Or, There Is No Time to Faint
Scripture: 2 Thessalonians 3:13
Date: August 17, 2025
Speaker: Sean Higgins
“Do not grow weary in doing good.” This is Paul’s command in 2 Thessalonians 3:13. Christians are not allowed to collapse.
As we considered last Lord’s Day, the word engkakeo occurs six times in the New Testament and is translated either as “grow weary” or “lose heart.” Always this is what we’re not to do. The idea behind the word is to do badly in a situation. Flexibility is one thing; crumpling into a puddle is prohibited.
There are four arenas in which we are called to keep heart:
So, if at the heart of losing heart is a failure in the situation, what went wrong? And if we get this right, here is where we scratch at the how we can not grow weary.
Again, the temptation to lose heart is as necessary as the imperative to not to. You must not quit, and also you must know what it’s like to want to quit. When you’re ready to walk away—what do you need? You need to recognize four parts of reality.
These are four axioms, meaning established truths that are self-evidently true. They are as true as the law of gravity. God made the world one way not another. God made the world to work one way not another. You do not make these things true, but if you do not identify and acknowledge them then your worldview is off.
I’m emphasizing this because, while we do need faith to see and hold onto these truths, faith is not in an imaginary object. Our faith is in the deeper magic (think of how Aslan not just described it, but depended on it), the principles by which God governs the cosmos. It’s not just that keeping heart is God’s will, we keep heart because of God’s will.
The four axioms undergird the four arenas.
In the parable Jesus told in Luke 18 about the persistent widow pestering the unjust judge, Jesus does not try to prove anything. He compares His Father to a self-absorbed and reluctant judge in order to highlight His Father’s character. We don’t pray to make God listen, we pray because He is the listening God.
The argument is a lesser-to-greater, an “if this, then how much more so this.” But again, this assumes the greater is true.
Jesus told the parable “to the effect that they ought always to pray and not lose heart” (Luke 18:1), and how He effects this is by building up their faith/their heart in who the God of sovereignty and justice and time and attention is.
If we think that God doesn’t care, we are saying that we do not accept who He told us He is. If we think God won’t act, it exposes our wrong theology. The reality is, God wills solutions through supplications. To deny this reality is pride. Those who keep heart in supplication remember what is true.
Christians are correct to resist pragmatism, that is, we shouldn’t do whatever gets results. But in some cases this has become a justification to “let go and let God.” Pragmatism does get results, but it sows to the flesh. The opposite is sowing to the Spirit, and it too guarantees results.
Paul said, “in due season we will reap, if we do not give up” (Galatians 6:9). This statement is not a motivational cat poster. It is part of the deep magic. It is realty, which we can deny but which we cannot disrupt. Paul argues from it; it is the basis on which (“for”) we ought not grow weary of going good. Faithful sowing brings fruitful seasons because God is not mocked.
The “Creator of the ends of the earth” (Isaiah 40:28) is indefatigable in this. He doesn’t grow weary of turning seeds into fruit. God can create out of nothing, but He does not violate math on earth. Grace gives what we don’t deserve, but grace never multiplies by zero. Burying your talent is not the same as sowing your talent.
Included in this axiom is the principle of growth, and even of compounding interest. Of all the options for how the world could work, God loves both being unto becoming, when the immature develop maturity, for humans to start as babies, for Time and Effort to have their place. Sweat equity is part of the cosmos.
While we could say that laziness is a denial of reality, laziness always works, as in laziness is a cause with it’s own guaranteed effects. Cause and effect is an inescapable reality. Everything is a kind of seed, even hoarding your seed. To deny your agency is laziness. Those who keep heart in sowing expect a harvest because God says to expect it.
God is the listening God, and God is the merciful God. Jonah was big mad about it (Jonah 4:1-4). He knew that if he told the truth in Nineveh that God would grant repentance and then accept that repentance. “I knew that you are a gracious God and merciful, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love, and relenting from disaster.”
Paul endured by this axiom. “Having this ministry by the mercy of God, we do not lose heart” (2 Corinthians 4:1). The ministry is a speaking ministry, proclaiming the good news of Jesus Christ as Lord. Of course, that reality is veiled to those who are perishing. But in our world blindness isn’t sovereign, God’s mercy is sovereign over blindness.
”For God, who said, ‘Let light shine out of darkness,’ has shone in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ” (2 Corinthians 4:6). The reality works through embodied ministry as well. “So death is at work in us, but life in you” (2 Corinthians 4:12). God makes it happen. His mercy saves and transforms. We can no more stop God’s mercy than we can stop God’s existence. (See also Exodus 33:17-23, especially verse 19, which is quoted in Romans 9:15.)
If we do not speak it is because we do not believe (see 2 Corinthians 4:15). To attribute to God’s mercy the weakness of our mercy, or to act as if others don’t deserve mercy, is short-sighted and self-righteous respectively. Instead, Christians, keep heart! God’s eternal purpose has been to glorify Himself through blessing rebels into the joys of a life of submission.
Both 2 Corinthians 4:17 and Ephesians 3:13 share a trifecta: both verses have the same word for “affliction” (even though translated as “suffering” by ESV in Ephesians), the same for “glory,” and the same for “don’t lose heart.” The word affliction refers to trouble that inflicts distress.
It’s the same word that goes to work in Romans 5.
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 5:2b–5 ESV)
Pressure produces endurance, endurance shapes character, character fuels hope, and hope ends in no shame. In other words, the end of the troubles is glory. We know the reality that fire is hot and light is bright but somehow we think that glory is easy. God highly exalted Christ Jesus after Christ Jesus humbled Himself by becoming obedient to the point of death (Philippians 2:8-9). So “have this mind among yourselves” (Philippians 2:5).
Charles Spurgeon said in his sermon “Holding Fast the Faith”:
“Doth that man love his Lord who would be willing to see Jesus wearing a crown of thorns, while for himself he craves a chaplet of laurel (an evergreen garland)? Shall Jesus ascend to his throne by the cross, and do we expect to be carried there on the shoulders of applauding crowds? Be not so vain in your imagination.”
Being awesome doesn’t feel awesome, and being transformed into glory usually doesn’t feel glorious. Not yet. Ah, but don’t lose heart! The process of being tempted to lose heart is when your heart has reason to rejoice in hope of the glory of God! Trouble is no time for self-pity. Those who know the plot keep heart.
Having a difficult season in your marriage? Wondering if your kid will get through this phase? Frequent antagonism from an unbelieving co-worker, neighbor, extended family member? Don’t grow weary. These axioms aren’t wishful thinking.
There is no time to faint because God wills answers, God wills fruit, God wills mercy, and God wills glory. Here is a weltanschauung without wobbles. So Christian, keep heart!
Brothers, do not grow weary in your praying, in your seed sowing, in your gospel ministering, in your trouble enduring. Believe what is true, that God answers, God gives fruit in season, God delights to show mercy, God is preparing you for an eternal weight of glory. Keep heart! (And keep company!)
Now may the Lord of peace himself give you peace at all times in every way. The Lord be with you all. (2 Thessalonians 3:16 ESV)