Surviving Tough Times

blast!

INTRODUCTION

There are situations in life that bring folks to their knees, that drive them to desperation, and from which there seems to be no escape. Even the most hardened macho hustler is stretched to the brink of his tethers in these, as these situations are no respecters of persons. They befall the innocent, the guilty, the saint, the sinner, the good, the bad, the ugly, the bold, the beautiful, the rich, the famous, and everyone in between. Living can be difficult.

As one famous singer sang: If it ain’t one thing … it’s another. Renowned motivational speaker Les Brown rightly said, We are in an era that the late Peter Drucker [a former world-renowned, Austrian-born American management consultant, educator, and author] calls the three C’s: accelerated change, overwhelming complexity, and tremendous competition.¹

Those who look cool, calm, and collected have simply mastered the art of depriving their troubles of the oxygen of publicity. Make no mistake, beneath that veneer lurks the raw deal.

We share our world with mathematicians and physicists who believe Murphy’s Law, which says, Anything that can go wrong will go wrong. Life is marbled with deadly situations that seem to defy every conceivable remedy man can humanly doctor. You don’t have to go far to see this. The headlines in our tabloids and the breaking news in the media ably, avidly, and regularly treat us to an elaborate menu of trouble in high definition. These situations are not occasional; they’re an onslaught, a daily assault.

Jesus, the master miracle worker, told His disciples they would have tribulation in this world. Fortunately, He was quick to add that they were to be of good cheer because He had an excellent track record of dealing with that tribulation. So there is hope.

That hope to make surviving tough times a real-life achievement is the theme of this book. Hopefully, this work will dispel and expose the defeatist myth, which insinuates that what will be, will be—that we can’t make it through the tragedies appointed to snuff us out.

If that myth were true, we would not do a lot of things: We would not wear glasses anymore when we can’t see well. Why bother? What will be, will be. We would stop wearing seat belts too and no longer engage the expertise of a mechanic when something breaks down. Why should we? What will be, will be. We would stop visiting dentists and doctors too when we felt sick, and perhaps not even open an umbrella if we are caught in a downpour. Why? Because what will be, will be.

Obviously, soldiering on with life like that is not an option. When our lives are besieged by trouble, we must commit and apply ourselves to corrective measures and actions; we must constantly be focused on improvement and excellence in our lives, especially when problems arise.

If our efforts in this always paid off, that would be very encouraging. However, that hardly ever happens, so it is our duty to strive for our own deliverance.

If, for example, we abuse our bodies with irregular sleep patterns, overeating or eating too much processed food, overwork, or the lack of exercise, we cannot blame fate for our troubles. We cannot naively say, This was bound to happen. No; we had a hand in it.

To the degree that we are able, we must actively prevent bad results stemming from our own choices. We cannot afford to be docile spectators, sloppily dawdling along without engaging in mending our mistakes, and being responsible for our wrongdoing. In truth, none of us will escape the consequences of our actions. None of us gets special seating in the auditorium of our lives.

If the devil is going to bog us down in any way, shape, or form, he is going to have to earn that without our help. We do not want to hand him a landslide victory and make his diabolical agenda easy due to our own laziness. A Chinese proverb says, Failure is not falling down but refusing to get up.

We must not throw in the towel and quit. We also must not rest on the laurels of our past successes. If plan A flops, the alphabet has 25 more letters!

We must be teachable and open to learning new things on one hand and going about old things in a new way on the other. When we are affected by adversity, we must be upbeat about bettering ourselves and helping others. We must not be stopped by stormy seas or handicapped by daunting circumstances. Instead we must learn. Those who fail to learn lessons from the past demonstrate a determination to repeat those mistakes. William E. Gladstone, a former British prime minister, once said, No man ever became great or good except through many and great mistakes.

In the pages that follow, you will find tried, tested, and true answers to help you deal with trials. Embellished with real-life examples and reinforced with heartwarming tales, as well as scores of biblical principles and concepts that explain the whys and hows behind it all, these stories are from those who have successfully navigated trials. Welcome to the world of survivors. Take your place, fasten your seat belt, and survive!

CHAPTER 1

RELENTLESS PRAYER

So when he had arrested him, he put him in prison, and delivered him to four squads of soldiers to keep him, intending to bring him before the people after Passover. Peter was therefore kept in prison, but constant prayer was offered to God for him by the church.

