Most of you have heard this story….

As Hitler was mounting his attack against England during World War II, Winston Churchill was asked to speak to a group of discouraged Londoners. He uttered an eight-word encouragement: “Never give up! Never, never, never give up!” This phrase is much the same as the Apostle Paul meant when he wrote in Galatians 6:9 (ESV), “And let us not grow weary of doing good, for in due season we will reap, if we do not give up.”

I know a couple of you are ready to throw something at me, because I have been in your same position, “Can you please just shut up?”, but the margin between succeeding and failing is found in this one word, perseverance.   These are difficult days, finances are not always available, I know, our budget here at the state has decreased for seven of the last eight years and the one year it didn’t we raised it by $25,000. It seems like our world continues to move against the Christian community. People seem more stressed than ever before, just look at the devastation we have seen around us. More people have to move to other communities to find jobs, but some people are moving in also. You are right; there is danger of becoming weary of doing good and it is so easy to become weary.

The apostle Paul said in our key verse, “in due season we will reap.” Reap what? John Wesley put it this way, “Do all the good you can, in all the ways you can, to all the people you can, as long as ever you can.” In short we are not to grow weary. We will reap, when, “in due season.” I do not know the answer for it is only God who knows that answer. We are not to grow weary, but do well. What I do know is that the reaping can only happen if we sow. If we sow sparingly, we will reap only a little and if we sow abundantly, we will reap more.

So what are we to do? We are to not ever get tired of putting God’s message out to the people he has asked us to serve. These are messages that we have poured over, prayed over and known that God wants us to share. We are to not ever get tired of showing Christ to all those around us, through words, through our lives, and through our failures, yes, our failures. We are to not ever get tired of loving those around us, really, those who love us, those who like us, and those that really do not care for us. None of these things are easy and we need the compelling power of the Holy Spirit in our lives. Why, because we cannot do it by ourselves.

Paul says in II Corinthians 4:16-18 (ESV), “So we do not lose heart. Though our outer self is wasting away, our inner self is being renewed day by day. For this light momentary affliction is preparing for us an eternal weight of glory beyond all comparison, as we look not to the things that are seen but to the things that are unseen. For the things that are seen are transient, but the things that are unseen are eternal.”

Find someone this year that can help you never, never, ever give up. We can find plenty of people who will tell us to give up, but find that fellow believer who will remind you to not give up and who will come beside you and prop you up. Boy do we need that other person!

(Some comments for this article were taken from an article I read from David Busby, with ECFA)