By: Sandy Huntsman
It seems all of us are prone to excusing ourselves. Rather than persevering to the end, we began to use our creative resources to concoct reasons why we can’t complete the task. I ran across this poem in a children’s book…
All My Great Excuses
I started on my homework
but my pen ran out of ink.
My hamster ate my homework.
My computer’s on the blink.
I accidentally dropped it
in the soup my mom was cooking.
My brother flushed it down the toilet
when I wasn’t looking.
My mother ran my homework
through the washer and the dryer.
An airplane crashed into our house.
My homework caught on fire.
Tornadoes blew my notes away.
Volcanoes struck our town.
My notes were taken hostage
by an evil killer clown.
Some aliens abducted me.
I had a shark attack.
A pirate swiped my homework
and refused to give it back.
I worked on these excuses
so darned long my teacher said,
“I think you’ll find it’s easier
to do the work instead.”
–Kenn Nesbitt Revenge of the Lunch Ladies
Where did we ever get the idea that “things” were easy or that problems and difficulties are unique to us. Anyone who ever did anything of substance had to learn to persevere. Thomas Edison, the inventor of the light bulb, conducted some 18,000 experiments before he achieved that goal.
Dr. Jonas Salk of polio vaccine fame worked tirelessly for three years before he succeeded in blessing the world with an effective weapon against that crippling disease. Abraham Lincoln failed to win the political office he ran for six times before he became President. Albert Einstein said, “I think and think for months, for years; 99 times the conclusion is false. The hundredth time, I am right.”
The Bible says in 2 Peter 1.6 “add to your faith… perseverance.” The problem is that perseverance, or “patience” as the KJV translates it, has come to mean virtually the opposite of irritability. It is what we need to do to control ourselves when the kids are acting up in the back seat of the car— again.
Patience, in the biblical sense, means much more than hard-to-come-by calmness in irritating situations. Two words are commonly translated which convey somewhat different meanings.
Endurance is first passive
The word is used in another book of the Bible, James 1.12, where we are encouraged to “endure temptation.” Here something comes upon a person; something happens to him. Endurance is the ability to withstand. This is the ability to “take a licking and keep on ticking” as the old Timex commercial use to tell us.
Perseverance is also active
Here the idea is that one is doing something and encounters difficulty in continuing it or seeing it through to conclusion, but we press on despite the temptation to quit. This is the encouragement from Galatians 6.9 “Let us not grow weary in doing good, for at the proper time we will reap a harvest if we do not give up.”
The encouragement is this, we must advance on against opposition. Is there a term then that embraces both dimensions… is it “steadfast continuance” or “patient endurance?” What ever definition you settle on and whether you are pursuing spiritual or vocational goals, if you want to succeed, you have to have the ability to keep on keeping on… It will be worth it in the end…..
Pastor Sandy Huntsman
Administrative/Worship Pastor
Boca Glades Baptist Church
10101 Judge Winikoff Rd.
Boca Raton, FL. 33428