Wednesday, March 3rd, ‘10

Wednesday, March 3^rd, ‘10

GRIT, DON’T QUIT!

“Now the just shall live by faith; But if anyone draws back, My soul shall have no pleasure in him” (Hebrews 10:38)

There are two opposing directions in Hebrews, “let us go on unto perfection” (6:1), and, “draw back to perdition” (10:39). We can go on or we can draw back. You’d think remaining neutral would be a third option but there is no such thing as neutrality. Failing to make progress is by default retreat because everyone else passes us by. Let’s look at nine quick facets of moving forward in progress…

First, there is simple SITTING. I don’t mean procrastination, but staying put until you get a word from the Lord. “Be still and know that I am God” (Psalm 46:10). Others have advised, sleep on it. We sit in order to “get”. Once we get the mind of God then we must move on to the second step, SPLITTING. That implies breaking off old mind-sets, doubts, fears and negative thinking so as to launch forth in faith. The husband is commanded to “leave his father and mother, and cleave to his own wife”. You can’t cleave to the new until you leave the old. So split! Burn your bridges behind you. That leads to the word FITTING. Adapt your life to your vision. If that means taking some college courses, do what you have to do. Make sure you and the career, the dream, the passion, are a good fit. God has a ministry that fits you. Don’t seek to be someone who you are not.

Then there is KNITTING. Any great project necessitates partnership. You can do much on your own but much more with a little help from your friends. Find the person who knows the person who knows. Network. Associate. Circulate if you want to percolate. Which takes us to OUTFITTING. Don’t just dream the dream; wear it. Dress up in enthusiasm. Outfitting means appropriating the best tools, putting on the whole armor of God, dressing for success. Another word is OUTWITTING. The enemy will set traps on the path. He doesn’t like the fact that you are bent on progress, not one bit. So he will plot your defeat. But here’s a great promise, “The enemy shall not outwit him…” (Psalm 89:22) The Holy Spirit can reveal any landmines along the way.

Perhaps the most important word in this chain is GRITTING and NOT QUITTING. Failure is the path of least persistence. “No man, having put his hand to the plow, and looking back, is fit for the kingdom of God” (Luke 9:62). As long as your teeth are gritted there is no chance for you to negate your positive confession or say something that will kill your faith. Gritting means chomping down on a promise from the Word like a bulldog on a bone then holding on for dear life. “The just shall live by faith” means that he will keep keeping on by faith. We have faith but greater still, faith has us! The last word would be HITTING, hitting on all eight cylinders, hitting the bull’s-eye, hitting the road, hitting pay dirt. “I press toward the mark”, said Paul, but what good is pressing toward something if you never hit that something? Our final destination is heaven but there are destinations down here that are reached “from faith to faith” (Rom 1:17). We hit a lot of targets along the way – and each victory propels us toward the next!