It is no secret that many pastors contemplate quitting regularly. Being a pastor is incredibly difficult. Jesus never promised it would easy. But don’t quit. Ministry is not a sprint. It’s a marathon. It is not just one fall, but many consecutive falls until you finally learn your balance. It is not how you start that matters, but how you finish.

Early this summer my family and I took a trip to the beautiful island of Puerto Rico. We spent a whole week sitting and playing with our kids on the beach. It was a great, much-needed vacation… except for one part.

My wife and I signed up for paddle board lessons. Paddle boards are like big surf boards that you stand on and move with a large paddle. We thought it would be fun to learn. When you see people doing it, they look so cool and relaxed while paddling around the island.

I quickly learned that paddle boarding is not as easy as it looks. If you don’t stay balanced, the board will quickly flip and dump you in the water. I fell a lot. Even worse, my wife was much better than me. Apparently her early years as a dancer taught her with a sense of balance that my clumsy self never acquired.

I was exhausted. The instructor was leading us a mile down the beach to a beautiful reef. He and my wife were way ahead of me because I kept falling. As we rode over the reef, the waves got bigger and I once again fell. This time my left foot grazed a piece of the reef. It hurt, but I quickly got back on the board. There were people on the beach laughing at me – enjoying the comedy of my falls – and I needed to catch up with everyone.

When I finally arrived at our destination, 10 minutes behind everyone, my wife said, “What happened to your foot?!”

Blood was flowing from a gash on top of my foot, and my foot was turning an odd reddish, purple color.

I said, “I think I kicked some coral.”….

Here is the point. My paddle boarding experience is a lot like ministry.

Sometimes you feel like the waves keep crashing on you. You are tired. You are physically and spiritually in pain. You kicked the fire coral. There is blood in the water. No matter how hard you try or what you do it feels like you keep falling.

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