S06E012, Mountains and Valleys, Endurance
In this episode of Endurance, the last of this season, Steven and Nathan are thinking about those bad days that we all have from time to time.
Endurance is your weekly spiritual workout, whether you think of yourself as a beginner, an intermediate, or advanced!
#GoDeeper
As Steven goes deeper into this week’s topic for Endurance, he begins with some examples of bad days. Jesus warned his disciples that they would face suffering in this world, but He also told them to be courageous because he had overcome the world.
Steven quotes a passage of Scripture from the book of James which commands us to rejoice when we face trails because they make us stronger. In addition to this, he makes a few interesting points. One of which is that whether you’re having a good day, a bad day or a worse day you should praise God. He also challenges us not to write off a day just because something bad happens.
#GoDo
Nathan and Steven discuss this week’s topic in greater detail:
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You don’t throw away an entire box of eggs because one has gone bad.
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Are you having a good day?
Check out this week’s episode to find out how to navigate the mountains and valleys of life.
Steven and Nathan
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Transcript
[00:00:00] Nathan: Hello, my name's Nathan, and this is Endurance your weekly spiritual workout. So get ready for some tough spiritual training. This week's episode is titled Mountains and Valleys. And basically we're looking at the idea of praising God in the good times and the bad times. Life is like a rollercoaster. We have a whole range of emotions, which we will go through at different times in life.
[00:00:48] Nathan: Not every day is the same. We don't always feel good. We'll have bad days. We'll have times that we feel down and depressed, times that we feel extremely excited and joyful. But either way, [00:01:00] we need to make sure that we praise God, that we thank him because he is just as good and he never changes, even though we do, even though our circumstances do, even though our emotions do. They do change.
[00:01:12] Nathan: So Steven's gonna be along in a moment to explain this to us, to talk about how we, how we have thankfulness, how we praise God regardless of our circumstances. Sit back and enjoy
[00:01:26] Nathan: Jesus didn't bear the weight of all your mistakes to leave you carrying life's stresses alone. #speaktruth.
[00:01:41] Andy B: Two minutes a day can change your world and in Just a Thought, that's kind of what I do. Because I take the ordinary moments of life and think, how can this apply to faith, to life, to moving through this world with people around us? How can a tiny spider or the handle of a [00:02:00] microwaveable rice pot affect our life? And how can it help us learn something about ourselves and the world around us?
[00:02:06] Andy B: So here's what I thought. Have you ever wondered what red flags, shredded tyres, persistence, holes, dishwater tea, rice maker handles, tape measures, giant spiders that are not and stripy fabric all have in common well you are not alone, and they actually link wonderfully together, as you will find out in the book.
[00:02:24] Andy B: I'm just gonna read this out from Reverend Johnny Douglas, who wrote the forward very kindly for me .Just a Thought is a collection of pregnant brain thoughts, but it's so much more than this. Andy reflects a determination, character and grasp of God in his loving purpose and wise ways.
[00:02:39] Andy B: As we go through life, there's all these things that go on. There's all these exciting things of life, but actually it's the ordinary and it's the normal from which we can learn so, so much. Each little chapter will take you a few moments to read, but hopefully will get your brain working and ready for the day. Just a Thought.[00:03:00]
[00:03:18] Steven: So this is Endurance Go Deeper, where we go deeper into the subject. And as Nathan says, we're talking about mountains and valleys. Kind of good days and bad days, and how we praise God no matter what our circumstances are. And this is in fact the the sort of season finale for the sixth series of endurance.
[00:03:35] Steven: We've been going for, I dunno how many episodes but we've done so many of these, and this is, I suppose I should sort of mark it. Shouldn't I really? Anyway, we haven't planned for anything like that. I didn't even plan to say that, but there we are.
[00:03:48] Steven: So we're gonna face good days and we're gonna face bad days. Sometimes it can feel like we face bad days, and then even worse days or worse days, and then even worse days, we can have bad days, we're gonna have them. In fact, [00:04:00] Jesus warned us that we would face bad days. He says in, oops.
