Endurance

[00:00:02] Speaker A: Hey, everybody. Welcome to a very special evening. I'm with my dad, doc, and we have the privilege of doing ministry together. How are you? [00:00:12] Speaker B: I'm good. How are you? [00:00:13] Speaker A: I'm great. Thank you so much for doing this with me. [00:00:16] Speaker B: I wouldn't miss it for anything. [00:00:17] Speaker A: So, we have a pretty big family. We're pretty much a rowdy. You hear us? People might call us the louds. [00:00:26] Speaker B: They would be correct. [00:00:28] Speaker A: It's normal. Total chaos, but in the best kind of way at our house. So, I'm one of five, and I have three older sisters. I like to tell everybody they're older every chance I get. And then we have Jay, our brother, and he is. He's the baby of the family. So the deal is, the girls, we have some debate on who's your favorite. Jay, we know is mom's favorite. [00:00:56] Speaker B: Yes. [00:00:56] Speaker A: Miracle baby. The only son. I never stood a chance. But the girls and I, we have a debate. Would you like to settle that debate now? [00:01:07] Speaker B: My favorite is whoever I'm with at the time. [00:01:11] Speaker A: Well, if I'm your favorite, I would just like you to blink regularly this entire interview. Deal. [00:01:18] Speaker B: We'll do that. [00:01:20] Speaker A: Okay. So, in all honesty, I was reading scripture, and I was studying romans, and I got to romans five, verse three through five. And my heart was incredibly captivated by this passage. And I'd like to read it to you guys tonight. And then what I would like to do is, I'd like to use a story from our. Our life to help illustrate it. And you've generously said you'll talk about some very hard things with us tonight. So thank you very much. [00:01:54] Speaker B: Yes. Things I've never talked about in public before. [00:01:58] Speaker A: Yeah. So there is a level of. I think a lot of the church would know it, maybe some of your close friends, but no one has really ever heard our story in this way, so I'm excited to share it, but I'd like to read the verse first. It comes from romans five, and we're starting at verse three. And it says, but we rejoice in our sufferings, knowing that suffering produces endurance, and endurance produces character, and character produces hope. And hope does not put us to shame, because God's love has been poured out into our hearts through the Holy Spirit who has been given to us. Okay, so, I think a lot of times when people hear this passage, the rejoice in your sufferings, rejoice in the trials that can really throw people for a loop, because no one's gonna be doing that. And as I was thinking about this scripture I was thinking about our life, and when you and I were sitting down to talk about this, you said, it's not really rejoice, but the original greek word means something a little bit different. [00:03:05] Speaker B: Yes. So the word is really boast or have pride in. So the idea is we can look back at the very hardest times in our life and have a sense of pride because it helped make us who God wanted us to be. [00:03:31] Speaker A: Yeah. And I think that is the. The gift of time, is you can look back and with the right perspective, you can see God's divine hand in it. [00:03:42] Speaker B: Yes. [00:03:43] Speaker A: But often there's different perspectives on how we handle sufferings or trials in our life. What do you think about those two things? [00:03:52] Speaker B: Well, it seems to me that people respond to trouble and difficulty and suffering in two different ways. For some people, the suffering draws them closer to God. And then the things in this verse happen. For other people, the suffering makes them misunderstand God, and they withdraw from God, and they lose the benefits of this passage. [00:04:25] Speaker A: And so our prayer, as you listen or you watch this, wherever it may be, is that you fall into the category that your heart is open to God. I think in life there's going to be trials, there's going to be pain, and there are going to be things that maybe never really make sense this side of heaven. But what God is doing in us and through us, if we allow it, I do think it can produce a hope and a deep sense. Sense of who God is. [00:04:53] Speaker B: Yes. [00:04:54] Speaker A: So that's our desire for you tonight. Okay. So in the eighties, we were in a terrible car accident. And it's a car accident where mom lost her arm. And it was your entire family, but you were. You weren't there at the time. You weren't in the car with us. [00:05:15] Speaker B: No. [00:05:18] Speaker A: When I thought about the scripture, I thought about how God has worked in our lives in a really powerful way, even in the midst of a lot of pain. And so you said that was probably the hardest day of your life. Could you tell us about what happened? [00:05:37] Speaker B: So Shay took you and the girls. Jay wasn't born yet to visit her mom, who