Endurance

Let's turn to please in Hebrews chapter 10. Hebrews chapter 10 and let's begin reading from verse 32. A little section to encourage the Lord's people not only in this book but also for us today.

Chapter 10 in verse 32 but call to remembrance the former days which after you were illuminated, enlightened ye endured a great fight of afflictions partly whilst you were made a spectacle or gazing stock both by reproaches and afflictions and partly whilst you became companions of them that were so used. For ye had compassion of me and my bonds and took joyfully the spoiling of your goods knowing in yourselves that ye have in heaven a better and an enduring substance. Cast not away therefore your confidence which hath great recompense of reward.

For ye have need of patience that after you've done the will of God you might receive the promise. For yet a very little while and he that shall come that is the coming one will come and will not tarry. Now look at chapter 12 in the first verse wherefore seeing we also are compassed about with so great a cloud of witnesses let us lay aside every weight and sin which doth so easily beset us and let us run.

Let us also run with patience the race that is set before us looking unto Jesus the author and finisher of the faith who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross despising the shame and is set down at the right hand of the throne of God for consider him that endured such contradiction of sinners against himself lest you be wearied and faint in your minds. Verse 7 if you endure chastening God dealeth with you as with sons. The number of virtues that Christians are expected to display in their life we can enumerate a good number of them.

There are some that seem to be particularly needed in particular times, circumstances, different periods of Christian testimony that perhaps call for different virtues, different aspects of the character of Christ that would be manifest in each one of us. I want to call your attention to a virtue that I don't think I've ever heard anyone speak on but it's been speaking to me and that is the virtue of patience. Now the passages we've read are not the words that we would usually use in the sense of that little ditty you know that says you know it patience is a virtue and so on.

I won't finish it because you might finish it the way you think about it, whichever one it applies to, but really we're not thinking about patience and waiting in the terms of having to wait for something to take place or waiting in terms of allowing events to happen in our lives or even tolerance in relation to other people's manners or characteristics or those kind of things are very important in our lives. We ought to show tolerance. We ought to show a gentleness.

We should show a moderation. But what I've read to you about is the word patience in a different sense altogether. It's the word endurance.

You'll find it a number of times in the New Testament and I would say that that's the thing that is very essential and has been essential over the years of Christian testimony, that which enables one just to continue going on without giving up. The word really is derived from a root word I believe that means to bear under. In other words, just to endure the circumstances and conditions, perhaps the trials that might be the afflictions.

It may be the different aspects of one's life that one has to continue on in the midst of discouragement perhaps, in the midst of other problems that assail us. A great virtue of a Christian's life is continuance, going on and not giving up. I think I've heard enough already this weekend that would encourage me just to go on.

I've heard also in conversation with individuals about some that have given up. That's discouraging. That's difficult and I trust that each one of us here tonight, here this afternoon, will realize that God does not really call upon us to go on and continue and endure for one year at a time or one month at a time.

I tried to encourage one some time ago. God only asks us to go on one more day, just one day at a time and to continue doing what is right for the honor of the Lord Jesus with the expectation that before tomorrow comes the Lord might take us home. That's a glad anticipation.

That's a joy that you and I should expect at any moment and in my own soul that's what encourages me tremendously. We'll all need to be faithful and continue in the right place doing what is right according to his will whenever he appears. I want to say seven things about this virtue of endurance.

Very simple things I want to sit down as quickly as possible so I won't try to elaborate on them in great detail. I want to say that patience is absolutely essential for you and me as a believer. God never tells us that we're going to have an easy life or a pathway does it? In fact it's most interesting to me that when the Lord found multitudes following him, immediately it turns to them and he tells them how difficult the pathway is going to be, how many problems are going to have to face, and how we're going to have to have determination, convictions, and a right settled attitude toward him if they're going to continue in discipleship and faithfulness to him.

But I would say that this context we read in chapter 10 emphasizes that very truth in verse 36. Ye have need of patience. We need endurance brethren.

We can't go on without it. This Christian life is not a matter of a little short 100-yard dash so to speak. It's an endurance race going right on to the very end.

And how easy it is just to drop out along the way, just to give up, just to say well it's too difficult, and the problems are too great, and there are other influences on my life that would take me away. Oh God says ye have need of patience. Why? Having done the will of God, you might receive the promise.

I would take it that in our life day by day, oftentimes we find that the believers, ourselves as well, we, you know the lack of results, the lack of immediate, what is the word you know, immediate feedback in the Christian's life sometimes tends to be discouraging. Well you know the word of God just simply tells us that we do need endurance. And those that have gone on well for God and have ended their life in a way that is honoring to the Lord Jesus, they have displayed day by day endurance and faithfulness.

Notice the context, it's in view of the coming of the Lord Jesus. I take it that he's writing to those who had every temptation to turn back from the old religion that they were once associated with. There were those who had every influence all around them that would seek to attract them away from the simplicity of what they learned in Christ.

