endurance

So we are getting ready for softball season by having pre-season conditioning. We spend two hours two times a week running and doing things to help build up endurance for our players. It's our hope that when the season comes around the girls will always be in condition to finish out the game. We'll see times of losing and times of having bad games, but it is our hope that never will we just implode from being tired and out of shape. It's one thing to win or lose, it's a totally different thing to be in better shape than your opponents.
In life Satan wears on us, and the world wears on us and eventually we come to a breaking point. We may cave in because of pressures and a lack of preparation or we may endure it and be stronger in the end. I just finished a book by John Piper called Roots of Endurance. He talks about 3 major spiritual leaders of their day who faced many, many trials and struggles. One that really takes the prize for endurance in my mind is CHarles Simeon. Simeon was appointed as the Pastor of a church in Cambridge. The people of the church did not like him so another preacher preached the Sunday main service. Simeon did not let that discourage him and he would preach the equivalent of our Sunday evening services today. Anyone who attends church regularly knows what a slap in the face that must have been. To be the Pastor yet unable to preach the main sermon to the largest crowd. Even more, in those days there were pew holders(kind of like trustees, but not) and they would lock the doors of their pews and unlock them on Sundays to allow people to sit in them. Well, the pewholders didn't want Simeon to be the preacher, so they locked them during the evening service which forced people to stand and sit in chairs crammed in the aisles. None of this slowed down Simeon, this went on for 12 years before the pewholders finally caved in and let him have the pews and have the Sunday morning service. At one point the preacher who gave the Sunday morning sermon even passed away and they appointed another one instead of Simeon. He pastored there for 49 years before he passed away still preparing a sermon for the following week. If that isn't endurance, I don't know what is.
Hebrews 10:36 You need to persevere so that when you have done the will of God, you will receive what He has promised.
You see Simeon got it, it is not about what you want, what you feel or think. It's about enduring hardships, facing them head on and doing God's will. Knowing that in the end it is far greater to have laid your head down on a good conscience and having done God's will, than to live in comfort doing what you want to with your life.
Thanks for reading and have a great weekend!