I once read a lecture given by a Jesuit priest on the Passion, where he made the observation, “The greatest work in Christ’s life was not his active ministry—the things he did, the miracles he performed, the words he preached—but what he suffered.”
Coming to Christian maturity means embracing the suffering of our lives, or in other words, embracing reality as it is. Jesus himself told this to Peter: “Amen, amen, I say to you, when you were younger, you used to dress yourself and go where you wanted; but when you grow old, you will stretch out your hands, and someone else will dress you and lead you where you do not want to go” (John 21:18).
Our greatest work is taking up our cross, suffering the facts of our lives, embracing our limited personalities, hidden regrets, and inabilities to become whomever or whatever we want. This is our greatest work because it allows the Lord to do his greatest work, namely, transform those limitations into the very things that occasion our new life through him and with him and in him. Only through the cross can we experience the resurrection.