I press on toward the goal to win the prize for which God has called me heavenward in Christ Jesus. Philippians 3:14
How is it we are supposed to press on? What does it even mean to keep going through the toughest?
The first, most helpful thing we can remember during the most trying times is God is not limited in His ability or desire to help us.
Since He initiates love, we can breathe a sigh of relief and get past any notion that we have to produce faith or fruition on our own. While God commands us to have faith, He also tells us that without Him, we can do nothing. Since we are not God, this truth is actually a life saver for us, and we more than survive by living out these words:
I am the vine; you are the branches. If you remain in me and I in you, you will bear much fruit; apart from me you can do nothing. John 15:5
When we are in the worst, the last thing we need is to muster our own strength to make something happen at points where we are most strapped for ability or resources. And no human being is exempt from difficulties in life no matter how educated, wealthy or prominent. Such events are not simply wished away. They are opportunities for us to turn to the living God, our creator, who is able to turn anything around.
Experience has taught me that when I have been thrown to the ground, I got back up. Nice, but this is nothing big. The real news story here is that it has never been me picking myself back up.
Every single time I am where I would most certainly be down for the final count, it is God Himself who personally takes hold of my life and picks me back up, directing me to keep going where He is leading – all by His ability, not mine. This is what it is to press on.
We do not do it on our own. I can look back at prayers over the years for God to use me. He has allowed some very tough things that seem to be deal breakers for Him to use me – too much broken. But in every instance I am reminded that in God’s economy, He is able to repair what we as humans would give up on. He shows His glory through the weak. And what do we do with weakness? We try to strengthen it and if we cannot, we tend to toss it. But God does not give up on us.
Since God sees value in what we prefer to avoid, we can ask Him to use the tough things for His glory and our good:
Now to him who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to his power that is at work within us, to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, for ever and ever! Amen. Ephesians 3:20-21
What is so great about that? It means we can actually press on because it is God who helps us do it.
He does not call us to move ahead on our own. He is more willing to help us take every step He is leading us to take than we are to ask for His help.
Take this in and be encouraged. It might seem that we will not make it through some crushing blows, but it is those very blows God is working in to get us through and to use for a good purpose.
With this kind of love, initiative and personal responsibility for us on God’s part, we cannot lose.