[00:04:08] Steven: John 6, all right. In John 16:33, he says, I have told you these things so that you may have peace in me. You will have suffering in this world. Be courageous. I have conquered the world. So, we will have suffering in this world. We will have face hardships. We will have bad days. We can be encouraged because Jesus has conquered the world.
[00:04:31] Steven: He conquered sin and death, and more than that, James 1:2-4 says, Consider it a great joy, my brothers and sisters, whenever you experience various trials, because you know that the testing of your faith produces endurance and let endurance have its full effect, so you may be mature and complete lacking nothing. So bad days will make us stronger people.
[00:04:51] Steven: When we get through a bad day as a Christian should, so, you know, not acting out of anger, keeping calm, going to God in prayer when we need to. [00:05:00] When we do all those things, we're getting stronger as a Christian, and even if we just get through it without sinning, that's a bonus or with less sin than normal.
[00:05:12] Steven: So I have an example over the last six or seven weeks I've been suffering from some sort of illness. I've been suffering from nausea and stuff like that. Been sick a few times and I've had some bad days and I've had some really bad days, but I've also had plenty of good days. And it's important to praise God in those good days, to be thankful for those good days.
[00:05:33] Steven: And it's also important to be thankful to God in the bad days. Even when it's a bad day, we should go to God and we should thank him for all that he's done for us, for all that we do have, and praise him anyway, even though it's a bad day. So I'm mostly talking about days that are bad that we can't do anything about.
[00:05:49] Steven: Some days are just bad. There's nothing you can do. You have a rough night's sleep, you suddenly wake up late and you gotta get to work or what have you, and you miss breakfast and one thing [00:06:00] just snowballs into the other. You spill your coffee, tea, whatever, and you're just gonna have those days, aren't you?
[00:06:05] Steven: I mean, who hasn't had a day like that when it just goes bad thing after bad thing and they happen. There's nothing we can do about 'em. We can, however, do something about our attitude, how we respond to those bad days, and that's what we're talking about here. We're gonna have bad days in exercise. You might have, a go for a run.
[00:06:24] Steven: You've eaten all the right foods, you've had a good night rest, but whatever reason, you're just weak. And there could be so many different things that could make you weak, lack of motivation, whatever. But you just have to accept, we're always come back this accepting what is and then knowing what you can do about it.
[00:06:38] Steven: Cuz there are gonna be bad days that are gonna come at us and there's something we can do about it. So like a bad thing might happen during a day, but that doesn't make it a bad day. You can have a really good day with one thing that goes wrong. Don't let that one thing that goes wrong ruin the entire day or week, or month, year.
[00:06:54] Steven: We have to keep things in proportion. What goes wrong goes wrong, [00:07:00] but it's not the end of the world. But let's talk about those days that we can affect those days, that we can stop from being bad. In fact, I just said that. Never mind, never mind, I told you I was having rough few weeks.
[00:07:18] Steven: Yeah, we're gonna have bad days, we're gonna have good days. But this is encouraging. Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil, for you are with me, you're rod and your staff, they comfort me. So even through the bad days, God is there with us. Even in those valleys, he is there with us through the valley of the shadow of death is a pretty bad valley.
[00:07:36] Steven: And even through that, God is with us and we should praise him. Whether it's a good day or it's a bad day. That is mountains and valleys.
[00:07:54] Jo: Family prayer time. So what is it, Peter?
[00:07:57] Peter: It's where, me and Mum well, [00:08:00] Jo we look at, we find a subject for a, prayer, so maybe Psalm or a country. And then we pray as we feel led. And bob's your uncle.
[00:08:09] Jo: Excellent. Yeah, absolutely. It's family prayer time, me and Pete. Pray. Pray together and we'd like you to pray as a family. So join us for family prayer time.
