The Power of Persistence

According to a Google search I did today, it takes over 40,000 steps to climb Mount Everest. 

That's a lot of steps. If you can manage 10,000 a day, you're doing pretty well—odds are you're a decently healthy person. But four times that? 

I'm no mountaineer, but I'd bet that the people who attempt Everest's summit don't show up when it's time to climb expecting to walk 40,000 steps in one day. It takes a while to reach the top, time enough so that the climbers don't slip and fall to their deaths on the treacherous hike. 

Similarly, they don't show up unprepared. Climbing a mountain of that difficulty isn't an easy endeavor, and the climbers know that; most practice and prepare for years in advance. For them, Everest is the summit in more ways then one—it's the culmination of all their hard work and training. 

And all that hard work started when they decided to take a small step in the mountain's direction. 

We have this idea of a victory being quick. That one day you'll wake up, be presented with an impossible task or trial, and overcome it by the sheer determination you have. But really, a victory is a slow drawn-out process that happens much more slowly than we expect. 

 

We read a book that we like. Perhaps it's 200 pages long. Since we're a fast reader when our imagination is captured, we finish it in a couple of days, or maybe a week or two. Then we mention to our friends how good it is, think about it for a minute, and move on with life. 

A 200 page book is more than we imagine it is. It's tens of thousands of words that an author typed out, carefully considered, and then invested hours and hours of time and care to print. Actually, it's more than that—considering the amount of times many authors rewrite their book to improve it, the final product we read likely has hundreds of thousands of discarded words behind it. It's a lot of work, guys. 

But do you think that author produced it in a single day? 

Of course not. Like the mountain climbers, that book is only possible because of years of effort. Years of hard, painful, frustrating toil, all to make something beautiful. 

Yes, it takes years. But years are made up of months, and months are made up of weeks, and weeks are made up of days. Hundreds of thousands of words to make up a book, divided over a year's number of days, seems a lot more manageable—to write 100,000 words in a year, you only need to write 273.97 words a day. (The .97 is essential here.)

Perhaps that author had a thought in his mind. I'll write 300 words every day, he thought, and I'll work on it a little bit for a long time. And then it'll get done. And he stuck to what he committed to, and after a long time, he succeeded. 

And the book got written, and its story was transferred from the author's head into ours. All thanks to that small, persistent work that the author did. 

 

Do you want to do something big? 

Do you have an Everest of your own? A book you'd like to write? A business you'd like to start, or a skill you'd like to grow in? 

Don't underestimate the power that persistence plays. There's a lot of time we're given to work with—making the most of it doesn't mean throwing everything you have at your disposal

at this moment at the goal you want to achieve. No, the real work is done over large amounts of time, by someone who cares enough to stick with the work in order to see it through. 

Jesus labored for three years to bring his Gospel to the people of his kingdom, to Jews and Greeks and everybody in between. That took time, and it took patience. 

Actually, Jesus labored for 33 years to bring his Gospel to the people. Imagine his childhood, during which he wasn't out teaching people and performing miracles. Do you think those years were wasted? 

No. God does all things for a purpose. 

Be patient. Do the work God has set before you, and endure. In time, you'll reap your reward. 

But it takes time. It takes effort, and it can take hundreds and thousands of days before that reward is ready to reap. So wait, and be patient, and delight to do the work of the Lord, for "to this end we toil and strive, because we have our hope set on the living God, who is the Savior of all people, especially of those who believe." (1 Timothy 4:10)