had cancer. And it was a Saturday morning. And I stayed at my office to finish my sermon for the next day. And while I was working on my sermon, I received a telephone call, and it was Illyria Memorial Hospital. And the nurse said that. That my family had been in a very serious accident and that Sharon was hurt the worst and that I needed to come as quickly, but as safely as I could. So I got in the car and, of course, I prayed the whole way there. I just prayed the whole way there. And I went up to the lady at the nurse, the nurse at the desk, and she sent me to the room. And they had Sharon with painkilling medicine. It was. It wasn't really working very well. And I stood beside her, and I saw her arm all wrapped up. And I kissed her and told her I loved her. And I was so, so sorry. And she asked me if you girls were all right, and I said yes. [00:07:32] Speaker A: And did you know where we were at the time? Had you? [00:07:39] Speaker B: I think I met somebody told me, I can't remember, that they had talked to all of you and that crystal was getting stitches. She had to have plastic surgery, but that everybody was all right. [00:07:58] Speaker A: So we were stopped at a red light and a drunk driver came. And do you remember the speed that they said? [00:08:06] Speaker B: Yeah, he was doing about 80 miles an hour. [00:08:09] Speaker A: So we were stopped and he hit us full impact. Ended up flipping the car several times. And I was four and a half, maybe five at the time. And I. I have little flashes of the accident, so I remember us singing, and then I remember everyone falling asleep. I don't even know if that's true or not, but in my little girl mind, I remember everyone sleeping. And it's funny. To this day, I have a hard time if everyone's sleeping in the car. I'll try my best to stay awake because I'm still, like, affected by it, but. So I have little flashes. And so, like you said, mom was hurt the worst, but Crystal was hurt pretty bad, too. And she had, I think. What did they see? 250 stitches across her forehead. So she. Glass had gotten in there, and Misty, Katie and I, we were. We were pretty much outside of whiplash. And maybe a few stitches, we were okay. And so I remember some peek a boo flashes of, like, crystal. I remember seeing her across the street crying. And I remember the first time I got to see mom. So there's some memories that I have, too. But I think something you said sticks out is when you got the call, you were writing a sermon. And I think oftentimes in life, you think when. When you're doing the right things with God, bad stuff shouldn't happen. [00:09:48] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:09:49] Speaker A: Yeah. And so there you are, working on your sermon for Sunday, and you get the call. What do you have to say about how that felt or what that looked like for you? [00:10:02] Speaker B: I really. I mean, I'm sorry. I really wasn't thinking in that way. I was just. I was just so desperate for Sharon in you girls to be good. So all I was doing is pleading with God that he would be with you, that the Holy Spirit would calm your heart, that you wouldn't be overwhelmed by the trauma. As you were describing the accident, Sarah, I remember a nurse stopped to help. [00:10:38] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:10:38] Speaker B: And that nurse attends our church. [00:10:40] Speaker A: She does. She's a beautiful. [00:10:42] Speaker B: She's a beautiful soul. [00:10:43] Speaker A: Shout out to Kelly, huh? [00:10:44] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:10:45] Speaker A: Yeah. So there was. I don't. I don't even know how that happened, but there was a group of people that came out to help because they saw it, and they helped get the kids out, and they helped. And Kelly was one of them. Yeah. Okay, so you're at the hospital, you're with mom, and what's your sense with God? Is it like you're saying, is it just pleading? Is it. [00:11:08] Speaker B: It was mostly just begging God in my heart. Then the doctors took me out of Sharon's room, and they said, her arm has to be amputated. Would you sign for that to be done? And I said, I am willing to do that. But I also believe that Sharon should. We should tell Sharon, and she should get a say. So we went back in, and the doctor explained to her, and I won't go into the details because they're all ugly. And Sharon said that she did give her consent. And I was crushed. I was. Shay is. She's a makeup woman. Clothes and looking good. [00:12:17] Speaker A: She's gorgeous. [00:12:20] Speaker B: Just part of who she is. And I was just crushed that she was going to lose her arm. And so they took her upstairs for the operation. And by then, my dad and mom were there. Chuck's brother. Sharon's brother Chuck and her sister Carolyn were there. [00:12:51] Speaker A: And we actually. There was our. My cousin, mom's niece. She was in the car with us all. And