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When You Feel Like Giving Up-DON'T!
While having the opportunity to continue your education is an exciting one, it can also be filled with difficulties and challenges. Some of those challenges may be the day-to-day juggling of your other responsibilities with your studies. Others may be financial challenges. Yet others may be challenges to your faith. Whatever they may be, rest assured that God is in control. In Romans 11:29 (NKJV) it says, "For the gifts and the calling of God are irrevocable." If God has called you to this, He won't change his mind or revoke His calling on your life. Never give up! He will provide everything you need to fulfill His calling for your life and education.
During my studies at the university I ran into a lot of hostility towards my Christian beliefs. Many of my professors were Marxists, communists, feminists and just plain liberal ideologues. Although Galatians 6:9 (NKJV) tells us "not [to] grow weary while doing good, for in due season we shall reap if we do not lose heart," we sometimes do. After the hostility toward my Christian faith at community college and my mother's suicide, I was, I freely confess, growing weary. I had to battle all the way to the highest reaches of the university administration to get my money refunded from a course I dropped due to my objection to the sexually explicit and vulgar material that was required reading in the course. (Not to mention the offensive profanity used by the professor on a moment-by-moment basis!)
It only got worse when I enrolled in a course, Political Philosophy, which was required for my major. The professor used the Bible as a text in the course under the guise of looking at the political philosophy of ancient Jewish leaders; however, in all reality it seemed that the professor got a perverse pleasure at ridiculing God's Holy Word. As much as he enjoyed ridiculing God, he enjoyed ridiculing the only student in class who openly challenged his characterization of scripture: me! Early on in the course he began a Tuesday-Thursday ritual: he would dramatically walk into class and proclaim some outrageous, doctrinally false statement that had to do with Christianity or the Bible. Then he would proceed to look directly at me and say, "Well, Kerriél, what do you think about that?" My classmates became quite hostile because this weekly interaction became a debate between the professor and me, completely ignoring the other 100+ students. The good thing was that I knew I would be put on the spot each class period, so you better believe I was prepared. The bad thing was that I was getting so weary of the overt hostility. Each Tuesday and Thursday I would come home from class and discuss with my family what had transpired that day; what challenge he made against my faith in God. I kept proclaiming that I was going to drop the class and switch majors so I would not have to endure this ritual.
One particularly brutal day I finally made up my mind; I was going to drop the class. That day I was arguing with the Lord the entire class telling Him how I was fed up, trying to justify my desire to quit. The most wonderful thing happened, though. At the end of the class a young girl who sat at the very back of the lecture hall came to the front where I sat, kneeled down in front of me, placed her arms on my desk and exhaled loudly in total defeat. She said to me,"You're a Christian aren't you?" I told her yes, I was. She proceeded to explain to me how much she admired my courage for standing up to the professor like I did. She said she would sit there in her seat trying to think of something to say in response to his outrageous comments, but she would just become paralyzed with fear. She said she would get angry with herself and compare herself to her brother, whom she knew would think of something witty or clever to say in response. She was so discouraged, much more than I was. She thanked me for speaking the truth in love, not just to the professor, but to the entire class. She shared with me that all she could do was to continue to pray for me, pray that I would have the right words to say to refute the attack of the professor, but more importantly the attack by Satan.
I was so convicted! I was only thinking of my struggle, my desire to be free from the continual attack on my beliefs. Just at the moment I was ready to give up, God provided the encouragement I needed. But He also provided the knowledge that I had a greater responsibility, not just to this particular student, but perhaps to others too. That day the Lord taught me that we must persevere when times of trial come. It has been said that sometimes we, as believers, are the only Bible some people will ever read. When you feel like giving up, DON'T! You never know who may be watching and being uplifted by your struggles. God's purposes may be so much larger than simply your education. We must be faithful to the situations in which He allows us to be. Be of good courage.
"But if we hope for what we do not see, we eagerly wait for it with perseverance," Romans 8:25 (NKJV). Persevere, dear one, God is faithful and He doesn't want you to give up!
Copyright © 2008-2015 Kerriél Bailey, Esq.
Reader Comments...
| 2011-05-08 18:50:38 "Kerriel, God is Great! I just finished reading through your articles. What a gift! You are a bright and shining light for Christ. Today has been an amazing Mother's Day, and while rejoicing in my life as a mother and loving my family has filled my heart, my spirit was lifted by new friendship. Nothing God does is an accident! I was weary this week; feeling burdened by the loss of my own mother; wishing and hoping for a respite from my anger and pain...there you were! I am blessed beyond measure for the gift of meeting you today! God Bless you; new, sweet friend! Love," - Samantha |
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