Keep on Keeping on

Do you ever feel like giving up? That the work in your hand is too much for you? Perhaps you have a first-hand understanding of what follows; whether you do or not, I hope you find it encouraging, just as I have. 

I joined a gym last month and have been working out with a trainer. He has really pushed me during our sessions. I don't think I've ever poured sweat before in my life! Well, he was working me really hard on the machines and weights, and I honestly could barely finish out my sets...my muscles were burning and shaking. I didn't know where the strength would come from to finish. "Come on, Heidi, you can do it. Just five more," he would say. And I would groan loudly and pathetically. Yet, somehow, each time I did it! Well, one time near the end of our first workout session when I honestly didn't think I would make it, I through my head back in a dramatic plea for mercy, and I saw the reason I was always able to make it through to the utmost expenditure of my strength: he was bearing the weight that I could not.

Now, you may already know this, but when you are weight lifting, you are actually tearing down the muscle. It's during the rest period that the healing and building of the muscles happens. I wanted to rest, but what my trainer understood and was obviously doing, was giving me the opportunity to break down as much muscle as I was physically and safely capable of doing so that I could then build as much muscle as I was physically capable of building. I just had to trust him and keep on keeping on.

It gave me a physical example of what God is doing in those verses that talk about His upholding us and not letting us be shaken, that in our weakness He is strong. So, my friends, let us encourage each other to keep on keeping on -- trusting and looking to the One who is working for us...even when it feels like we will fail. 

The Fray

Thirty-nine years, six months, twelve days, twelve hours, ten minutes, sixty-seven seconds. With each grasp, you find the rope thinning, and you realize the place you've come to is frayed, the strands fine hairs.  Dreaming long gave way to Surviving, and you've since worn hope to tatters. Your grip is locked, you cannot go forward, you will eventually fall.  You cannot save yourself, there is no other to rescue you.

Hands frozen, breathing shallow, eyes glazed and staring beyond the fray; a word trickles off your lips, down the corners of your mouth, ...oh, God, make me strong....

Be Strong, says a voice, pragmatic and thoughtful. Be Strong -- in the Lord, in the power of His might.

Do you want your grasp to hold and the strength to carry on? If you have accepted Christ's sacrifice as the punishment you should have received from God for your sins, then you have been given peace with God and confident access to the might that raised Christ, the Righteous One, from the grave and put all things under His feet and all power into His hand. Take up and use what has been given you. The strength to carry on comes only by advancing in the accurate use of truth, righteousness, peace, faith, salvation, and the Spirit -- moment by moment, hand over hand. One caveat: these tools must grow on you, from the inside out and is only accomplished through the personal mentorship of Christ Himself. 

This may not lead you where you thought you were going. But it is the only option to live. Let's see where it will take you....

And, by the way, you will not fall, for you are in His hand.

(Ephesians 6:10-18, Ephesians 1:15-23, Ephesians 2:13-18, John 15:4-11, John 10:29)