In one of my former ministries, there were two families that barely preceded me there. One was brought to faith and discipled by my predecessor and the other had recently moved to the area and were looking for a good church. They both had kids of a similar age and they were both broken families. The one had been married previously, then divorced, then reconciled after the wife had three kids from a mediating relationship (they had one child together), and the second had been divorced and were a blended family she brought two boys and he brought three boys to the relationship. Over the years the kids grew and were eventually making big life decisions. During these years both families were going through tremendously difficult times, in both families the kids were making sketchy decisions and the parents were at their wits end trying to get things to work and keep their homes in order. Eventually, the trials and hardships became too much for the reconciled couple, the three kids from the wife’s other relationship decided to exercise their right to choose who to live with and moved out, their marriage started to fall apart again, and eventually we never saw them in church, they ended up falling away. The other family had their sons decide to go off to college. Two joined the military and eventually went to college while the youngest went straight to college. Through it all the family stuck it out even though a couple of the other sons went somewhat wayward. Now two of the sons are married and raising their families back in the church they came from. What’s the difference? Perseverance, Genuine Faith, and Grace.