A Journey Towards Joyful Grit
By Stephen Ward, Resonate Spokane
The idea of “Joyful Grit” has truly been a journey for me. As a young believer, I mistakenly thought that if I obediently followed after Jesus with my life, then I would be protected from difficulties in life. I even remember hearing teaching that seemed to support this idea from some Christian leaders. Several life experiences began to poke holes in this logic and forced me to grow in my understanding of God’s blessing in the midst of hardship.
During my freshman year of college, I experienced the loss of my grandfather, my uncle, and my pastor. These experiences rocked my view of God’s goodness and what it might mean to follow Jesus through painful experiences. I felt like quitting college and even contemplated whether ministry was something that I wanted to pursue. I believe now that God was using these difficult experiences to test my faith as James mentions in James 1:2-4. He stated, “Consider it pure joy, my brothers and sisters, whenever you face trials of many kinds, because you know that the testing of your faith produces perseverance. Let perseverance finish its work so that you may be mature and complete, not lacking anything.” God continued to patiently teach me to find my joy in Him in both the “easy” and “hard” experiences.
“Grit” or perseverance as James calls it was still a concept that I really didn’t understand. It was still difficult for me to see how hardships were helping me grow in perseverance and maturity. Sometimes it is easier to see God’s work in us when we look back over past experiences. I now see God was helping me begin to trust Him as my faith became my own rather than something I believed because my parents had believed.
I began to really grow in my understanding of “joyful grit” when Karis and I moved to Malawi, Africa, as missionaries. Over time, as we faced hardships, I began to see the process of my faithful steps of obedience, combined with God’s power working in me, progressively produce a steady growth of endurance and maturity or “grit.” We faced issues of safety, language learning, health, culture shock, the prospect of almost losing our newborn son to malaria, and ongoing spiritual warfare. I began to more fully understand Paul’s teaching in Romans 5:3-5, when he states, “Not only so, but we also glory in our sufferings, because we know that suffering produces perseverance; perseverance, character; and character, hope. And hope does not put us to shame, because God’s love has been poured out into our hearts through the Holy Spirit, who has been given to us.” Progressively, as we faithfully took steps of obedience, God gave us joy and produced more trust in Him and the maturity to follow Him, even in our darkest days. I was increasingly learning that “joyful grit” is a process that grows and matures over time. It isn’t something I can produce on my own strength, so I can’t take credit for it; but it is something that my disobedience can hinder, so I need to take responsibility for it.
My “joyful grit” would again be tested in my life. Over eight years ago, my family and a small band of individuals moved to Spokane to follow God’s call to plant a church. There was such a mix of emotions leaving friends and ministry behind to go and start something from scratch in a part of America that I was very unfamiliar with. We were excited and anxious all at the same time.
Within the first two years, we experienced such a range of highs and lows that it really stretched my personal struggle to trust God with people, our church, and my joy. We saw many people come into a new relationship with Christ and take major steps of faith and we saw God grow our church body rapidly during this season. At the same time, we saw staff members fall into sin and leave our church and we were accused of mishandling church funds by a member of the church, and had to go through the Northwest Baptist Convention to have them do an audit of our financial books to prove nothing had been done wrong. My wife Karis and I went to a local Christian counselor to get some help processing the stress and weight we were feeling. In our first session, he looked at me and said, “You're a pastor, I can’t tell you anything that you don’t already know from God’s Word.” Obviously, this was extremely discouraging and caused me to make the horrible decision to quit seeking further help. I went through a period of feeling inadequate in my spiritual life, unable to process the tremendous stress I was feeling. At the same time I was leading a staff trying to balance the amazing activity of God and the spiritual warfare we were facing. That decision not to reach out for help was an act of disobedience that I believe caused me to miss seeing the best in my marriage, my family, and my ability to live out God’s joy with those around me the way He intended. Through my disobedience, I allowed the enemy to continue to rob me of peace and joy.
Even as difficulties continued, God blessed us and Pinnacle Church was able to start two new campuses during our time in Spokane. We watched God work in our children's lives and had the privilege of baptizing them and seeing them take steps in their faith. God was continuing to teach me that even during difficult circumstances, He was still at work, still bringing people into a relationship with Himself, and still desiring to use broken people willing to faithfully follow Him and invest in others.
A few years ago, the moral failures of both of the two remaining pastors (besides myself) at our original campus came to be exposed and eventually led to the closing of Pinnacle Church. This was such a difficult time for me as I attempted to process everything that had happened: the loss of personal friendships and the loss of a ministry. There were seasons of anger, hopelessness, and depression. God led me to Keith Evans who began to mentor me by phone weekly. Karis and I also began seeing a Christian counselor (a different one) to help us process our pain and grief.
As I look back over my life, I see a complex journey with the Lord. God used some difficult experiences to continue to show me clearly that I haven’t yet arrived in my ability to daily trust Him and find my joy in Him alone. Paul’s words in Philippians 3:12-14 really challenged me. “Not that I have already obtained all this, or have already arrived at my goal, but I press on to take hold of that for which Christ Jesus took hold of me. Brothers and sisters, I do not consider myself yet to have taken hold of it.” It is a daily battle. “But one thing I do: Forgetting what is behind and straining toward what is ahead, I press on toward the goal to win the prize for which God has called me heavenward in Christ Jesus.” God has used His Word, His presence through prayer, and His encouragement and challenge through fellow brothers in Christ to spur me on to continue taking daily steps of obedience even in the face of hardship and difficulty. He still uses my obedient steps to grow His “joyful grit” in me and through me. Paul shows us clearly that God uses our suffering to produce perseverance (grit) that strengthens our character and that ultimately leads to a more centered hope in Christ. This pattern is what Paul has in mind when he challenges the church in Philippines 4:1 to “stand firm in the Lord.” It is why I desire to keep learning more every day to grow in “joyful grit” not from what I do, but through my relationship with Christ and through His mission for my life even when it’s painful. Let’s challenge each other to keep pursuing Christ and His mission even through pain and hardship so that God will produce His “joyful grit” in us!
