How to Lean on God for Strength When You’re Ready to Give up
I wrote this post a while back, at a time when I was ready to give up on the calling of the season. Looking back, I’m glad I kept going. Here are a few words of encouragement if you need to lean on God for strength in a hard season.
How to Lean on God for Strength
A chartreuse glow rises from the wood line, and I’m ready to throw in the towel and call this season over. I’m ready to give up, check out, and get on with the next thing.
I sincerely believed this would be easier by now. I believed I’d have more energy, more normalcy, and some greater sense that this adventure is almost finished.
Instead, I feel like I’ve been run over by a train, and I’m bracing for the semi-truck that’s about to knock me down when this stretch of the journey is over.
Maybe you can relate. You might feel unappreciated and overlooked. Maybe you’re tired of going through the motions in a cycle that never ends. You might be walking through a long season of suffering, and you can’t wait to climb out of the pit.
We all reach the end of the rope sometimes.
What do you tell yourself when you can’t find the hope you were claiming when the journey first started?
How to Lean on God When You Want to Quit:
I stumble upon it in the glow of first light with yellow hues rising from the skyline:
“This hope we have as an anchor of the soul, a hope both sure and steadfast and one which enters within the veil” (Hebrews 6:19).
I am ready to give up. I’m at the end of my rope. But what I find at the end of this rope is not a loose knot or even a tightly tied string. Instead, I find an Anchor.
An anchor is immovable, secure, and stabilizing. An anchor is fixed outside the vessel and provides stabilization when the wind and the waves are foreboding.
Are you on the brink of letting go, friend?
Go ahead and let your hands slide to the bottom of the rope to which you cling. If you have made up your mind to walk with Christ, you will find the Anchor of Hope at the end of your rope. The anchor of hope is more than just expectations for circumstances to improve. Your anchor of hope is Jesus Christ himself. Jesus is waiting for you at the end of your rope.
3 Ways to Lean on God for Strength
Your hope is not in improved circumstances. Your hope is not found by fixing the brokenness in your life.
Christ is your hope. Jesus is with you in the middle of this hard season. He is here in the storm, in the job you want to quit, in the ninth month of the never-ending pregnancy.
Jesus is with you in the middle of this hard season. He is here in the storm, in the job you want to quit, in the ninth month of the never-ending pregnancy. #LeanonGod #HopeinJesus #DoNotQuit Share on XYour circumstances don’t need to change for you to be firm and anchored. Christ, the Anchor of Hope, holds you securely here and now. He is an Anchor immovable, steadfast, and secure.
Put your hope in improved circumstances, and your hope will probably fall short. Your circumstances might not improve. But put your hope in Jesus’ presence with you, and your situation doesn’t need to get better for you to cling to hope.
If you’re struggling to let this living Hope sink into your heart, here are a few promises to claim while the storm rages around you:
1. Your suffering might feel like it will never end, but it will one day end.
We find this promise as we cling to the following words: “So we do not lose heart. Though our outer self is wasting away, our inner self is being renewed day by day. For this light momentary affliction is preparing for us an eternal weight of glory beyond all comparison, as we look not to the things that are seen but to the things that are unseen. For the things that are seen are transient, but the things that are unseen are eternal.” 2 Corinthians 4:16-18
2. Lean on God for strength, and you will emerge looking more like Jesus.
We find this promise in the book of Romans: “Through him we have also obtained access by faith into this grace in which we stand, and we rejoice in hope of the glory of God. More than that, we rejoice in our sufferings, knowing that suffering produces endurance, and endurance produces character, and character produces hope, and hope does not put us to shame, because God’s love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit who has been given to us.” Romans 5:2-5
3. God is preparing good things for you, even if you cannot see them just yet.
We find this hope here: “For in this hope we were saved. Now hope that is seen is not hope. For who hopes for what he sees? But if we hope for what we do not see, we wait for it with patience.” Romans 8:24-25
A Free Online Devotional to Help You Lean on God for Strength:
May today be the day you take hold of the very personal anchor of Hope that is Christ. He is waiting for you, and even if your hands are too weak to hold onto him, his grip on you is secure.
I also have a gift for you. Rays of Light for the Dark Days is my free online devotional for your darkest days. You will find powerful inspiration and practical encouragement to help you through life’s trials. Click here and I’ll send it to your email inbox!
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