she was a baby at the time, and she was unharmed. [00:13:00] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:13:01] Speaker A: You know, in the eighties, there were no such thing as you don't buckle a baby in. Right. [00:13:05] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:13:05] Speaker A: They kind of just loosely lay next to you or someone's holding up. [00:13:09] Speaker B: So, yeah, the world changed. [00:13:10] Speaker A: Yeah. Okay. So I think. I think when. When you go through something hard, one of the thoughts I'd like to pull out from what you said is instead of maybe blaming God, what if instead you plead with God, and in your pain, you lean in to that there is a God who is for you? [00:13:32] Speaker B: Yes. [00:13:33] Speaker A: Something that's always captivated my heart about you and mom is in the hardest parts of life. You've trusted God deeply. And we were talking yesterday, mom and I, and she's a hero. She's just a hero. [00:13:52] Speaker B: Yes, she is. [00:13:53] Speaker A: And she was talking about how she never blamed God, but she. She said, okay, it's not what I don't have. It's what I do have. And she always had the capacity to think about what she could do instead of maybe what. What she couldn't do. And that's a gift. And I think when you lean into God, there's an optimism, there's a hope, as scripture teaches. But sometimes the pain of life, it's not just the day of the car accident. [00:14:26] Speaker B: No. [00:14:26] Speaker A: Sometimes the hits keep coming. And in this verse, it talks about a perseverance and endurance. And when we go through these trials, it creates something of a patient perseverance in us, if we'll allow it. So were there other hits that came after this car accident? [00:14:48] Speaker B: Yeah, there were. There were. There was a bad. We had an economic crisis. The bills were thousands and thousands of dollars. [00:15:07] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:15:08] Speaker B: And I wasn't. I mean, the. The church was not very big yet, and we weren't making a lot of money. I worked, and Sharon taught. [00:15:22] Speaker A: She's a teacher. [00:15:23] Speaker B: And we. I mean, we just. In one day, I think we went. It doesn't sound like a lot now, but in the eighties, it was astronomical. We went $26,000 in debt. [00:15:36] Speaker A: That's a big hit. [00:15:40] Speaker B: And. [00:15:42] Speaker A: And when you're making no money. Yeah. [00:15:45] Speaker B: Right. And when you're getting by and you have four kids. Yeah. [00:15:49] Speaker A: Yeah. So one of those was the economic stress, you know, the financial stress of. [00:15:56] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:15:57] Speaker A: And then. And then there's a reality of how. How does mom redefine life? How does she start getting back to normal? So. So you get a financial. You get the hit, the initial hit, then you get a financial hit. [00:16:13] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:16:13] Speaker A: And was there ever a time you questioned God? [00:16:18] Speaker B: I don't know that I questioned God, other than saying, well, what is the way forward? I believe you know where I am. I believe you know what I'm feeling. I believe that you will never leave me or forsake me. So what is your way forward? How do I go forward from here? [00:16:44] Speaker A: So it's a leaning into God. And then it's. I mean, people know that it's not ever just one thing. It's this. It's one thing after another. Sometimes it's big. Sometimes it's a death by a thousand cuts, you know? And so in that part of what the scripture is saying, this endurance, this patience, this perseverance, it's this idea of asking God, can you just show me your way forward? [00:17:16] Speaker B: Forward. [00:17:17] Speaker A: And what was your sense in it. So what was your way forward? [00:17:22] Speaker B: It was just basically just get up every day and do what I was called to do. Get up every day. Love. Sharing the way God wants her to be loved. Get up every day, try to create a beautiful home for my kids to grow up in. Get up every day. Go to work, serve God the best I can. [00:17:53] Speaker A: Show up. [00:17:54] Speaker B: Yeah. I never expected that God would wave a magic wand over me and everything would be back to normal. [00:18:04] Speaker A: Although, Jesus, if you're listening, we will take it. [00:18:09] Speaker B: But I did have this. We've talked about my vision before. I did have this overwhelming sense that God had something special for us and that if we would just, day by day, walk with him and trust him and walk by faith more than sight, that God would get us there. [00:18:37] Speaker A: When you think back, is there anything you wish you would have done different? [00:18:44] Speaker B: Yeah, I do wish I would have. If I could have done it over, I would have taken some time off work and spent more time with Shay