WHEN YOU FEEL LIKE QUITTING

"There's only one thing that can guarantee our failure, and that's if we quit.” - Craig Breedlove, American professional race car driver and five-time world land speed record holder.

To borrow from Eric Copeland (For the Creative Soul), maybe you’ve decided that since nothing is happening the way you want it to, the way you expected it to, that you should hang it up.  Just quit.  This is how you sometimes feel as you serve the Lord and work at building a productive life with your particular talents and opportunities.  Maybe you’re trying to build a business or develop a stream of income which brings results that are rewarding to you.  You doggedly invest your time, money, energy, and abilities in worthy pursuits.  But nothing happens.

And you come to the conclusion that God is trying to tell you to quit doing whatever you’re trying to accomplish. But let’s be realistic.  Is that how God works?  Is that how He worked in the Bible?

Abraham knew he was really really old to have children, and that Sarah couldn't physically. But God didn't say, "You know, forget it you old geezers.  You really are too old for kids."  Instead God said to Abraham, "Look up at the sky and count the stars – if indeed you can count them." Then he said to him, "So shall your offspring be."

Or when the Apostle Paul was in a boat during a terrible storm and the men thought all was lost, God didn't send an angel to Paul saying "You better jump in the lifeboats!"  Instead God told Paul to hold on.

God does not even suggest quitting.  If anything, He tells us to endure, and for quite an interesting reason.

"Therefore, since we are surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses, let us throw off everything that hinders and the sin that so easily entangles. And let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us." - Hebrews 12:1

We are surrounded by people watching us and watching what we will do.  If you’ve set an example to those around you that you are working to use the talents God has given you, and then give up, what kind of precedent are you setting?  And not just for family or friends, but what about total strangers and acquaintances that are watching what a "Christian" does to see if they want to emulate that life?

When you think about it, Abraham and Paul were showing an example of faith by not giving up. We have to as well.

“I'm interested in that thing that happens where there's a breaking point for some people and not for others.  You go through such hardship, things that are almost impossibly difficult, and there's no sign that it's going to get any better, and that's the point when people quit.  But some don't.” - Robert Redford

If you’ve heard a little voice in your ear saying it’s time to quit, that’s not God telling you to quit.  God does not whisper and tell us to quit, but to endure and run the race.