Well listen brother, we're not living in different days altogether. Our day is very similar. There are many influences that would like to take you away and rob you of the joy of going on and finishing, as Paul could say, finish my course with joy.

Yet one determination, one desire, I'm going to end well for Christ. You need endurance. You need that.

It's a virtue that God wants to see displayed in every one of us. I don't know about you but I look at older saints that have been in God's assembly for years, thick and thin, up and down, problems and good days as well. I look at them now and I say thank God for their example.

How wonderful it is to keep on going on, just going on for him. We need endurance and that will be an essential virtue. I want you to notice with me in this context, we didn't read it, but endurance is encouraged by examples.

I take it that in chapter 12 he's looking back on those witness bearers that had gone before that he's listed in chapter 11. And those in chapter 11 you look at their lives carefully, we won't do it this afternoon, you look at their lives carefully and you'll find that every one of them was marked by endurance in the difficulties of their circumstances. I think of Enoch, a dear man, living an absolutely wicked days when everything was contrary to him walking with God.

Yet the most amazing thing that I read about his life is that for the moment he began to walk with God he walked without interruption until the Lord took him home. What endurance, determination, that this was most important to him and came ahead of everything else in his life. He was living in the days before the flood when the wickedness of man was great.

Sometimes you look at the day that we're living in, just remember Enoch, a man that walked with God. He endured. And we find down through the record of those men, whether it was Noah in the days in which he labored for those 120 years building an ark, I think that must have been a tremendous work.

Noah wasn't a carpenter, not amazing. Think about Noah getting an ark, a great big boat that he had built and he never had any experience in boat building. He was trusting not his ability, he was trusting the Lord to protect him.

But there was a man that endured for those 120 years and the result was he saved his house, he preserved a posterity. We read about Abraham, a man that went out not knowing whether he went. He went out in obedience to God and he endured it says not having received the promise but having seen them afar off.

I take it that all those individuals that are listed in Hebrews chapter 11 were men and women as well that were examples of those that endured. How about Moses, a man that was 80 years old before he ever began to do work for God. Not in the sense that he wasn't being prepared but that's when God called him to do the work.

And you know dear brethren, you and I can be encouraged by the example of others. And not only that, we can be an example to others as well. Saints of God that goes on faithfully, triumphantly, joyfully, happily, usefully in the things of God, they can be a positive influence on a younger believer.

You don't know who you might be influencing. You don't know who might be following your example. And sometimes those that have been so prominent maybe in taking such an active part in a local assembly, if they fall, if they leave, if they get discouraged and give up, they can have a terrible effect upon others who are hurt and injured by their example.

So we need those examples. James chapter 5 gives us a lovely example. He says you know the patience of the prophets.

Take for an example their patience. I can look at those men like Jeremiah, a man that was marked by endurance. A man that persisted in his faithfulness to the Lord in spite of the fact that there was no response on the part of the people.

And even to the point that he went with them into Egypt knowing that it was a wrong move. A man, those prophets, marked by their endurance, their faithfulness, their persistence, and their constancy of character. He says take an example from them.

Then he says you've heard of the endurance of Job. And think of that man and how he endured. And so we have, brethren and sisters, examples in the word of God that would encourage us and give us a pattern to follow.

May God help us to follow them. Now not only is patience encouraged by examples that we received and also we receive and what we also give, but patience is also a vital Christian virtue that needs to be developed. It has to be developed and it takes experiences to be able to do that.

I think that when you think about the principle of endurance we find that little by little God may work in a different way or may bring us into different circumstances, but it's all by way of experiences so that we might learn more what it is to just continue in steadfast obedience to Him and determination to seek to follow Him. I think that we have the experience of Hebrews chapter 12. He says let us run with endurance the race that is set before us.

Run with endurance the race that is set before us looking off unto Jesus the author and finisher of the faith. And so we have that development that has to take place. A young believer is a fragile individual oftentimes.

God doesn't expose them to severe trials or bring them into difficulties in a marked way, but as Abraham got on his relationship with God and developed faith in God, more and more the trials became more intense. Brethren and sisters, over the period of our life and our knowledge of God and our fellowship with Him, He wants to develop in our life endurance, continuation so we might not give up. Well then my next point is this, that endurance is going to be developed by the very strangest thing.

The very thing that would cause a person to give up is what God uses to develop endurance. What is that? Persecution, afflictions, trials. You know what he says in James chapter 1, he says my brethren count it all joy when you fall into trials.

Count it all joy. He says you need wisdom to be able to understand that. But he says you count it all joy knowing that the trial of your faith is much more precious.

It's how it's developed something. It's going to develop endurance and continuation. The trial of your faith is what makes that grow and makes it become more solid, makes it deeper and more genuine in your life.

You look at Romans chapter 5 and he says there that in relation to God's dealings with us in Romans chapter 5, he says we boast in tribulation. Really? We boast in tribulation? He says yes. He says knowing that tribulation worketh endurance.