immediately after the accident, I preached. The accident was on Saturday. I preached the next Sunday. And if I could have done it over again, I would have. I would have taken off some more time. And especially when she got home from the hospital and. [00:19:16] Speaker A: Yeah. Okay, so the scripture says that, you know, take pride in some of the things that you've gone through. Is there something that you feel like when you look back, you think, I'm so glad I handled it that way. [00:19:37] Speaker B: I can say, I'm so glad that God handled it that way. Do you know what I mean? I am so glad that, I mean, Sharon lost half her arm. It's just totally life changing. And she did have this very healthy attitude. I'm gonna. I've got this. I'll figure out how to do stuff. And, I mean, she raised Jay with one arm. [00:20:10] Speaker A: Yeah. The miracle baby. [00:20:14] Speaker B: I'm very, very grateful for the spirit that Shay had because it made it easier for all of us. [00:20:21] Speaker A: It sure did. I look back on it now and I think to myself, if we have the right attitude in trials you and mom have modeled in the kid's life, my family, our family's life, that when you get it right, you teach your family how to get it right. And then if your family can accept that and they teach. It's generational. [00:20:47] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:20:48] Speaker A: And I think so often we let our emotions consume and listen, there were bad days in there. [00:20:53] Speaker B: There were bad days. [00:20:54] Speaker A: We had bad days. [00:20:56] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:20:58] Speaker A: And when there's bad days, what was your strategy? To get back on course or to get right back. Did you have a strategy when you. When. Yes, God is good. Yes, he's faithful, but it's hard. [00:21:13] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:21:13] Speaker A: Did you have a strategy when maybe you lost it or maybe it all felt overwhelming? Do you have a strategy to kind of get back on in a healthy mindset? [00:21:27] Speaker B: I hope this doesn't sound too pious, but somehow or another, God taught me to turn to him again and again and again. My turning to God yesterday won't get me through today. [00:21:45] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:21:48] Speaker B: My reassurance of the Holy Spirit yesterday doesn't get me through today. I also have had a big life commitment that when I get it wrong, I'm going to go say I'm sorry. So when the stress was too much for me and I would be too sharp with you girls, I would say, look, I'm sorry. I want to be a better dad than that. [00:22:13] Speaker A: I think that is everything, to be totally honest, because, I mean, if you're watching, you have lost it at some point. No one is perfect. There is a level of life that when you. You're gonna need to own it. And I think too often we don't own it. I think too often we. We don't say anything. We try to let it pass. But the way you taught us was to own it, to come in, apologize, and try better. I mean, and that is a life giving strategy for you. Lose it. You're gonna have a bad day, but you're gonna turn to God, and you're gonna turn to him again, again and again and again and again, again. But then own it. Apologize. Because I think what happens is the scripture teaches us, you're producing character. You're producing something that God wants to approve, something that God is doing inside of you through it. What's the word for character? [00:23:18] Speaker B: In the original text, it's actually the word to be approved after a test. The affliction and the patient. Perseverance is a test. And if you cling to God in the suffering and you patiently persevere, then God says, I approve of your character. You're being the person I want you to be. You're trusting in me in the way that you should trust in me. [00:23:53] Speaker A: Yeah. And then the scripture goes on to say that our character produces this idea of, like, can you talk about hope? [00:24:05] Speaker B: Yeah. Hope is the expectation that the thing I desire is just about to happen. So my greatest desire through this was for Sharon to recover and then for us to be able to get out from under the economic burden of it all. And I'm not going to go into the details, but about four years after Sharon's accident, God did a miraculous thing for us, and we were able to pay off the entire hospital bill. The expectation that Sharon would recover and live a good life and be the woman that God wanted her to be, that God gave me, that Sharon interacts with people, and they don't even know. She doesn't have an arm. [00:25:12] Speaker A: I know. I was with a couple last night. They're like, we didn't even know. I think it says, and hope does not put us to shame. There is a truth that when we follow God heart and soul, when we follow him, when we do hope, and the thing we want most is just right