GREAT THINGS ENTERPRISE
CLAUDE BLACK
Mark 7:26
The Power of Persistence
After Alice graduated from high school in 1960, she wanted to find a job. My father told her that he had heard the Dow Chemical Company in Madison, Illinois—the company where he had worked for over 30 years—was hiring. So, Alice dressed in good office attire and went to the personnel office only to be told that they were not hiring. The next day, she went back to the same office. She went to the office every day for a week, only to be told that they were not hiring. It was there, however, that she heard that the Mercantile Bank in St. Louis was hiring. She went to the bank, and the personnel manager hired her for their bookkeeping department. She was persistent.
According to historians, when Hannibal, the Carthaginian general, told his officers that he planned to take his army and elephants across the Alps to attack Italy, they complained that it was impossible. Hannibal reportedly replied, “I shall either find a way or make one.” And he did. He was persistent.
I drove by a construction site recently where workers were starting a new building with concrete blocks. Day after day, they laid one block after another until they completed the building. They laid hundreds of concrete blocks, one at a time. They were persistent.
When Jesus went to Tyre, apparently to get away from the hostile critics in Galilee and to find rest, he went into a house—whose owner the writers do not mention. Apparently, while he was reclining at a meal, a woman came in and fell at his feet. “But the woman was Greek, Syrophoenician by race, and she kept asking him that he might cast the demon out of her daughter.” (Mark 7:26) According to Matthew, Jesus ignored her, and the disciples suggested sending her away. (Matthew 15:23) The word “ask” here is in the imperfect tense, implying that the woman kept asking. Some translators render this word as “kept asking,” “besought,” or “was asking.” The point is that this woman did not intend to be put off; she was persistent.
There is a cliché that says: “Persistence pays off.” It seems important that the goal toward which one persists is honorable to the Father.
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