Take Another Step - Endure

Endurance is an interesting word. What do you picture? Maybe the word endurance calls up in your head someone puffing through a marathon, or a frazzled mother dealing with unruly kids, or maybe you imagine a stack of homework. Whatever image you have called up in your head, the task seems daunting. In fact the images the word endure calls up often will seem likd an almost insurmountable task. It makes you want to give up just thinking about it. Then what is the Lord doing asking us to endure to the end? How can a task that requires endurance be endured? What we have to do is shift our perspective. When running a marathon, you can think constantly about how little you've gone and how much effort that little distance took or you can think about the goal and how each step brings you one step closer to it. So it is with enduring in your faith. In both cases, sometimes will be harder than others. You'll see all these other competitors who are running or jogging past you and you feel more dejected and your steps slow. But you can't give up. If you stop moving forward then you've stopped moving forward. That statement seems like a "duh" but if you're no longer moving forward then you've stopped progressing and the goal seems farther and more impossible to reach. Once you've stopped it's harder to start moving again. So here's what enduring means: take another step. At times it will be incredibly difficult and painful but even if it's just one step or a couple inches at a time you need to do your best to keep moving forward. And don't forget: the lord isn't waiting at the finish line; he's helping you get there.