Hold On - Don’t Quit!

“Never give up, for that is just the place and time that the tide will turn.”

Harriet Beecher Stowe

I had fainted, unless I had believed to see the goodness of the Lord in the land of the living. Wait on the Lord: be of good courage, and he shall strengthen thine heart: wait, I say, on the Lord.

Psalm 27:14 (KJV)

Have you ever been in a situation where you were ready to call it quits? I often wonder, as the quotation from Harriet Beecher Stowe suggests, if the very moment we are ready to call it quits is the moment when we will begin to see positive changes in our situations. What if the very moment we are ready to throw in the towel is the moment when God shifts our situation?

I often get impatient when I am stuck in traffic on the highway, especially if I am pressed for time and have someplace I need to be. I despise getting stuck in a lane that is not moving. When I’m really impatient or in a rush, I have made the decision to switch lanes. I’m sure you can relate to giving up on the lane that you were in because you were not making any progress in reaching your destination. More often than not, the very moment I switched lanes is when traffic began to flow in the lane that I was previously in. The cars that were behind me in the lane I was in breeze past me as I sat stuck in a new lane. Truth is, if I had waited another moment, another second, I would have been on my way, moving in the direction of my destination.

And so it is with life. Not quitting requires patience. Not quitting requires strength. Not quitting asks us to be still, trusting that progress is being made even if we cannot see or feel it. Not giving up is hard work, but if we hold on, we just may be at the point where God turns our situations around.

Growing in Christ

Pastor Donna Olivia Owusu-Ansah