Why we should never quit:
The most exciting parts of a year are the last two weeks of December and the first two of January. People are filled with excitement of the New Year’s opportunities and prospects. New resolutions appear more practicable than all the others broken over the years.
Equally so, new ventures and new businesses are exciting. The start of a new business, new-political regime, a new church approached with great hope, excitement and expectation. Attend a wedding and even the most-unhappily-married will sing jubilant songs to the new couple. And to the new couple – hope, joy, optimism is written all over.
Soon however reality sets in and many of those dreams and programs are abandoned as people quit. It is said, winners never quit and quitters never win. We need to determine never to quit. Why do people quit?
Firstly, because quitters never win. They may make an appearance of success, but at the end, quitters are losers. To be a winner you must learn to patiently stay on until the job is done. Even when you seem to be failing. Quitting just destroys your chances of winning.
Secondly, quitting closes your road. Quitting makes a dead end of any road, often just as it is ready to open. I know people who quit employment in certain places because they had wanted more money. In less than a year, employee terms were improved for all far above their current earnings. They quit too soon: They made their road a dead end. The darkest hour of the night is just before dawn. We must therefore learn the discipline of persevering through those very dark moments because dawn is nearer than when we started. Don’t close your road by quitting.
Take a marriage situation, for example. There could be a thousand solutions available to a couple that divorces. But divorce always closes the road to any solution. Many regret, later but it is too late.
Thirdly, quitting binds you to your past. All of us must realize that failure is part of success. Failure is not the worst thing that can happen to you. When you fail, it does not justify a new name, Mr Failure. It is just one of the many experiences in life.
Do not accept to be bound by your past. Learn from your past and go for your future. You must learn to constantly do what the apostle Paul learnt to do. In his words,
“But one thing I do, forgetting what is behind… I press on toward the goal…” (Phil. 3:14).
Learn to forget the past–both good and bad–and persevere to the end.
I thoroughly enjoy reading the biographies of men like Thomas Succlife Mort, of Sydney, Australia. He is the man who invented the refrigerator with the goal of seeing meat exported from Australia to Britain. He gave himself three years to do the job. But it took him 26 years to finish (23 more years!). He lived long enough to see the first shipment of refrigerated meat leave Sydney but died before learning whether it had reached destination safely. What kept him going so long? The secret is still found painted twenty times in ceiling of his study: “To persevere is to succeed.
It is always too soon to quit.
Fourthly, an understanding of how life goes is another reason you should never quit. Life is not a 100 meters dash. It is more like a marathon. Many people are enthusiastic starters. Even clowns whose main purpose is to get the world see them in the field. Many people join to show off.
After a short while in the limelight, those in front start giving way. Some even join the cheering crowd to cheer those left in the race but it is those who persevere to the end we remember in the long run.
I asked an older minister who has built an excellent church, What his secret of success in ministry is? His answer was simplistic, as far as I was concerned. He said, Longevity! He continued, Do it again and again, until it works. Do it for thirty, forty years. It will work.
Lasting things are not a result of a few quick maneuvers. Perseverance brings lasting results.
Does not quitting imply staying on the same thing all through? Are there exceptions to the rule of never quitting?
Yes. You may transfer if you must. You may relocate. You may modify products. But don’t quit.
Perseverance, staying on to the finish is an indispensable quality of leadership – at any level. It will be required to counter opposition, for opposition is bound to arise. But a true work of God thrives on opposition.
‘Let us lay aside every weight, and the sin which so easily ensnares us, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us, looking unto Jesus, the author and finisher of our faith’ Hebrews 12:1-2.
I pray that after all the challenges, the opposition, the setbacks, and roadblock, we can come to the end of the journey without regrets and say like Apostle Paul,
“I have fought the good fight, I have finished the race…(2 Tim. 4:7)
That can only happen if you don’t quit!
