“He who endures to the end will be saved.” Matthew 24:13. A look at the end-time call to endurance – not a marathon of works or incredible spiritual feats of extraordinary accomplishment, but of following in the footsteps of the Savior.

<p>“He who endures to the end will be saved.” Matthew 24:13. A look at the end-time call to endurance – not a marathon of works or incredible spiritual feats of extraordinary accomplishment, but of following in the footsteps of the Savior.</p>

<p>Free sharing permitted under the Creative Commons <a rel="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/3.0/us/">BY-NC-ND 3.0 (US)</a> license.</p>

Dalton SDA Church

Chester Clark

The Endurance of the Saints

Father in heaven, today we recognize our great need.

We recognize that of ourselves, we can't even be blessed by coming to church.

So Father, today we just want to pray once again that you might be here in our midst, we might learn not from the preacher, but we might learn from your spirit and from your word that we might be blessed for having been here.

1 of the most amazing stories of endurance that I have ever come across myself is the story of Stefan Engels.

Maybe some of you heard about him in the news about a year and a half or 2 ago.

Stefan Ingels is a Belgian who, as a young boy, was diagnosed with asthma and told that he would never be able to be involved in sports or athletics.

Because of his respiratory problems, he had to stay indoors much of the time, and he had to stay still much of the time.

And yet, Stefan decided that He would not be controlled by his limitations.

And he began an exercise routine which led to him running his first marathon at the age of 25.

Stefan went on to compete competitively in triathlons, which you know a triathlon is a marathon plus a 100 mile bike ride plus what is it a 4 mile swim or so?

It's a it's a it's a fairly Invigorating experience from what I'm told I have not experienced it myself That in itself is an endurance feat.

But, Stéphane would not be satisfied with this, just running triathlons.

Before he would quit his athletic career, he wanted to continue in doing something that no 1 had ever done before.

Stéphane decided that he would run 365 marathons in 365 consecutive days.

After 18 days, he had an injury and had to stop.

A year, a year and a half in rehabilitation and he started again.

Now you'd think running 18 marathons in 18 consecutive days would be enough.

But he set out to run these 365 consecutive marathons.

In order to find marathons in 365 consecutive days, he would begin in Barcelona, but he would run these 365 marathons in 7 countries, in Spain, in Portugal, Belgium, Canada, Mexico, the United Kingdom, and the United States.

And so imagine not only having to run every consecutive day, but having to travel between marathons to get to your next marathon must have been overnight pretty much.

He said that the key was a slow pace for the 26.2 miles.

He averaged about 4 hours, but his best time was 2 hours and 56 minutes.

And he ran a total of 9, 569 miles in these 365 days.

Sort of Makes me tired just reading about it, actually.

Makes me want to stop and get a drink of water.

I don't run fast and my heartbeat is slow, below 100, but it is more of a mental story, he said.

The problem was thinking about running a marathon every day.

He would get overwhelmed if he started to think about having to run a marathon every day.

So he says, I just told myself to run that day and did not think about the next day or the next week.

The secret of his completing these 365 marathons, it wasn't really the physical challenge.

And this is something that we wouldn't necessarily know because we haven't been there.

But he's learned the secret, pace himself, not run too fast and physically it wasn't a problem.

Of course, remember he was already a triathlete so he, you know, he was capable.

But the challenge was keeping his mind 1 day at a time.

Not going ahead to tomorrow, not going ahead to next week, but this day, this race, 1 day at a time.

You know our scripture for today, in Matthew 24, verse 13 says, But he who endures unto the end, the same shall be saved.

And I often think of this, when I think of endurance, I often think of something like Stefan Engels.

I often think of something like 365 marathons in 365 days.

It sounds very harsh and almost an impossible feat.

But I don't think that's the case in what Jesus is talking about here today.

We're going to explore a little bit about what this endurance means.

I think that as we do so, you're going to see, as Stephan Engels learned, that it's not so much the challenges of the future, it's the challenge of now.

It's not so much the challenge of what's going to happen in the end.

Oh, there's going to be trouble, there's going to be trials, there's going to be difficulties, there's going to be persecution.

In fact, this passage is clearly speaking about end-time faithfulness, because if we read the next verse, it says this, and this gospel of the kingdom will be preached in all the world as a witness to all the nations, and then the end will come." Now often we think of this as sort of a parallel gospel commission, sort of synonymous with Matthew 28 and verses 19 and 20, go ye therefore into all the world.

We talk about how this is Jesus' will that before the end comes, the whole world should know the gospel.

They should have an opportunity to know the Jesus that we love and serve and have an opportunity to make a decision, an informed decision, about their destiny.

But I would like to look at verse 14 as a promise.

It's my favorite way to read the verse, because it's not ambiguous at all.

It's very declarative, and it's very, very clear what it is saying.

It says that this gospel of the kingdom could possibly be preached in all the world.

I like that word because even in our modern days we resurrect that old English term shall instead of will, it gives it greater certainty, doesn't it?

You know, that seems to us to be more definite than just will.

This is, I, The gospel of the kingdom will be preached.

Will be preached in all the world for a witness to all the nations and then the end will come.

And Jesus is saying here, he who endures to the end shall be saved.

This isn't the only verse that we find it.

In fact, if you'll turn in your Bibles to some other passages, Mark 13 and verse 13.

Let's look together at what we find here in Mark 13.

Verse 13, I like the way, you know, We're blessed to have the Gospel accounts not just written by 1 individual, but by several, aren't we?

As we see their different perspectives, they come from, we find different insights into what Jesus' words meant.

And he says in verse 13, this is Jesus being quoted by Mark, it says, And you will be hated by all men for my name's sake, but he who does what?

Let's look in the letters, the epistles, James first of all, James 1 and verse 12.

We're going to try to understand here what is this endurance that the Bible is talking about, that Jesus is describing, it's pretty important, isn't it?

If he who endures into the end will be saved, I want to know what that means and what that is.

The Endurance of the Saints

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