What to do When Tempted to Lose Heart

Have you ever lost heart? You know, that feeling of discouragement when your best made plans just aren’t working out – when you want to throw in the towel, cash in your chips, cut your losses, bag it, go to the house, quit, give up, or a thousand other surrenderisms. Perhaps you’ve heard someone say something like, “It’s only a temporary set back. It’ll get better soon.” Or, “It’s only minor surgery – you’ll be fine.” It may be minor to you, but when they are cutting on me, it’s major!

The Apostle Paul told his friends in Corinth that he wasn’t one to lose heart, and neither should they (2 Cor 4:1). If anybody had reason to complain it was surely Paul; beatings from his fellow countrymen, stoned, shipwrecks, robbed, exposure, hunger, thirst, naked (2 Cor 11:24-28). Yet he didn’t complain. He referred to these and other hardships as “light and momentary troubles.” Light and momentary for you Paul, but this is the kind of stuff I call heavy and long lasting.

Heavy and long lasting like the last month of my fourth grade year.

It was late April 1970. The windows in Mrs. Whitmire’s classroom were raised as high as they would go (no AC back then), and the pre-summer heat, along with the smell of honeysuckle, was beckoning me to a place not bound by four walls and a seven-foot tall teacher with a yardstick. My thoughts were fully engaged with the endless summer that awaited me, all while having to endure the long-lasting and heavy burden of multiplication, division, nouns and verbs.

That last month of school drug on to what I calculated to be 49 dog years – heavy and long lasting.  My endless summer, on the other hand, came and went like a thief in the night – light and momentary to say the least.

Could Paul have gotten confused about what hardship is and isn’t? Could he have been delusional? Too many days spent in Mrs. Whitmire’s class and not enough summer-time fun with his buddies? None of the above. Paul knew that everything he endured – from minor inconveniences to near-death experiences were truly light and momentary in the context of eternity. He was able to have this perspective because he was clear about his purpose – his “WHY” (see also Col 2:2-3).

Paul’s “why” was focused on “what is unseen, not what is seen.” He knew that the fourth grade would not last forever. He knew that one day he would get out for the summer, and the summer would truly be endless. I would call this heaven. That’s what Paul called it as well.

Perhaps you are facing what seems to be an endless “fourth grade” right now – a relationship gone awry, a career in jeopardy, a prodigal whose turnaround looks improbable, an illness that dashes your hope. Take heart – don’t lose it. If Paul had focused on his circumstances rather than his opportunities for advances, he would have never made it. The same is true for you and I. We are going to lose heart from time to time. But we don’t have to lose it for all time. I’m reminded of Jesus’s words to his disciples less than 24 hours before his crucifixion: “In this world you will have trouble. But take heart! I have overcome the world (Jn 16:33).”

Had the story ended with the crucifixion, these words would be of no encouragement for those of us who have temporarily lost heart, nor would there have been any reason for Paul to cast his vision anywhere other than his current circumstances. But the story didn’t end there. In fact, you could say the story began there, because the next day a dead man got up and walked out of His grave.

The hope Paul had was not delusional, and it’s not delusional for those of us who believe in, and are trusting in, the one God sent. Take heart. What is seen is only temporary – what is unseen is forever. Your endless summer awaits!

Play to win this week in the game that really counts!