NEVER SURRENDER! NEVER GIVE UP! -- Devotional for February 20, from "Good Seeds"

Let us not become weary in doing good, for at the proper time we will reap a harvest – if we do not give up. (Galatians 6:9)

II Timothy 3:16,17 tells us that, “all Scripture is inspired by God, and is therefore profitable for teaching, reproof, correction, and training in righteousness, so that the man of God will be thoroughly equipped for every good work.” One of those Scriptures is today’s verse, an exhortation from the Lord, linked to a wonderful promise. The goal of the Christian life is not salvation – that’s the starting block, not the finish line! The prize we compete for, the paycheck we work for, is the harvest. And it would not be wrong – if we plow and sow and water and fertilize and weed and prune, a little bit each day – to look for fruit, if only just a little, each day. Longfellow wrote, “Not enjoyment, and not sorrow, is our destined end or way; but to act that each tomorrow find us farther than today.” Our Lord implores us not to become weary. When does this happen? “When I work too hard,” you say. Yes, we must balance hours of concentrated labor with moments of rest and recuperation. But the implication here is not mere physical exhaustion from overwork, but mental and emotional discouragement from being overwrought. This is a condition that comes more from looking at our load than from lifting it, and from listing and licking our wounds instead of lying still to let them heal. We forget to count our blessings when we’re so busy recounting our burdens. God’s correction is in order here: regardless how daunting the task, you need not become discouraged from it. Know this: there is not an automatic one-on-one relationship between difficulties and discouragement. But there is an antidote to the doldrums that lurk around the corner of every difficulty. Actually two. The first is the built-in value of the thing we are doing. Whether or not there is a reward at some future time, it is a good thing that we are doing good things – if they are God-things: activities that build up others and bring out the beauty of nature and the glory of nature’s God. There is power in “good things” to bolster drooping spirits. But God will be no man’s debtor. When we serve and please Him with loving words and righteous deeds, we can know that sometime, in His time, we will reap a harvest. But there’s a condition: DON’T QUIT. It’s a race, and you’ve got to stay in it, to the end! “What is this saying to you and to me? That it’s too soon to quit, and too late to flee! So just stay on task, moving forward, not back. Go take that hill – but don’t take no flak! Never surrender! Never give up! It’s always too soon to quit. Go get your orders from heaven’s headquarters, and go out and get on with it.” (Poem by SM).