How Does Perseverance Help Consistency?

How should continued effort affect our walk? This devotion looks at how perseverance can help lead to consistency.

Nuggets

We have to be alert to dodge those things that Satan throws.
Perseverance is all about going from milk babies to steak adults.
Our goal is to please God.
When we gather the knowledge and study His Word, God wants that information to change us.

Devotions in the Consistency Needed for Spiritual Growth series

How Does Perseverance Help Consistency?

I figured the title of this devotion would be How Does Endurance Help Consistency? However, Holman Bible Dictionary didn’t even define the word. Nave’s Topical Bible took me to perseverance.

I can take a hint.

Let's Put It into Context

Merriam-Webster Dictionary defined endurance as “the ability to withstand hardship or adversity” or “the act or an instance of enduring or suffering.” Perseverance, on the other hand, was defined as “continued effort to do or achieve something despite difficulties, failure, or opposition.”

Resources

Thank You, God. Continued effort does fit in better with the idea of consistency.

We are getting at consistency through diligence. Diligence talks about being persistent. The Merriam-Webster Dictionary defines diligence as being a “steady, earnest, and energetic effort.”

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If perseverance is continued effort, what efforts are we continuing?

Stand Firm

“Be alert, stand firm in the faith, be courageous, be strong” (I Cor. 16: 13 CSB)

Remember, we are in spiritual warfare in this life. It is hard with Satan throwing everything he has at us.

We have to be alert to dodge those things that Satan throws. I know. Keep an eye out for spiritual warfare darts. Being watchful helps us know what we are up against — and we have a lot for which to watch!

But the fight does take place here, too. We get the consequences of that war.

We have to consider that we have God’s armor to protect us. God calls us to stand while He fights for us. We have to remain alert in order to make sure which way the fight is going.

God calls us to be vigilant. He tells us to stand firm. That takes continued effort. If we aren’t consistent and don’t take that firm stand, our efforts will not be as effective.

But look how we are standing. “… stand firm in the faith …” (I Cor. 16: 13 CSB). Faith is the belief that the doctrines stated in God’s Word are true, even if we do not understand all aspects of them.

We don’t have to be in control. We don’t even have to see it. “Now faith is confidence in what we hope for and assurance about what we do not see” (Heb. 11: 1 NIV).

God is in control.

That stability of standing firm helps us to “… be courageous, be strong” (I Cor. 16: 13 CSB). We have God’s promises on which to hold.

I know. Many of us don’t feel courageous. Let’s see what some say about courage.

Vaughan wrote, “Courage lies midway between timidity and recklessness.”
Fairbairn wrote, “Sin produces despair. Holiness begets courage and faith.”

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What does that tell me? Courage is in there — it comes from God. It is more evident when we persevere and stand firm.

Grow Up

“Then we will no longer be little children, tossed by the waves and blown around by every wind of teaching …” (Eph. 4: 14 CSB)

Perseverance is all about going from milk babies to steak adults. We don’t want to stay the way we are. Our goal is to navigate the process of sanctification so that we can become more like God.

To read a related devotion, click the button below.

Ephesians 4: 14 identifies one aspect of milk babies. They are “… tossed by the waves and blown around by every wind of teaching …” (Eph. 4: 14 CSB). Lathrop warns us that growing up will not be easy.

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When we are following the worldview, it is easy to get caught up in the fads and trends that characterizes it.

If we are wanting world acceptance, we can feel like we are tossed from one fad to another. That can easily happen when our focus is wrong.

But what is that really saying about us when we flail around like that? It means we are being inconsistent.

Woods wrote, “The inconsistency, the fickleness, the shiftiness, natural in a child, because a sign of immaturity, is out of place in those who are no longer children.” That inconsistency is out of place in disciples of God.

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Inconsistency not only makes us look immature, but it also makes us an ineffective witness. Our testimony is wrecked because we do not show that our faith is strong enough to be firm.

To grow requires continued, sustained efforts. We need to focus on God. Our goal should be walking in His Spirit.

To read a related devotion, click the button below.

When We Go Walking

“so that you may walk worthy of the Lord, fully pleasing to him: bearing fruit in every good work and growing in the knowledge of God” (Col. 1: 10 CSB)

Daille defined the way of man as “… the fashion and method of life which each man follows.” Walking is used “… to signify a regulating and framing of the life after some certain manner, whether good or evil …”

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Huntington noted disciples are to walk with “… purpose, strength, and circumspection ….” He, too, warned us it isn’t going to be easy.

