Diligence – Definition: careful and persistent work or effort; constant and earnest effort to accomplish what is undertaken.

It is increasingly interesting to watch the lives of the people who were on the South African singing reality show The Voice SA with me recently.

Throughout the show, we continuously spoke about the fact that our eventual placement and even first year following the show didn’t really matter in the end. What mattered most when we left was consistency, in other words, working hard, and not riding on the “success” of the show because we were all going into the same industry. Therefore, the people who constantly put in the work were going to be fine, no matter what.

We are all in our own lanes, hoping to do best with what God has given each of us. But in order to finish our lives having multiplied whatever gifts we have, we have to have been diligent.

Here are four keys to being diligent, and finishing this year well. I have decided to use the life story of the Bible character Joseph to demonstrate them:

  • Realise that diligence easily decreases with increasing age and disappointing experiences. Therefore, we need to consciously counteract this tendency to slow down. Joseph remained diligent even when it seemed that his hard work and dedication were taking him backwards.
  • Realise that the challenges and failures of being a leader (which I expect that anyone who is pursuing something that will make a large scale difference, is), that everyone experiences, can make a person sluggish and lazy. Hebrews 10:38 says it like this: “But my righteous one will live by faith. And I take no pleasure in the one who shrinks back.”
  • Don’t be intimidated, but rather, inspired by those who’ve done better and try to imitate them. 1 Corinthians 4:16 says the following: “Therefore, I urge you to imitate me…”
  • Diligence will cause you to rise to the top wherever you find yourself. Remember Joseph? His brothers were really irritated by him – but he got sold into slavery because of how trustworthy he was to his father, Jacob, and because of his excellence he over-achieved wherever he went.

It can be frustrating to feel that you are not seeing the results of all of your hard work into your career, school work, hobby, or body (LOL). But patience and consistency always pay off in the end.

“We want each of you to show this same diligence to the very end, so that what you hope for may be fully realised. We do not want you to become lazy, but to imitate those who through faith and patience, inherits what has been promised.” – Hebrews 6:11-12

Not perfection, but excellence

We all know that striving for perfection can be extremely draining, and that’s why we aim for excellence (Definition: the quality of excelling, an outstanding feature). Jesus Christ was the only person on earth who was perfect, and the sacrifice he made for us allows us not only to enjoy life, but to explore and experiment without being scared of failure!