How to live without losing heart

We all tend to loose heart when we hit some roadblocks of life, I have gone thru this many times in my life, I am sure many of you have your share of experience. why do we lose heart ? When I was meditating 2 Corinth 4:1-4. Paul gives interesting advice on how not to lose heart, it can be a great spiritual advice for many of us to reexamine our life and learn from Paul’s life.

Symptoms of why we loose heart ?

Prayerlessness

'Then Jesus told his disciples a parable to show them that they should always pray and not give up. ' Luke 18:1

The Context of the verse in Luke 18:1 is, Jesus talks to his disciples of a widow who kept coming for a plea with persistent ask. Jesus says “they should always pray and not give up.”

• Prayer is the symptom of a person depending upon God, and prayerlessness is a symptom of a person who has stopped depending upon God.

• Most of us turn to our own self when we have challenges in life or when we loose heart, we don’t turn to Prayer.

• When life overwhelms us, and circumstances gets our eyes off Jesus, and we go back trying to figure out everything on our own, try for solutions with known people / own our ability and stop depending on Christ thats the point we loose heart and get low.

We grow impatient

'Let us not become weary in doing good, for at the proper time we will reap a harvest if we do not give up. ' Galatians 6:9

• We want instant results on what we expect, as the world we live has raised our expectations on every thing, we have no patience to wait for things, same is true spiritually as well

• We do a lot of things based on what God directs us to do, but God has certain time and season for every thing to make his plans come to light, We grow impatient and start to loose heart as God is not doing his work

• What Paul says (Read Galatians 6:7-9). Make the right choices of life, sow in the field with the Spirit leading you and you saying yes to Christ. But not only that, you reap more than you sow. Every time you plant seed (seed here refers to life events that God plans for you in your life) you’re going to get more than you planted. When you reap you will reap a bounty full based on God’s timing.

Growing undisciplined

'For even when we were with you, we gave you this rule: “The one who is unwilling to work shall not eat.” We hear that some among you are idle and disruptive. They are not busy; they are busybodies. Such people we command and urge in the Lord Jesus Christ to settle down and earn the food they eat. ' 2 Thessalonians 3:10-12

• God created this world for us to work and eat the fruits of labour, many of us want to take short cuts, as “No Work” and only the fruits of labour, We tend to loose heart and complain to God that we have not got what we desired without we doing the work God is asking us to do

• Paul gives the rule for the Thessalonia church “The one who is unwilling to work shall not eat.”, but in actuals they were “They are not busy; they are busybodies.”

• Busybodies - Instead of doing the work you are asked to, you are interfering in other peoples job. Some people advising others or turn to Gossip and spend time talking about others wasting the time that God wants us to do.

• This is one reason we loose heart, we spend too much time meddling into others business which is not our job that Jesus asked us to do. This is the undisciplined behaviour that Paul is talking.

Lose sight of future hope

'Therefore we do not lose heart. Though outwardly we are wasting away, yet inwardly we are being renewed day by day. ' 2 Corinthians 4:16

• In the above verse, What Paul is saying here is outwardly you may feel you are struggling, but the struggles what you go through is strengthening you in your spiritual life (thats what he refers “inwardly”) day by day

• Don’t look at your life of what you go thru in the world, your life is not on what you see here in the world, it’s going to continue for eternity. So don’t loose heart with what you see and fret about it.

Secrets of not losing Heart

We can learn a great deal from Paul’s life, he has gone thru so much of struggles in his life, half of his life he spent in prison and many theologians say most time he lived a low life but his spirit was high, there are few secrets that he shares when he speaks to the Corinth church

Paul did not lose heart because he was grateful for his ministry

'Therefore, since through God’s mercy we have this ministry, we do not lose heart. ' 2 Corinthians 4:1

• Paul did not lose heart because he was grateful for his ministry. Paul’s ministry, Paul’s message were all given by the grace and the mercy of God. His ministry was a gift out of the very loving heart of God and he didn’t deserve it. Thats what Paul refers to in 2 Corinth 4:1.

• Go back to 2 Corinthians 2:12 he says “The Lord had Opened a door for me” 'Now when I went to Troas to preach the gospel of Christ and found that the Lord had opened a door for me, ' 2 Corinthians 2:12 God opens the door for him, the door refers to his ministry which he received from God

• When you realize that God gave you the ministry or the things what you have, then you realize that what God initiates God sustains. you are not going to lose heart. This comes from the attitude of gratitude from the heart and your heart will not loose as it relies on God as the source.

Paul did not lose heart because he was careful about his manner

'Rather, we have renounced secret and shameful ways; we do not use deception, nor do we distort the word of God. On the contrary, by setting forth the truth plainly we commend ourselves to everyone’s conscience in the sight of God. ' 2 Corinthians 4:2

• Corinth was filled with lot of false teachers and prophets, Paul says he did not use any of the deception technique of them, what he has from his ministry is from God.

• See how Paul kept from losing heart. It was all Christ in him, but there was an attitude of gratitude in him, He was grateful for his ministry. He saw the ministry as a privilege; he didn’t see it as a job. He saw it as an awesome privilege to serve God, he realizes that he did not deserve that privilege, but in that gratefulness caused him to be careful, careful in the manner in which he went about that ministry because he was up against others who were doing it a fleshly way. And he wanted to make sure God was honoured and that he did what he did in the sight of God.

• He was Godly Sincere to what he was called , he lived what he wrote in 'Now this is our boast: Our conscience testifies that we have conducted ourselves in the world, and especially in our relations with you, with integrity and godly sincerity. We have done so, relying not on worldly wisdom but on God’s grace. ' 2 Corinthians 1:12

Paul did not lose heart because he was humble about his message

'For what we preach is not ourselves, but Jesus Christ as Lord, and ourselves as your servants for Jesus’ sake. ' 2 Corinthians 4:5

• He was humble about his message, he had great humility, He wasn’t in any way thinking more highly of himself than he ought to think “what we preach is not ourselves”

• Paul exhibited the attitude of gratitude, The fact that Paul had received the ministry from Christ, the fact that he didn’t deserve it, the fact that he saw the false ministries all around him; it just caused him to be humble about his message. He didn’t have people walk away impressed with Paul. He had people walk away impressed with who Jesus is and what Jesus wanted to do in their lives.

Summary

Check to see if you have these four symptoms and situations of life thats making you loose hope

1. We lead a Prayerlessness life

2. We grow impatient to God’s plans and we tell God we need it immediately.

3. We grow undisciplined - not to the work God called us to do, instead do what is not our work to do

4. We loose sight of future - We loose the sight of what God has planned and look at what’s immediate to us

Secrets from Paul’s ministry that we can learn not to loose hope

1. Paul’s attitude of gratitude, Let’s emulate the same, what you have is from God, he will sustain you and take care of you.

2. Paul’s attitude of Godly Sincerity to glorify God when things around him is not that great

3. Paul’s attitude of Humility to honour God more, than to show off what he is doing more.