around the corner. He doesn't put us to shame in it. [00:25:33] Speaker B: Yeah, he does. [00:25:33] Speaker A: He works. He shows up. And I think one of the beautiful things is it doesn't. It didn't happen overnight. [00:25:41] Speaker B: No, it didn't. [00:25:41] Speaker A: For the Collings family, no hits kept coming. But the goodness of God after us. [00:25:49] Speaker B: Yes, it did. [00:25:50] Speaker A: And because you taught us to lean in, because you taught us to keep going back to him, because you taught us to hope in him and that there will not be shame in that. No, that he shows up because he's faithful. It's made all the difference in how my view of God is. And so I just want to say to everyone who's listening and watching, you have a choice in how you show up in life. Life. You have a choice in how you believe and trust in God. And I want you to know that God is faithful. And the scripture shows us that we will not be put to shame. So believe, trust, hope, and let God pour out his unfailing love. The scripture ends in this beautiful way. And it says, hope does not put us to shame. Because God's love has been poured out into our hearts through the holy spirit who's been given to us. How have you seen that? Maybe through this trial, through your life. [00:26:54] Speaker B: So in the affliction, God's grace was sufficient. We didn't get through that accident because we gritted our teeth and we were good people. God's grace was greater. He gave us greater grace. He poured out his love in our hearts through grace to deal with each step of the way. In the patient perseverance, God was pouring out his love in our hearts. By giving us the strength to just show up one more time, just keep doing what he asked us to do in the approval of character. That's God pouring out his love in our hearts. He's saying, thank you. You're what I want you to be. This is my beloved son, in whom I am well pleased. And then the hope, that's the brightest light of his pouring out, is he pours out his love in us by filling us with hope. And when God teaches you how to hope in one area, it's easier for him to teach you how to hope in a lot of areas, because I knew I could trust God because of this accident. I ended up trusting God for a whole bunch of ridiculous. [00:28:24] Speaker A: It's like you see him work, you see him show up, and you're like, okay, I know I can trust him in this. I call it. It's like there's footholds in our life where you trust him here, and then you're able to grab the next one, and then because of that, you're able to grab the next one. And there's this beautiful, lifelong adventure with God, if you allow it. Okay, I want to close here, and I just want one last piece of advice for everyone listening who's going through or who will encounter a hard part. And maybe it's been hard for them to see the goodness of God. What would be one piece of advice? [00:29:03] Speaker B: God is your friend. [00:29:05] Speaker A: He's for you. [00:29:07] Speaker B: God loves you more than what you know. He is looking for ways to reveal himself to you. He's looking for little openings in your thoughts. He's looking for little openings in your heart. And if you will turn to him, if you'll trust him, he will pour out his love in your heart. He will find a way to give you the grace you need at each step of the process. He loves you more than you can. [00:29:46] Speaker A: Imagine, and he's better than you think. [00:29:49] Speaker B: Right. And, sarah, if we think he doesn't understand our suffering, we need to remind ourselves that he suffered for us. We do not have a great high priest who is not able to sympathize with us because he has endured all that we have to endure. He has suffered more than we have to suffer, and he is our advocate in affliction, in endurance, in approved character, and in hope. [00:30:27] Speaker A: Thank you. Thank you for sharing vulnerably. And I love you so much. [00:30:31] Speaker B: I would not do this for anybody but you. [00:30:34] Speaker A: I know. I just think we just made it clear today. One thing and one thing only. We know the favorite. Let me pray. Let me hold your hand, darling. Father, I love you. I thank you for your goodness. I thank you that you teach us in scripture who you are and that you are a God that helps us persevere. You are a God that helps us produce a character that's pleasing to you. You're a God who is faithful to show up and to give us hope and to pour out your love. And so I pray for every person listening. Will they feel your love in a special way when they think about trials in their life? Can you help them take pride in who they were and how they showed up? We love you so very much, and we're so incredibly thankful for all you do and all you continue to do through us and in us. I love you with all my heart. [00:31:28] Speaker B: I do love you. [00:31:29] Speaker A: And in your son's name we pray. Amen. Amen.