Last Friday night I watched a group of young high school boys play football, the Junior Varsity at Modesto Christian School. My grandson was part of the team. This team has struggled this year. They’ve had a lot of adversity and they lost members. The team is small, which means that most of them play the entire game as both offense and defense. They never get a rest, and it’s been that way in each game they have played this year. They scored a touchdown in this game, the first one this year.
They had heart and determination. They never gave up. They were exhausted when it was over. Some of them were going to be mighty sore the following days, including my grandson who took a lot of hits and ended up with a bad bruise on his hip. Still, the team never gave up.
Winston Churchill gave some great speeches in his day. He is reported as having said, “Success is not final, failure is not fatal: it is the courage to continue that counts.”
Courage. Paul closed his first letter to the Corinthian Church with an exhortation about courage, “Be on your guard; stand firm in the faith; be men (and women) of courage; be strong.” [1 Cor 16:13 NIV]
As I watched these young men stand strong even though exhausted and beat, I thought a lot of Christians could take a lesson from them in courage. It is the courage to continue that counts.
