Remain Faithful Without Knowing How the Story Ends
BibleTalk.tv
This may be the clearest evidence of mature endurance.
Most things would be easier to endure if we knew how they were going to end. Tell me that the illness will be gone next year and I can face the treatments. Tell me that my child will eventually return to the Lord and I can endure the present heartache. Tell me that the financial crisis will be resolved in six months and I can manage the anxiety.
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But God rarely gives us that information.
This is why James eventually points his readers to Job:
We count those blessed who endured. You have heard of the endurance of Job and have seen the outcome of the Lord’s dealings, that the Lord is full of compassion and is merciful.
- James 5:11
Job did not know what the reader of the book knows. He did not know why his suffering had come. He did not know how long it would last. He did not know how the story would end.
And Job certainly struggled. He grieved. He questioned. He complained. He demanded answers. But he kept turning toward God.
There is a profound difference between struggling with God and walking away from God. Endurance does not mean that we have no questions left. It means that unanswered questions no longer have the power to separate us from the One we trust.
