Persistence Pays Off

I am sure some of you know I used to be an avid runner. My goal was to run a 1/2 marathon. (That whole story is a blog post by itself…maybe another time.) I was always told once I caught the racing bug I would never be sufficed until I did a whole marathon. FALSE! Hard no. Ha! I ran many races including three 1/2 marathons. My last big race was in 2019. Let me tell you something. One of the main lessons I learned over the years through the sport of running is that persistence pays off.

How many of you know there would be no way to go from inactive or barely active to running 13.1 miles overnight? Like anything that takes hard work, persistence is key. It took months of training. It took months of mental preparation. It took months of right eating.

I can’t tell you the feeling I had when I finished my first 1/2 shortly after having a 4th kid. It was tough, but I decided after I completed it that I would get a running coach and do even better for my next race. Day after day, I would wake up at 4:30am to go out in the bitter cold and snow, rain and sleet, darkness broken by sunrise. It became one of my favorite times of the day. I would get lost in my thoughts and prayers. I think you get the picture. In order to be able to cross the finish line, I had to persist in my training. Side note- it really helped knowing someone would be checking on me daily to see if I did the work I was supposed to. Accountability is a beautiful thing.

My running ventures came to mind as I was recently doing some prep work for a teaching I will be sharing with our mom’s group tomorrow morning. It’s all about prayer. In my studies, I was taken back to one of my most favorite passages depicting what one of our approaches should be when praying about something.

Check it out. Eight short verses from Luke 18.

“1 One day Jesus told his disciples a story to show that they should always pray and never give up. 2 “There was a judge in a certain city,” he said, “who neither feared God nor cared about people. 3 A widow of that city came to him repeatedly, saying, ‘Give me justice in this dispute with my enemy.’ 4 The judge ignored her for a while, but finally he said to himself, ‘I don’t fear God or care about people, 5 but this woman is driving me crazy. I’m going to see that she gets justice, because she is wearing me out with her constant requests!’”

6 Then the Lord said, “Learn a lesson from this unjust judge. 7 Even he rendered a just decision in the end. So don’t you think God will surely give justice to his chosen people who cry out to him day and night? Will he keep putting them off? 8 I tell you, he will grant justice to them quickly! But when the Son of Man returns, how many will he find on the earth who have faith?”

Persistence- firm or obstinate continuance in a course of action in spite of difficulty or opposition.

Jesus used the woman’s persistence to teach on prayer. He said his chosen people can cry out to him day and night. There is never a bad time to go to God in prayer. You can be in the car, in bed in the midnight hours, in your office, at the sink, in the shower, walking your dog, at your church, in the store…anywhere.

We are in the middle of a 21 day corporate fast. Peeps, I encourage you- DON’T GIVE UP. Press in and keep presenting your requests to God. Persist until you see breakthrough. Don’t just fast and not eat and then skip the praying…pointless! Meet with God. Sit with him. Hear what he wants to say. Share what is on your heart. Whatever you do, continue in prayer in spite of what your reality tells you right now. Fight on your knees to have your reality match the truth of God’s Word. 1 Thessalonians 5:17 tells us to “pray continually.”

Someone once said, “Persistence is nothing more than concentrated effort mixed with determination and faith.”

Let’s commit to be like that lady until we see our answers in our lap. Persistence pays off.