This summer has been and continues to be a challenging one. I don’t intend to bemoan my circumstances. Neither am I pleading for a reprieve from the arrayed struggles. I’m simply relaying that I do not expect to look back on the summer of 2023 with any measure of fondness. It has been busier than busy, sometimes crueler than cruel, and occasionally sprinkled with some enjoyably restful moments. Our time together in Florida was one. Taking Evelyn to see a NASCAR race was another. In between, far too many negatives filled the gaps.

As I said, I don’t mean to complain. Complaining accomplishes nothing. Muscle through and do; that’s more my way. Complaining invites excuses and accepts defeat. Ask Jennifer. I don’t accept defeat too well, but mostly because there almost always seems to be a way to succeed. You just need to find it. The adage rings true that you can either be a part of the problem or a part of the solution.

Part of acknowledging any challenging situation means admitting to what’s really going on behind the scenes in this world. Sin is a very real thing, and it has infected everything. I should not be surprised when the season I look forward to more than any other becomes something to endure rather than enjoy. Sin will do that. God certainly doesn’t promise immunity from tragedy to His Christians—at least not in the way the name-it-and-claim-it charlatans of this world suggest.

On the contrary, He assures us we’ll experience trouble. Jesus said as much to His disciples, saying, “In the world you will have tribulation” (John 16:23). But He didn’t end His words there. He continued, “But take heart; I have overcome the world.” Here the Lord promises His care. He promises to give us what we need to endure. Saint Paul echoed the same, writing, “God is faithful…he will provide the way of escape, that you may be able to endure it” (1 Corinthians 10:13).

While He gives what’s necessary to each believer as He knows best, as you can see, there’s something He sets before the whole world: the Gospel—absolute hope through faith in Christ and the promise of eternal rest apart from sin’s terrifying grip. That hope is endurance’s fuel. Interestingly, Christian endurance produces some pretty neat behaviors. For example, in times of trouble, when I discover myself stretched to my emotional extremities, I become attuned to the humor in seemingly humorless things. Just this morning, my backpack on my shoulder, my rolling bag in one hand, and a cup of coffee and my keys in the other, I attempted to use my foot to open my office door only to lose my balance and stumble forehead-first into its solid oaken barrier.

It hurt. How I managed to fumble like that, I don’t know. Still, I laughed because it was ridiculously funny.

Over the years, I’ve come to realize that the man who can laugh at whatever befalls him demonstrates a type of lordship over this world. From the Christian perspective, he proves a Job-like verve capable of saying, “The Lord gave, and the Lord has taken away; blessed be the name of the Lord” (Job 1:21). He can speak along with King David who wrote so daringly, “The Lord is my light and my salvation; whom shall I fear? The Lord is the stronghold of my life; of whom shall I be afraid? (Psalm 27:1). He can be at peace because he “is not afraid of bad news; his heart is firm, trusting in the Lord (Psalm 112:7). He’s already asked and answered himself, “What can flesh do to me?” (Psalm 56:4).

Nothing. Everything sin has corroded is passing away. “Behold,” the Lord said, “I am making all things new” (Revelation 21:5).

With this trustworthy Word from our gracious Savior, bad news is a toothless beastie, tragedy is a pinprick, catastrophe is a mouse’s shadow, and heartbreak is a wound needing little more than a Band-aid. All this is true because, as Saint Paul wrote so plainly, we are justified before God by faith in Jesus Christ (Romans 5:1). The endgame has already played out on Calvary’s cross. Now, everything is endurable by the power of the Holy Spirit at work within us. I’d say, maybe even laughable. Paul explains:

“Therefore, since we have been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ. Through him we have also obtained access by faith into this grace in which we stand, and we rejoice in hope of the glory of God. Not only that, but we rejoice in our sufferings, knowing that suffering produces endurance, and endurance produces character, and character produces hope, and hope does not put us to shame, because God’s love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit who has been given to us” (Romans 5:1-5).

In conclusion, please don’t think I’m making light of anything you might be enduring right now. I’m not. And neither is our Lord. I’m merely setting a point of origin for steering into all of it. You have hope. God said so.