—Acts 12:4–5, emphasis added

Unapologetically, I begin with prayer. And no, I’m not some kind of prayer expert. In fact, I am a desperate amateur in this most potent, timeless, noble, and expedient discipline. Interestingly, prayer is perhaps the most difficult, challenging, debated, opposed, and resisted activity we participate in—and that’s in the church! It’s much worse in nonreligious circles. Viewpoints on prayer are often two-sided and rarely agree.

In one camp, there are avid proponents who make no bones about prayer being the master key that unlocks each and every breakthrough we seek to secure. Real-life testimonies undergird this stance, and with an agelong tradition lending credence to their assertion, these folks rest assured that their beliefs are written in stone and unquestionable.

Camp two carries its own plethora of scriptural references and contends with equal passion a stand completely opposite camp one’s. The ideas of those in that camp are also plausible.

The result? There’s an incredible array of books on prayer. Authors are keen to write about the middle ground, seeking to present a balanced position on the subject in the hope that their work will help resolve the many questions between the two camps. Bookstores and the internet are awash with new titles on prayer—many screaming, Me too! So coming up with a new treatise on the subject is akin to preaching to the choir.

Still, I believe satan and his hordes of helpers in spiritual darkness are greatly hampered in their diabolical agenda when people get down to serious praying. The enemy will do anything to curtail the prayers of God’s people even in the smallest way. This only underscores the need for even deeper and more protracted praying.

The devil would sooner tolerate people giving God the highest praises for hours, attending multiple church services, listening to lots of motivational sermons, giving large donations, or running awe-inspiring church programs than have them praying relentlessly to release spiritual resources on earth as it is in heaven (Matt. 6:10).

E. M. Bounds candidly noted that:

The Devil often tries to break the soul down and reduce it to despair. In order to discourage us, he tells us that we will never succeed, that the way is too hard and the burden too heavy. He takes advantage of weak, distracted nerves and suggests fears. Grace is hidden from sight, shortcomings are magnified, and weaknesses are classed as gross sins…. He darkens the future. Heaven and God are hidden by a thick veil of tomorrow’s cares, trials, and needs. The imaginary disasters, failures, and evils of the future are powerful weapons in Satan’s hand. He suggests that the Lord is a hard master and that His promises will fail. He works on the corruption that remains in the heart and raises a great storm in the soul.¹

This is not hard to understand. Prayer is the most powerful discipline available to mankind. A dear old friend of mine, the Reverend Douglas Lott II, often said, If you won’t pray, you won’t stay. If you won’t fast, you sure won’t last.

Prayerlessness is synonymous with powerlessness. Living is not just hard without power; it’s impossible. So is being a witness for Christ. The disciples of the early church were sternly instructed to wait in Jerusalem until they were endowed with power. (See Acts 1:4, 8.) God actually built His forgiveness, healing, and revival on prayer. (See 2 Chron. 7:14.)

A highly acclaimed psychologist is quoted as once having said: Prayer is the greatest power available to the individual in solving his personal problems. Its power astonishes me.²

Rather than teasing and laughing mankind to scorn, the sorrows and hardships we encounter in life are inadvertently saying, "Can’t you see that this situation requires something beyond you—possibly something divine—to get you out of the mess you are in?" These situations actually drive us to prayer. They urge us to offer up constant unrelenting prayer long enough to see change manifest.

This is not to suggest we do not take faith-filled action. Instead, that action should be taken against a backdrop of constant, unrelenting prayer.

Prayer is a powerful key to releasing us from whatever restricts, constricts, or traps us or others in awful and unacceptable positions in life. This key is placed in the hands of anyone who will take a stand. Regardless of the pain and oppression, we can pray our way out of these limiting bonds so we can pursue the greater things that lie before us in our lives.

Dr. Myles Munroe wrote:

Prayer is the greatest opportunity and privilege offered to a person in Christ. Yet because of the power of prayer, the adversary makes it his business to see that the prayers of individuals and churches are ineffective. Satan knows that a church is only as powerful as its prayer life. Therefore, he will use misconceptions about prayer to thwart our prayer potential. These misconceptions are hurdles to overcome as we address the problems that lead to unanswered prayer.³

Surviving by the Skin of Our Teeth

In the fall of 1994 I was an immigrant with an unresolved status in a foreign land. I had an entire folder of postponement letters, written to advise me of adjournment upon adjournment of my scheduled appointments with immigration officials. Typically clad in brown envelopes, the letters were not welcome, and I always opened them with a sizable chunk of trepidation in my