他有如正常的小孩。
他們玩耍的時候，母親側耳旁聽他們之間的對話。
幾分鐘後，兒子對玩伴說：「你知道你背上的東西是什麼嗎？」駝背的孩子十分難堪，支吾的說不出話來。
男孩趕忙接著說：「那是裝著翅膀的盒子；有一天神會為你打開蓋子，你會成為天使，振翅高飛。」
總有一天，神要使每個基督徒都能認識，他們今日在地上所奮力抵擋、掙扎的過程，乃是主藉以變化、成全他們人格的工具，為了使他們成為磨得閃亮的石子，得以建造祂永世的殿宇。
－邁爾斯
For it was fitting for him, for whom and through whom all things exist, in bringing many sons to glory, to make the pioneer of their salvation perfect through sufferings.—Heb 2:10 NETSteel is iron plus fire. Soil is rock, plus heat, or glacier crushing. Linen is flax plus the bath that cleans, the comb that separates, and the flail that pounds, and the shuttle that weaves. Human character must have a plus attached to it. The world does not forget great characters. But great characters are not made of luxuries, they are made by suffering.
I heard of a mother who brought into her home as a companion to her own son, a crippled boy who was also a hunchback. She had warned her boy to be very careful in his relations to him, and not to touch the sensitive part of his life but go right on playing with him as if he were an ordinary boy. She listened to her son as they were playing; and after a few minutes he said to his companion: “Do you know what you have got on your back?” The little hunchback was embarrassed, and he hesitated a moment. The boy said: “It is the box in which your wings are; and some day God is going to cut it open, and then you will fly away and be an angel.”
Some day, God is going to reveal the fact to every Christian, that the very principles they now rebel against, have been the instruments which He used in perfecting their characters and moulding them into perfection, polished stones for His great building yonder. —Cortland Myers