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Our goal is to please God. We can only attempt to do that through faith.

Paul told us that the outcome of our walks should be producing fruit. This fruit is leading people to God so that they can ABCD, supporting other believers, and growing the church, both inwardly and outwardly (Burns).

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Production of fruit indicates growth is occurring. Spence advised us that “the real means of growth is the knowledge of God.”

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It takes work for us to produce fruit. That work stems from knowing the truth (Arnot). Fruit is only produced through continued effort.

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Rooted and Grounded

“But now he has reconciled you by his physical body through his death, to present you holy, faultless, and blameless before him — if indeed you remain grounded and steadfast in the faith and are not shifted away from the hope of the gospel that you heard. This gospel has been proclaimed in all creation under heaven, and I, Paul, have become a servant of it” (Col. 1: 22-23 CSB)

In order to produce the fruit, we need to be rooted and grounded. Thomas encouraged us to “strike the roots of your faith deep into the soil of eternal truth.

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We talked before that, because we have Jesus in our hearts, we are “… rooted and grounded in love” (Eph. 3: 17 RSV). This love provides the fertile ground in which to grow our fruit.

When we gather the knowledge and study His Word, God wants that information to change us. We need to take it and build a strong root system.

Change is not easy for us, so we have to make sure we persevere.

Making the Connections

We have to put continued effort into the following:

Growing our faith so we can stand firm.
Growing to be a mature disciple.
Producing the fruit to show evidence of our conversion.
Establishing a sustaining root system.

Making the Connections to Self-Discipline

“And let endurance have its full effect, so that you may be mature and complete, lacking nothing” (Jas. 1: 4 CSB)

All we do should have one purpose — working out our salvation so that we become mature disciples. We are going to need to discipline ourselves so that we don’t give up.

We know that the end goal we are working on is Bassett’s list:

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spiritually perfect,
having all our graces and virtues in their entirety,
not being deficient in anything.

How Do We Apply This?

“But the one who looks intently into the perfect law of freedom and perseveres in it, and is not a forgetful hearer but a doer who works—this person will be blessed in what he does” (Jas. 1: 25 CSB)

“Don’t be led astray by various kinds of strange teachings; for it is good for the heart to be established by grace and not by food regulations, since those who observe them have not benefited” (Heb. 13: 9 CSB)

We have to seek God. We have to hear His Word, read it, study it, meditate on it, and memorize it. All through that, we need to be in prayer, asking God to provide the meaning.

Searching for and Seeking God

Hearing His Word (Rom. 10: 17).
Reading His Word (Rev. 1: 3).
Praying to Him (Heb. 4: 16).
Studying His Word (Ac. 17: 11).
Meditating on His Word (Ps. 1: 1-2).
Memorizing His Word (Ps. 119: 11).

To read Has God Provided Everything We Need?, click the button below.

Disciples aren’t supposed to only hear the word. It is supposed to change us. This transformation is supposed to elicit a response. God wants to see the evidence of our internalizing what He has to say to us.

We follow God’s laws and commandments. All of them.

We have to watch and pray. We have to be on alert and prepared. We can’t follow the world’ fad or trend of the moment.

Continued effort. Continued effort will bring consistency as it establishes a habit. God will guide us on what we need to go.

Father. The end goal is to be like You. It is to have Your thoughts and Your ways. Help us succeed.

If you have not admitted that your relationship is not right with God,

have not asked Jesus to be your Lord and Savior,

and have not confessed your sins,

please read through the Plan of Salvation and prayerfully consider what God is asking you to do.

Don’t know what your spiritual gifts are?

Take this Spiritual Gifts Inventory

The Disciple’s Job Description

Complete Job Description

Individual Description

Job Duty #1
Be a Living Sacrifice (Romans 12: 1-2)

Job Duty #2
Work Out Our Salvation (Philippians 2: 12)

Job Duty #3
Bring Him Glory (Matthew 5: 16)

Job Duty #4
Proclaim the Gospel (Mark 16: 15)

Job Duty #5
Love People (John 15: 12)

Job Duty #6
Make Disciples (Matthew 28: 19-20)

Job Duty #7
Other Duties as Assigned
(Ecclesiastes 3: 1)

It Was Enough
Vocalist: Elaine Guthals
Keyboard: Chris Vieth

What do you think?

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