Perseverance/Grace

per·se·ver·ance
[pur-suh-veer-uhns]
noun
1.steady per­sis­tence in a course of action, a pur­pose, a state, etc., espe­cially in spite of dif­fi­cul­ties, obsta­cles, or dis­cour­age­ment.
2.Theology . con­tin­u­ance in a state of grace to the end, lead­ing to eter­nal salvation.

I remem­ber get­ting an email from one of Con­nors coaches a while back when he was in Tball jok­ing that Con­nor would be play­ing on a win­ning team — that they hadn’t lost one yet. :) But that isn’t real­ity! There are win­ners and there are losers…we have to teach our chil­dren at a young age what it means to per­se­vere in life. We have to learn what it means to work hard and try your best and still fall short.
Kyle was really dis­s­ap­pointed after he lost quite a few games last week­end and teaches a valu­able les­son. There are going to be days when you do your best and work as a team and you are going to be anni­hi­lated. You may lose by a ton…but you have to get up and you have to play again. You have to work hard, put in hours and hours and prac­tice and you MIGHT beat them the next time. That is real­ity. Every­one isn’t a win­ner all of the time. You have to work hard, you have to hus­sle, and you have to prac­tice. You have to learn from your losses.
I like the sec­ond mean­ing of this word. We all fall short, but if we per­se­vere, God will grant grace to us til eter­nity. You are going to fall short, get back up and TRY again! Learn how to lose…learn how to win…but most impor­tantly learn that GOD is there to pick you right back up and heal the pieces and put you back together every­time. He has grace on us and we need to extend that grace to others.

How  can we become gra­cious – more like Jesus.

Richard Black­aby in his book, “Putting on a Face of Grace” has a list of tips for us.

• Speak words intended to build up,  not to bring down.
• Focus on their need rather then  your own.
• Freely for­give.
• Swal­low you pride and say, “I’m  sorry”, and “I was wrong.”
• Live your life with a goal of “no  regrets”.
• Don’t keep score of what is fair.
• Grace doesn’t con­demn or give up  on people.
• Grace empha­sizes mercy, not  justice.
• Read 1 Corinthi­ans 13 regularly.

And always keep in mind that it is God’s spirit within us who will change us into becom­ing peo­ple who extend grace  to others.

Father, you  con­tin­u­ally show grace to your chil­dren no mat­ter how many times we mess  up.  Thank you so much.  We don’t deserve your love.  Enable us, through the power of your Holy  Spirit, to become peo­ple of grace.  Amen

A lot of what I wrote was from my notes from Pas­tor Brian Blenden at CrossPointeCommunity.com