God Persists When We Resist

November 2nd, 2026

Monday, November 2nd

God Persists When We Resist

By: Pastor Steven Covington

Before I became a parent, I didn’t realize how much time I was going to spend trying to convince my exhausted children that they need to go to sleep, talking them into brushing their teeth, or selling broccoli as if it tastes like candy. We grow up, but we don’t stop resisting the good things we ought to do.

Here’s the deal: even if my kids resist my instructions, I persist, because I have their best interests at heart. And in time, my hope is that they will continue to do the right thing on their own even when I’m not looking over their shoulder. That’s the definition of integrity we learn when we’re young: “to do the right thing even when no one is watching.” I’ll say it like this: integrity is a trust exercise - believing that dad was right.

Jesus tells a great story about two brothers to make this point in Matthew 21. He says,

“What do you think? There was a man who had two sons. He went to the first and said, ‘Son, go and work today in the vineyard.’ 29 “‘I will not,’ he answered, but later he changed his mind and went. 30 “Then the father went to the other son and said the same thing. He answered, ‘I will, sir,’ but he did not go. 31 “Which of the two did what his father wanted?”

The best measure of where a person places their trust is not in the things they say they will do, but the things they do. God, help us to be the kind of people who will do the right thing because we trust that you love us and have good intentions for us – even if we resist you at first. Amen.