I was surprised to find that the definition of tenacious found in Webster’s discusses the idea of holding fast or clinging to something. This idea conjures up a picture of a 2-year-old at day care drop off who refuses to let go of his mother. Maybe you never had a child behave like this, but both of mine have and still do under certain circumstances though they are well out of their toddler years. Holding on for dear life, afraid of the unknown, afraid of being abandoned, afraid of meeting new people or perhaps being left out at play time, they wrap their arms around what is familiar and safe to them. Even though this can be somewhat frustrating or embarrassing for me, I am still honored to be their source of comfort.

What brings you comfort? To what do you cling? What are you holding on to for dear life?

When I first wrote about the characteristics common to survivors, I referenced the article that said tenacity was the ability to take the pain and keep going. While I still believe the ability to Just Keep Going is vital for survivors and that perseverance is one key aspect of getting through difficult circumstances, but that to which we cling when the going gets tough is at least as crucial.

I recently attended a bible study where the book of Ruth was the topic. In the days since this study, I have pondered the inspiring tale of this tenacious survivor. When I re-read the story the other morning, I picked up on something I had missed in the translation read during the study. Ruth 1:14 says that “Ruth clung to her.” Ruth clung to her mother-in-law after having lost her husband. Ruth was a Moabite woman who married one of two sons of an Israelite family who had fled to her country in search of food during a famine in their land. Both sons and their father died and the book began as the mother, Naomi, was about to return to Israel. The Moabites were the descendants of Lot, Abraham’s nephew. During the conquering of the Promised Land, contentions arose between the two peoples because the Moabite king feared the Israelites, who were peacefully encamped in his territory. King Balak called upon a pagan prophet to curse the Israelites (Numbers 22), but the one true God foiled their plans. Enmity ensued despite the failed attempts to bring destruction upon God’s people and the Moabites were forbidden to the 10^th generation to enter the assembly of God (Deuteronomy 23:3-6).

Yet, we still read that Ruth clung to her Israelite mother-in-law and departed her home and all that was familiar to her to return with Naomi to Israel. Ruth willingly left her home, her family, the gods of the culture in which she was raised and followed her mother-in-law to go to a land where she would be an unwelcome and widowed foreigner. She makes a heartfelt plea to Naomi not leave her in which she says, “Your people shall be my people, and your God my God.” Ruth 1:16. She refused to let go of the faith in the one true God she had come to through her association with this Israelite family, and held on to it while letting go of all else she had ever known. Despite the hardships ahead, she chose to cling not just to her mother-in-law, but to Yahweh. By so doing, she was taken to be the wife of a distant relative of her husband’s family and was ultimately placed in the lineage of not only King David, but Jesus himself (Ruth 4:13-22). She chose to live like an eternal survivor and cling to God in a terribly troubling time, and was rewarded with a prestigious role in the salvation of all mankind because of her tenacious faith.

Could you do it? Would you be able to leave your home, your family, everything you had ever known to follow and seek God’s will for your life, even if you knew there would be hardships? Jesus called His disciples to do this very thing.

He repeatedly told those He was calling to follow Him and leave behind everything, to let go of all that brought them comfort, their family and friends, freedom, their belongings, their professions and homes, even their dead and dying. There is some evidence that many of these blessings were restored to them, but I cannot overlook their willingness of those early few to drop everything and follow Jesus. They learned quickly that you can only hold on to so much, but there is just one thing to which you can cling that will enable you to say, “it is well with my soul.” Deuteronomy 30:20 says we should, “cling to Him for He is your life and the length of your days.”

One of my favorite hymns, “It Is Well With My Soul,” is a perfect example of clinging to Jesus while letting go of what you hold dear. Horatio Spafford did not simply piece together a beautiful composition full of empty words. This is a song born of gut-wrenching loss and deep personal pain. In 1873, he wrote the hymn while on a ship to England where he would comfort his wife in the aftermath of a tragic ship-wreck that killed their four daughters. Two years earlier, their son had died in the Great Chicago Fire. Even as his ship sailed close to the point where his precious daughters drowned, he was still able to cling to the cross, and know that all was well with his soul despite the profound loss he had suffered on earth, that “The sky, not the grave, is our goal.”

I know Jesus was speaking of the end times when He said, “He who endures to the end will be saved” in Matthew 24:13, but I find great encouragement in these words for even my everyday trials. If I continue to cling to the cross, no matter what happens until I reach my earthly end, I am saved. Jesus knew the pain and suffering He would endure to ensure that salvation for all of us, but he remained true to the word and the will of His Father. Jesus, being fully human, asked, just as we would, if there was any other way for the Father’s will to be done, but He says, “Nevertheless, not my will but Yours be done.” Luke 22:42. Knowing that His betrayal, abandonment, brutal beating, crucifixion and separation from His Father was the only way to fulfill the word and the will of God, His final words were, “Father, into Your hands, I commit my spirit.” Luke 23:48. In other words, “I’m letting go of all that this earth holds and clinging to you and your will, Father.”

Jesus predicted his suffering and death to his followers several times during His ministry. When one of His well-meaning apostles attempted to correct Him, he was seriously rebuked. Peter simply said, “Far be it from You, Lord; this shall not happen to You.” Matthew 16:22. Surely many of us would react the same way if one of our friends or role models was to make a similar statement. Just like Peter, we likely react with unbelief and probably want to protect them from harm, to take away their pain. Instead of hugging Peter and being thankful for his concern, Jesus had a very different response. He said, “Get behind Me, Satan! You are an offense to Me, for you are not mindful of the things of God, but the things of Men.” Matthew 16:23 Peter was more concerned with comforting and saving Jesus, than the purpose to which He had been called, which was to endure the punishment for all of humanity’s sin so that we could all be saved.

As Eternal Survivors we are called not to simply endure the trials that come in this life, but Paul reminds us that “we also glory in tribulations, knowing that tribulation produces perseverance; and perseverance, character; and character, hope.” Modern day tribulations can come in any number of ways, but I believe it is when we suffer the loss of something to which we would ordinarily find hope in this life that we are being pointed toward the true source of our life. When we lose our health, a person close to us, our livelihood, familiar surroundings, a home, or our security, we must act like the Christian Paul describes in Romans 12:9 and “cling to what is good.” Jesus tells us in Matthew 19:17 that, “No one is good but One, that is God.” We have His word, His will, and His purpose to cling to when all else falls away. Christian survivors are tenacious; they may feel the pain of this world, but still find the glory and hope in the love of God for us. When we are able to set aside our own personal pain, our comfort, our selfish desires and earthly possessions and commit ourselves to the will of God for His purposes and glory that is when we will begin to live with a tenacious spirit.

Military spouses are familiar with letting go. We let go of familiar places and routines when new orders come, we let go of friends who move away, we let go of places we have made our homes for a few precious years, we let go of things we don’t have space for in our new quarters, we let go of our husbands for weeks or months or even a year or more at a time. It is in this letting go, however that we are given an opportunity to grab hold of and cling to Jesus for all He has done and wants to work in our lives. If you aren’t living at the whim of Uncle Sam, or you aren’t up for a PCS any time soon, you can still take some steps to let go of anything that might be holding you back from all that God has planned for you. Start with some of your time, just give Him 5 minutes today, and maybe a couple more than that tomorrow. Build a relationship with Him and soon you will find that He is exactly what your heart has been longing for, that He is capable of filling all the voids where you have let go of something, that He is the only one to whom we must cling for the assurance of our status as an Eternal Survivor! So, I challenge you to let go of everything else and cling to the cross, to live with the tenacity of an Eternal Survivor and hold on for dear life to the only thing able to give us eternal life!