How do you keep on going in ministry in a relationship in a job in a relationship, in a job, in a disability. How do you keep on going? Year in, year out, decade in decade out

decade out when there are personal and relational and

spiritual and financial obstacles that sometimes simply seem absolutely insurmountable. So how do we keep on going when life is hard?

That's the question John Piper answers from First Thessalonians 1,

1 to 10 in this episode of Light and Truth.

This sermon was originally preached at Bethlehem Baptist Church on July 27th, 1986.

It seems fitting that at the end of the series on Hope,

the final fruit of hope that we talk about is endurance because that's what will have to be true of you if you are to carry on with the implications of what we've said.

The text is verse 3, 1st Thessalonians 1.

And the particular phrase in verse 3 is that little phrase at the end the

endurance of hope I take that to mean that hope produces endurance or that endurance is the fruit of hope.

The reason I take it to mean that is because the other two phrases that come just

before it, the work of faith and the labor of love seem to have that same meaning. Wouldn't you agree that work of faith means

a work that flows from or comes from or is born of faith and a labor of love means a labor that is born out of love and comes from love and therefore

the endurance of hope is an endurance that comes from or is born of or is the fruit of hope. So I understand the phrase to mean

the endurance that we must have comes from hope. And the question that I

want to pose behind this connection this morning for you to keep there in the back of your minds as we probe the connection between hope and endurance is this. How do you keep on going in ministry, in a relationship,

in a job, in a disability? How do you keep on going? Year in, year out, decade in, decade out, when there are personal and relational and spiritual and financial obstacles that sometimes simply seem absolutely insurmountable.

How do you keep on going in the path of obedience to which God has called you?

When the limelight has shifted off of your ministry.

What does it take then?

It takes endurance.

...