Endurance

You know that when your faith is tested, your endurance has a chance to grow. So let it grow, for when your endurance is fully developed, you will be perfect and complete, needing nothing.

James 1:3-4

HOW DOES A person develop the important quality of endurance? Sticking with the biblical program? Staying in the game? Hanging in there despite setbacks, reversals, and the underhanded actions of others?

The way it happens is by being tested and going through difficult circumstances. No one ever developed perseverance by having a happy, no-conflict kind of life. Such pampered people become spoiled, and when bad times come, they throw tantrums instead of dealing with the real problems.

God sends such tests to all Christians so that they will develop this all-important quality. What kinds of tests? The kind that will push your patience to the limits. The kind that might send you into a fury if you were another kind of person. The kind that push your buttons, nail you to the wall, and feel like pains in the neck.

Are you experiencing a trial or two these days? Remember, God may be testing you to develop your endurance. He wants to bring you to the place where you lack nothing in terms of character. His promise is that as you learn it, you will emerge one day, “perfect and complete.”