Years of blood, sweat, and tears blasted off into the sky as SpaceX attempted to be the first private company to put a rocket into orbit. The first attempt had failed due to a fuel-line leak that ignited a fire. Here then was the company’s attempt to redeem itself.

But as the starship moved into the second stage of its flight, the fuel in the tank began to slosh…the dreaded slosh. The SpaceX team had “slosh” ranked eleventh on the list of things that could scuttle the shuttle. But every risk they addressed would come with a tradeoff. In this case, adding a slosh inhibiter would also increase the weight of the ship. So they had decided to mitigate the first ten risk factors and accept the small risk of slosh, and hope for the best. It turned out to be a disastrous decision. Like the rocket they launched before it and the one they would launch after it, the second mission went up in a blaze of optimism and came crashing down on their heads in fiery defeat and soul-crushing debris.

In this world, you will have slosh, but take heart, Christ has overcome the world. The SpaceX story is not about Christ, but Christ does teach us to take note of admirable qualities that we see in the world. We are not to emulate the sinful stuff, but we are to learn from what the world does well. “The master commended the dishonest manager for his shrewdness. For the sons of this world are more shrewd in dealing with their own generation than the sons of light” (Luke 16:8).

In the case of Elon Musk, you’ve gotta hand it to him for his grit. When a fuel leak brought down his first rocket, and slosh brought down his second, and a cooling system failure brought down the third, most people thought SpaceX was dead. But within hours of the third failure, Elon wrote, “SpaceX will not skip a beat in execution going forward. There should be absolutely zero question that SpaceX will prevail in reaching orbit. I will never give up, and I mean never.”

When the SpaceX team read Elon’s words, they were inspired. One said, “He told us to go for it, and it blew me away.” Another said, “I think most of us would have followed him into the gates of hell carrying suntan oil after that. Within moments, the energy of the building went from despair and defeat to a massive buzz of determination.”

Now, you have to understand, in early 2008, both SpaceX and Tesla were on the brink of bankruptcy. None of the SpaceX rockets had made orbit and none of the Tesla roadsters had made it to the road. Production costs in both of Elon’s companies were ballooning. The financial crisis of 2008 made it more likely than not that the companies would fail. The only thing that could keep them afloat was raising more capital investment. But remember, this was during the financial crisis of 2008. Who was willing to pour money into risky projects during the financial crisis?

The advice that most experts gave Elon was to tank either Tesla or SpaceX to let the other one survive. However, Elon Musk, not raised Christian, did have some biblical background. There were seasons of his life where his divorced mother dragged him to Sunday School. And from those days, Elon remembered a story about Solomon, the one where Solomon said “split the baby,” but only in order to test the contending women as to who truly loved the baby.

1 Kings 3:25-27 tells the story: “And the king said, “Divide the living child in two, and give half to the one and half to the other.” Then the woman whose son was alive said to the king, because her heart yearned for her son, “Oh, my lord, give her the living child, and by no means put him to death.” But the other said, “He shall be neither mine nor yours; divide him.” Then the king answered and said, “Give the living child to the first woman, and by no means put him to death; she is his mother.”

Elon remembered this story when he considered the advice he was being given about his companies. These were his “babies”, so to speak. And from this story, he decided that he cared too much about the people and the missions of Tesla and SpaceX. He would sooner work himself into the ground than give up on either of them, to let it die. He refused to divide the baby. Instead, like a man in a trance of steadfast determination, he worked day and night to make a way to keep his babies alive. And he did. Barely. But he did.

Elon is far from an example of Christlikeness. But he does exhibit a commendable character trait that Christians can learn from. Elon has grit. The old expression is helpful, “when the going gets tough, the tough get going.” Grit is the resolve to never quit. We can learn from Elon Musk, a picture of grit and determination. Sometimes you have to grit your teeth, agonize over ways to save your babies, like Elon did with SpaceX and Tesla.

Jesus would apply the Luke 16 parable of the shrewd manager this way: “One who is faithful in a very little is also faithful in much, and one who is dishonest in a very little is also dishonest in much. If then you have not been faithful in the unrighteous wealth, who will entrust to you the true riches? And if you have not been faithful in that which is another’s, who will give you that which is your own? No servant can serve two masters, for either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and money” (Luke 16:10-13).

So, Jesus’s lesson is not about building companies to become the richest man in the world. But he does want us to notice something (Luke 16:8) about the richest man in the world. He got that way by grit. And grit is commendable.

If you run a marathon and you seem to be failing, show some grit and push yourself to make it to the finish line, even if the blisters bleed. If you run a ministry and it seems to flailing, show some grit and make it better. If you run anything in life, from the dishwasher to a fortune 500 company, show some grit and find a way to make it work.

The people of this world are living for their own kingdoms; we’re living for the kingdom of Christ. “Whatever your hand finds to do, do it with your might, for there is no work or thought or knowledge or wisdom in Sheol, to which you are going.” (Ecclesiastes 9:10). “And whatever you do, in word or deed, do everything in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through him” (Colossians 3:17). “Whatever you do, work heartily, as for the Lord and not for men, knowing that from the Lord you will receive the inheritance as your reward. You are serving the Lord Christ” (Colossians 3:23-24).

In this world, you will face slosh, but take heart, Christ has overcome the world. So, show some grit. Say, “I will never give up. And I mean never.”

In Christ,

Pastor Jeff