And it's only the trials and the difficulties that God allows to come into your life and mine. The things that we like to leave behind and escape if possible. No he says count it all joy.

Look at it from God's standpoint. See it from the results that God wants to produce in your life. Don't try to get away from it.

In Hebrews chapter 12 he says if we endure chastening, what is it? God is dealing with us as sons. It gives us the privilege of enduring those trials, afflictions. Many in time past have endured tremendous, tremendous persecutions.

You know there are those in this world tonight, this afternoon, who are enduring great persecution for the name of Christ. God allows them, in fact the word of God tells us that that is a gift. God gives it to them.

I wonder sometimes why he doesn't give it to us. Not that I'm asking for it. But nevertheless he is saying that those persecutions and trials that his people endure are the ones that develop this characteristic.

The very thing that would cause one to give up are the ones that God uses to develop it. Those afflictions might be even physical distresses. Many a child of God who has passed through a time of trial, maybe a physical illness, it just brought them to be cast upon God in absolute dependency.

They would say afterwards looking back on it, it was for my benefit. There were blessings that came out of it. There was a result that I hadn't anticipated.

And the wonderful thing is that those trials can be used of God physically, economically, socially, whatever they might be. If they only cause us to deepen in our desires and appreciation of the sufficiency of Christ to meet the need for the present circumstance, that's what will encourage us on developing endurance in our life. It may be persecution for their testimony.

It may be in relationship to the different forms that pressures can take. That's the word afflictions or persecutions. It's the idea of pressures put upon you.

It's the pressures that develop the endurance. Now I'm no forester. I've got men in here that know much more about trees than I do.

But I've been told anyway that the tree that stands alone by itself on the top of a hill and endures all the winds and the storms and all the pressures that come to bear upon it from the time it's young, young, I guess young, that's right, is the one that has the strongest wood. The one that can stand, the one that has the deepest roots, and the one that has the ability to withstand all those extremities. One that is in the middle of a forest that has different circumstances altogether is not the same as the one that's all by itself.

Well you know these afflictions, these difficulties, what God may allow in your life or He may allow in mine, they're for a purpose. It might strengthen us and cause that there might be an ability just to go on and continue in faithfulness to Him. I want to quickly stop, very quickly anyway, I want to think about a few more things.

I would take it from Romans chapter 15 and verse 5 that patience comes from God. Endurance. God is a God of endurance, a God of patience, a God of consolation he says.

And God has been enduring, He has been enduring the evils and the arrogance and the ignorance of man for all these years. He is a God that displays patience with His people. He never changes from His purpose.

He never alters His determination. He's going to bring it to a completion. But if you and I need endurance, we need patience, He's able to give it.

He's the God of patience. He wants to instill in your life and mine that ability just to continue going on until the Lord comes. Then I would think that in Second Thessalonians chapter 3 and verse 5 we have at least a suggestion that patience is characteristic of the Lord Jesus.

I'm taking that, I know it's a passage that has different opinions about its interpretation perhaps, but it speaks about the patience of Christ, the patient waiting of Christ. And allow me anyway to think about it this way, that is that the Lord is patiently waiting. Waiting to do what? Until the moment when His Father will say, rise up, call them home.

Waiting for that moment when as Isaac was waiting patiently for Rebecca to come over the sands of the desert. He's waiting for you and me to arrive home as well. And in Revelation chapter 1 verse 9 we read about the Lord's patience.

Brother we need to exemplify the Lord Jesus in just continuing in patient waiting under the will of God until His purposes are fulfilled. But last of all I wanted to say this, that future reward is promised for past patient endurance in the life. I take that from Revelation chapter 3 and verse 10 where the Lord says to the church in Philadelphia, because thou hast kept the word of my patience.

Their endurance, many things that would have caused those in Philadelphia likely to give up. He says you only have a little strength, very weak and likely oppressed and not capable of doing all that they would have liked to have done. But they were patiently going on in faithfulness to the Lord Jesus.

He says I'll give you a reward. Twice over we read about the fulfillment of the promise of the word of God being linked with the patience of the saints, the endurance of the saints. Brethren as we lay hold upon the certainty of the promise of God, wouldn't that give us ability just to go on.

The anticipation in this chapter, chapter 10 of Hebrews that the coming one will come brethren. He says there's only a very little while and that one who is promised to come, he will come. Brethren I can only say this, patient endurance in fidelity and devotion to the Lord Jesus will never ever lack a reward in the coming day.

May God help us. You know dear brethren I really believe that this is a virtue we need especially today. Many times brethren go on year after year preaching the gospel faithfully without ever seeing a soul saved.

Difficult isn't it? There are brethren who carry responsibility of the assembly and instead of seeing improvement in conditions they might see deterioration. It's difficult. But you know endurance, laying hold upon God, depending upon him, doing it for him is what will carry us through the end and keep us faithful to our absent risen Lord until he comes again for us.