The Extra Mile: A 5-Day Devotional on Finding Faith and Purpose by Evan CraftSample

Day 3: When the Road Gets Hard

Training for a thousand-mile bike ride across the Andes sounded really exciting…until, that is, I actually started doing it. I hadn’t ridden a bike in years. I wanted to quit after mile 3. I tried to push on, but my legs were burning, and my pride was bruised.

But mile after painful mile, God began to speak. He reminded me that faith doesn’t grow in the easy places, it grows in resistance. Just like our muscles need pressure to get stronger, our spirits need challenges to go deeper.

And I wasn’t alone on this journey. My friend Alex rode with us on a prosthetic leg. His courage and strength continually inspired me - he showed me what it means to keep going when it would be easier to stop.

I learned that God never promised life would be easy. But He promises to be with us in the hard things. In our weakness, He shows His strength.

The Extra Mile Challenge: Where do you feel weak or overwhelmed right now? Could that be where God wants to show His strength?