Have you ever felt as if you wanted to run away from God? Maybe you thought the responsibilities of the Christian life were too heavy for you, or you just could not be the person you were supposed to be and do the things God was asking you to do.
You knew God expected you to flee temptation but you could not seem to resist it, and now you feel as though God is on your back. You have failed. What is the point of trying?
You are not alone in failing. The Apostle Paul failed and Peter failed. David, Israel’s greatest king, “a man after God’s own heart,” failed. Moses, giant among the Israelites, giver of the law, deliverer of his people, failed. Jacob, father of Israel, failed. Abraham, one considered righteous through faith, failed. Even Adam & Eve failed. It is not failing that is the problem; it is what one does after he or she has failed.
As we look at our failures discouragement looms over us. It seems too much and our old way of living starts to sound appealing. We begin to take our focus off God and put it onto ourselves. As we do this, we give Satan the ability to gain a little ground and to tear us away from our relationship with God.
With the right attitude, all the problems in the world will not make
you a failure. With the wrong mental attitude, all the help in the world will not make you a success.
Warren Deaton
Whatever God calls you to do whether it is to resist temptation, to help others or something else it seems overwhelming. The task seems to enormous for you to handle. Instead you just want to get away from Him for awhile, go someplace where He cannot see you, so you don’t have to face the challenge.
“Every day, a fatherless boy gazed at the fence separating his family’s ramshackle cabin from the Glen Lakes Country Club golf course on the outskirts of Dallas. What chance did a poor Chicano boy with a seventh-grade education have of being welcomed into that world?
Yet the boy was determined. First, he gained entrance to the grounds as a gardener. Then he began caddying and playing a few holes at dusk. He honed his putting skills by hitting balls with a soda bottle wrapped in adhesive tape.
Today no fence keeps Lee Trevino, two-time U.S. Open winner, from being welcomed into any country club in the nation.
Sure, Trevino had talent. But talent isn’t what kept him from quitting after he placed an embarrassing fifty-fourth in his first U.S. Open. His secret was perseverance.
Persistent people know they can succeed where smarter and more talented people fail. . . Successful people understand that no one makes it to the top in a single bound. What truly sets them apart is their willingness to keep putting one step in front of the other—no matter how rough the terrain.”[i]
“God wants us to be victors, not victims; to grow, not grovel; to soar, not sink; to overcome,
not to be overwhelmed.”
William Arthur Ward (1812-1882)
Many godly people in Scripture faced tasks which they believed were beyond them, but the confidence to carry on came through the assurance of God’s presence. For example, when Moses was called by God to return to Egypt and deliver the people from bondage, he shuddered at the enormity of the task. When he tried to back off, God said, “Certainly I will be with you” (Exodus 3:12).
When Joshua took over the leadership of the nation after Moses’ death, he struggled with the same lack of confidence. But God was right there to encourage him: “No man will be able to stand before you all the days of your life. Just as I have been with Moses, I will be with you; I will not fail you or forsake you” (Joshua 1:5).
“Perseverance is the rope that ties the soul to the doorpost of heaven”
Frances J. Roberts
God is with us when we embrace what He has called for us to do. Obstacles will come. These obstacles can discourage us, slow us down, detour us, or cause us to quit. Too often we allow some kind of rejection or disappointment to discourage us. Distractions and frustrations in life can weigh us down. It can become hard to hold onto the hope that motivated us for a better life.
Beware it is at this point that satan is ready to pounce on us “Be careful! Watch out for attacks from the Devil, your great enemy. He prowls around like a roaring lion, looking for some victim to devour.” 1 Peter 5:8. He wants us to give up and live our life according to our own desires and not for God’s purposes.
“The godly may trip seven times, but they will get up again.”
Proverbs 24:16 (NLT)
Embrace the challenge to preserve. Let us not let our circumstances discourage us and lose our way. Hold onto the hope that God loves us and is always there.
“We were saved with this hope in mind. If we hope for something we already see, it’s not really hope. Who hopes for what can be seen? But if we hope for what we don’t see,
we eagerly wait for it with perseverance.”
Romans 8:24-25 (GW)
At 45, missionary Frank Laubach was a theological seminary professor in the Philippines. He was next in line for president of the seminary. However, the board selected someone else. Laubach went to the hills to sulk. He was angry about the unfairness of life. He was a failure in his own eyes.
Was that the end of his story? No way. In his solitude, Frank developed a technique for teaching hundreds of millions of people throughout the world to read for the first time. He became the father of the modern literacy movement. Frank Laubach learned to live above failure, and on a new level, he found how to achieve excellence.
“By perseverance the snail
reached the ark”
Charles Spurgeon
When our hearts are weary and we are tempted to quit, let us press on and embrace the challenge. We shall call upon the Lord and He will set us upon solid ground.
From the ends of the earth I call to you, I call as my heart grows faint;
lead me to the rock that is higher than I.
Psalms 61:2 (NIV)
“We must never forget that the word persevere comes from the prefix per, meaning through, coupled with the word severe. It means to keep pressing on, trusting God, looking up, doing our duty—even through severe circumstances.”[ii]
Jesus, help me to be for Thee,
Just like a big, strong cedar tree;
When all the other trees are bare,
The cedar stands so green and fair,
The wind and storm, the ice and cold
Make it more beauty to unfold,
So I would stand in trial and test,
Just trusting You to do what’s best,
Though Others fail, Lord, keep Thou me!
May I a cedar Christian be!”[iii]
[i] Suzanne Chazin, “The Ultimate Key to Success”, Reader’s Digest, April 1992, 21-26.
[ii] From a sermon by Robert J Morgan
[iii] Unknown
Hope for the broken hearted:
http://thinkpoint.wordpress.com/2007/02/22/hope-for-the-broken-hearted/