Tip of My Iceberg

He faithfully and deliberately tried every day he stayed with us. He persevered, even when he was unsuccessful. His failures didn’t deter him from trying.

Finally, on the morning they were to leave, Ward caught a lizard. He was so pleased with himself as he showed it to me and his mom; his smile said it all.

What impressed me wasn’t his catch of the day; goodness knows, we have lizards under every rock and leaf here in Florida. I was inspired by his perseverance and persistence. I know me; I’d have given up after day one. But each day, every time he went outdoors, he tried to catch one of those slippery little buggers.

Until he did.

I know I don’t have that kind of personal discipline. Follow-through for me has been a challenge my whole life. If I’m discouraged or bored, I quit.

When my oldest was born, the novelty at the time was needlepoint. Tiny stitches in tiny holes. I thought it would be cute to stitch the numbers one through ten made of animals and frame it. I made it through the first number, a monkey hanging somehow from a tree shaped as a one. My baby was born; the needlepoint wasn’t finished.

Two and a half years later, when the second child came along, I brought it out and made it through half the number two, an elephant with its trunk wound around a stick to look like a two. Didn’t finish.

When the third child came along, I threw the thing away. The frustration of not finishing was greater than any joy a finished product would have provided.

Culturally, I’m not that far off today. Finishing well is a challenge. Our attention span has decreased steadily since the days of Sesame Street, when the storyline changed every three minutes. Now with social media coming in steadily at all hours of the day, we don’t want to wait for anything. Read and scroll. Repeat. Not only has our attention span dwindled, but our valuing of doing things well has diminished, too.

Finishing well has been a challenge since the beginning of time. A particular story that has always fascinated me is that of Noah. He lived during a time when “The LORD observed the extent of human wickedness on the earth, and He saw that everything they thought or imagined was consistently and totally evil.” Genesis 6:6. God was sorry He had made man. But Noah had found favor in God’s eyes because of his obedience. God told him to build an ark because He was going to bring a massive amount of rain to the land, and this was where he and his immediate family would ride out the flood with two of every kind of animal on earth.

Almost every culture on earth has a flood narrative in its history. Genesis 2:5-6 describes how there had been no rain up until this time, so building a boat in the middle of the land with no understanding of what a storm was took a remarkable amount of faith. People mocked Noah and his sons as they worked for about 75 years to build this huge boat.

Noah never wavered in his persistence, even though he didn’t understand fully what was being asked of him.

When the rains came and the earth was flooded, the only ones left alive were those in the ark. His persistence and faith paid off, despite the mocking of neighbors.

Ward showed a modicum of that perseverance, not quitting even though he was discouraged.

God gives us the patience we need to persevere.

What does it take to make you quit?