Sermon Notes from 7/12/2025
Title: How To Endure?
Coming before you today, I feel like I’ve preached this message many times before. Endurance. I’m sure you’ve heard other pastors speak on it too. Endurance means to keep running the race. It carries the expectation of a reward at the end. Endure to achieve something, right?
But it’s not always that simple. It’s really hard to endure when you face setback after setback. When you’re hurting.
“Because you have kept my word of endurance, I will keep you from the hour of trial that is coming on the whole world to test the inhabitants of the earth.” Revelation 3:10 NRSVue
Revelation 3:10 makes a promise—not that God will remove us from the trial, but that He will carry us through it. That sounds powerful, but in the moment, it can feel hollow. I’ve been there.
How can I keep holding on to something I can’t touch, something that feels so distant, when the present feels like hell? How am I supposed to endure when everything in me is breaking?
In those moments, well-meaning verses can feel like a slap in the face. I’ve gotten angry before when someone quoted Scripture at me while I was barely holding it together. Sometimes, what we really need is for someone to just say, “I see your pain.”
Romans 12:15 tells us, “Rejoice with those who rejoice, weep with those who weep.” That’s not a command to fix people. It’s a call to show up. To sit in someone’s sorrow without judgment. To be present.
I’ve asked before which biblical figure you relate to. Some have said Job. We’ve all lived through a season of Job. I’ve taught on his story. Job lost everything. His friends said a lot of the wrong things—but their first response was something I deeply respect. In Job 2:11–13, they sat with him in silence for seven days because his grief was so great. Imagine someone doing that for you. No words, no advice. Just presence. That is a model for how we care for one another.
Maybe that’s how we endure. Maybe endurance is not pushing past pain but acknowledging it, facing it, and walking through it together.
Here’s how we begin:
- See it
- Name it
- Sit with it
- Respond with compassion—to others and to ourselves
Empathy is not optional. It is the heart of Jesus. Mercy and empathy are the way through. They are what make endurance possible.
We need to give each other room to feel, to process, to grieve, and to hope. That kind of love is radical.
Faith is radical. Trusting in God’s promises even when everything seems impossible is radical. Just like what Jesus did for us was radical. Can we do that too? Can we hold on when it feels hopeless? Can we endure together—not with empty words, but with real presence and radical love?
Let’s ask ourselves—and each other—how we can help one another endure.
There is a poem that speaks to today’s message that I want to leave you with:
Even Now, God is Faithful
Even now, God is faithful.
He always abides where you are.
Living among the hurts of your heart,
he heals wounds into testimony scars.Even now, God is faithful.
He cares about your fears.
Breathing peace into your spirit,
he brings calming strength to you here.Even now, God is faithful.
He fulfills his good plans.
Ordaining all things to have purpose,
his glory reigns and commands.Even now, God is faithful.
He forgives sins confessed.
Patient with his justice,
he longs for all to repent.Even now, God is faithful.
Forever, he protects and provides.
With unconditional love, he sent Jesus
to bear our sins and bridge the divide.Even now, God is
faithful,
never changing,
the great I AM.
Fulfilling every promise with
immeasurable grace,
he keeps you safe in
the palm of his hand.~Jamie Trunnel ©2021, ascripturedlife.com
Amen
-Pastor Alex