Try Again

“...but we rejoice in our sufferings, knowing that suffering produces perseverance, and perseverance produces character, and character produces hope, and hope does not put us to shame.” - Romans 5:3-5

Not long before I turned five-year-old, my parents signed me up to play on my very first softball team. And because my dad was such a great parent, he would take me outside to the backyard almost every day and help me practice. He would throw me grounders, and I would have to scoop them up and throw them back to him. But when I was first starting out, a lot of times I would miss the ball. Or I would drop it when I tried to pick it up with my glove. I would get so frustrated whenever I messed up that I would start to cry. And then I would say four words that I’m sure my dad heard way too many times to even count.

“I can’t do it.”

After so many times of trying and failing, I would just want to give up, thinking that I was never going to get it right. Thankfully, my dad wouldn’t let me quit. Anytime I would say those four famous words, he would say, “Yes you can. Now let’s try again.” And he would throw me another grounder.

This is such a beautiful picture of how God is with us. So often after we’ve faced several failures or disappointments, we want to stop trying. We lose all sense of perseverance. We say, “I can’t do it.” But then there’s God, right there beside us, saying, “Yes you can. Now let’s try again.”

It is so important that we continue to persevere even when life doesn’t turn out the way we thought it would. Paul talks about this in Romans 5 when he says, “...but we rejoice in our sufferings, knowing that suffering produces perseverance, and perseverance produces character, and character produces hope, and hope does not put us to shame...” (Romans 5:3-5).

If life always worked out according to our expectations, then we would never have to persevere through anything. We’d never reap the benefits, the character building, and the hopefulness that comes from persevering through hard times. To put it bluntly, the only way we’re going to learn how to persevere is to face difficult circumstances. But we can be confident that as we are enduring those circumstances, we are building character, and that character produces hope. And hope is the best thing you can have when you’re dealing with failure, disappointment, and unmet expectations.

Hope is a gift from God, a gift that we often tend to ignore whenever life gets tough. We want to focus on how bad our current situation is, or how nothing seems to be going our way, or how we’re tired of being hurt and rejected. We only feel hopeful when things are going well and life is smooth sailing. But we can’t let our circumstances dictate how hopeful (or hopeless) we feel. Our hope must be solely based in our Heavenly Father. Nothing more. Nothing less. And if we can live our lives with that mentality, we can persevere through however many setbacks we may face along the way.

Maybe you’re in one of those seasons right now, where your circumstances are less than ideal. Maybe you’re facing one failed relationship after the other. Or you might keep getting rejection letters from the grad schools you’ve applied to. Or maybe doors seem to keep closing on your career. Regardless of what you’re facing, please hear me when I say this. Don’t give up. Don’t think you can’t do it. Because you can.

You CAN keep going.

You CAN persevere.

You CAN get back up.

And you can have hope, knowing that the Lord is right there with you the entire time, saying “You can do this. Let’s try again.”