[00:08:38] Nathan: Okay, so here we are for the last segment of Endurance, where Steven and I discuss the topic in greater detail, and more importantly, I asked him some tricky questions and take the mick out of him
[00:08:50] Steven: And, what do I do?
[00:08:53] Nathan: Well, you just, you just smile and wave.
[00:08:55] Steven: Smile and wave.
[00:08:56] Nathan: Smile and wed,
[00:08:56] Steven: Yep.
[00:08:57] Nathan: Okay. So I thought you made a good point. Well [00:09:00] actually, there were lots of good points, but one that stood out for me was where you mentioned that one bad incident doesn't make the entire day bad.
[00:09:09] Steven: Hmm.
[00:09:09] Nathan: And that's really important. Just because we have one bad instant. Often we have a tendency as humans to blow things outta proportion. So for example, we go to the shop and we can't find our favourite sandwich for lunch.
[00:09:24] Nathan: Now we think, oh no, it's the end of the world. I can't find my favourite sandwich. And really, that's rather trivial.
[00:09:31] Steven: Yeah, we do tend to sort of write off days when something bad happens, you know, when you can't find that sandwich in the shop.
[00:09:36] Nathan: Exactly.
[00:09:36] Steven: And, and the world ends and we just write off the day. But I think you can get past,
[00:09:40] Nathan: Or you're waiting for an email and it doesn't arrive.
[00:09:43] Steven: Yeah. I think you can get past these first world problems, can't we? Yes.
[00:09:47] Nathan: Yeah, they are.
[00:09:47] Steven: But also proper bad problems, more than just losing a sandwich or what have you? Real problems like I don't know banging your head, having a really rough night's sleep, genuine problems, a short trip to A&E or something [00:10:00] that do kind of ruin the day, but you mustn't write the day off, you could still have plenty of good,
[00:10:05] Nathan: Experiences.
[00:10:06] Steven: Yeah.
[00:10:07] Steven: And you can learn lots from it and all.
[00:10:08] Nathan: Yeah. I mean, you don't throw away an entire box of eggs just because one egg has gone bad.
[00:10:14] Steven: And there's no use crying over spilt milk.
[00:10:16] Nathan: Exactly. That's an entire different kettle fish though. Oh, sorry. Anyhow, I was wondering though, cuz we're talking about good days and bad days.
[00:10:27] Nathan: How's your day?
[00:10:30] Steven: Nah.
[00:10:31] Nathan: Mediocre. So you're not really in on a mountain or in a valley, you're just. Going along a mountain ridge?
[00:10:38] Steven: Well, I'm a halfway up the mountain kind of person, not halfway down.
[00:10:43] Nathan: All right, I see. Yeah. Right. So you've got your back to the valley.
[00:10:48] Steven: I'd like to think so.
[00:10:50] Nathan: Just mind you, don't trip over and fall down again.
[00:10:54] Nathan: Yeah,
[00:10:55] Steven: yeah. Well, yeah. But even if you do trip over, you don't wanna just write that [00:11:00] day off. Exactly.
[00:11:01] Nathan: You can get back up again, which actually we talked about last week. When you fall and stumble, actually no that was the week before. When you, when you stumble or fall, you can get back up again.
[00:11:11] Steven: Yep.
[00:11:12] Nathan: Yeah.
[00:11:12] Steven: I'm sure there's a song about that
[00:11:14] Nathan: probably.
[00:11:15] Nathan: Anyway, so yeah. I suppose to summarise, we're gonna have mountains and valleys in life. We're going to have good days and bad days. But let's remember that regardless of our circumstances, And even they think even if everything's going badly, even if, even if everything's gone wrong and they are some genuine problems, don't forget to praise God anyway because he's still good.
[00:11:38] Nathan: And those bad incidents, you know, they can't be blamed on God it's the result of, of the world we live in, of, of other people. So yeah, we need to praise God in every circumstance.[00:12:00]
Steven Berry, 09/04/2023