Wednesday, October 24, 2007

Don't Give Up!

Another confession. I said a few weeks ago that one of the lions that I was chasing was running a marathon. Well lately I've allowed life to get in the way of my running and I haven't been picking it up like I need to.

It's easy to get discouraged and frustrated when life gets hard or isn't being directed according to our plan. BUT, we must not look back! God has been telling me that I can't live life in the 'what ifs' . . . it's defeating. That I must press ahead in Him!

Paul said: "Brothers, I do not consider myself yet to have taken hold of it. But one thing I do: Forgetting what is behind and straining toward what is ahead, I press on toward the goal to win the prize for which God has called me heavenward in Christ Jesus." (Philippians 3:13-14)

The following is great encouragement from Billy Graham about confidently moving forward:

“When we come to Christ we begin reading the Bible and praying and having fellowship with other Christians, and we start to grow. Many times our growth will be so slow and so infinitesimal that after a while we become disgusted with ourselves. For the first two or three years after I came to Christ I had some terrible moments of discouragement and despondency. When I was in Bible school in Florida, I had a little hideout in the woods that nobody knew about. I would go there alone and spend hours, and I’d have it out with the Lord on subject after subject and problem after problem. Perhaps growth was rapid, perhaps it was slow, but always it was in the grace and knowledge of Christ. Listen: if you are not all that you want to become immediately, don’t give up. Two or three or five years later you can look back to that moment and say, ‘Well, I’m actually growing.’ It’s a gradual process, like physical growth.”

Let's keep pressing into Jesus . . . and encouraging one another to press on!

No comments: