There is no end date on this. How do I keep going when I cannot see when it stops, or whether it will?

“When thou passest through the waters, I will be with thee; and through the rivers, they shall not overflow thee: when thou walkest through the fire, thou shalt not be burned; neither shall the flame kindle upon thee.”

Isaiah spoke to a people facing exile, a hardship measured in decades rather than weeks. The wording is deliberate: when you pass through the waters, not if, and through them rather than around them. God does not offer the exiles an exit. He offers his presence for the entire length of the crossing, which was the only promise that would have been true.

“Wherefore seeing we also are compassed about with so great a cloud of witnesses, let us lay aside every weight, and the sin which doth so easily beset us, and let us run with patience the race that is set before us, Looking unto Jesus the author and finisher of our faith; who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is set down at the right hand of the throne of God.”

The writer addresses Christians tempted to abandon the faith under sustained pressure, and reaches for the image of a distance race. The word translated patience means endurance under load, the runner's virtue rather than the waiter's. He tells them to fix their eyes on a single point ahead. Anyone who has run any distance knows why: you cannot look at the whole course and keep moving.