Endurance

Philippians 1:6, "I am certain that God, who began the good work within you, will continue his work until until it is finally finished on that day when Christ returns." (NLT) Each of us need to be secure in the knowledge that God plans on completing what He has started in our lives when we were converted. We need to remember that we can walk in confidence with the knowledge that God is working toward the completion of our journey with Him. You may have heard this principle of completion referred to in this manner; "Our walk with God is not a sprint but a marathon." Our life with God is one of faithful endurance. Yes, we are to be committed to a faithful walk with God but we also need to realize that God has made a faithful commitment to us. Read the promise found in our text one more time, "...will continue his work until it is finally finished on that day when Christ returns." That promise of Paul referring to the work of Christ in our lives offers hope and strength for the future days of our walk with God. We are not traveling this road alone but we have the accompanying presence of Christ guiding us as we face our individual challenges. We do not rejoice when trouble or difficulty comes our way but we do rejoice when we realize that we are not alone. We also can rejoice when we realize that Christ has not given up on us and that He is still at work completing what He has begun. Do not give into the pressure to stop in the midst of your journey; as of now the grade of our life is "incomplete" but Christ is not finished yet. There is still work to be done in my life and even now as I am writing this note the Spirit is at work. The enemy seeks to make us feel alone or feel that our life is a failure. But remember that we are still in the process of spiritual completion. If you stopped an assembly line in the middle of the process of furniture being built you and I would not want to purchase that product for our home. The reason behind our lack of a purchase would be the fact that there was still work to be done on the product. DO NOT GIVE UP on yourself and DO NOT GIVE UP on others. The project of our lives is not finished or completed yet; He (Christ) is still at work in us. Do not lose your hope or your faith; we can trust in the fact that God has planned for His work to be completed in our lives and we need to walk in the strength of that promise. I begin each day realizing that God is still at work in me and I need to respond with a commitment to follow the Lord to the best of my ability.