“And it is impossible to please God without faith. Anyone who comes to him must believe that God exists and that he rewards those who sincerely seek him.” Hebrews 11:6

Have you ever had a day, week, month, or maybe even year that just didn’t go as you wanted, planned, or expected? There are times in our lives when everything seems to be in sync, when God makes things clear, and we are sure of where we are headed. He gives us His vision of what He wants from us. But then there seems to be periods of our life that appear to be a jumbled mess, a time of not seeing God’s clear vision of where He is leading us, or not knowing what He is calling us to do.

Navigating those times of uncertainty can be difficult. Uncertainty will either overwhelm us with fear or we will overcome it by faith. How do we do it? Walking by faith and not by sight requires us to study and learn about the confidence and trust, through faith, that God wants to produce in our lives. We do it by experience. If Noah had seen the rain, he wouldn’t have needed faith to build the ark. If Moses had seen the Red Sea already parted, he wouldn’t have needed faith to raise his staff above the water and lead the Israelites to the other side. If David had seen Goliath already defeated, he wouldn’t have needed faith to stand and fight. If God showed us everything He was going to do in our lives, we wouldn’t need faith to follow Him.

I think that’s why the writer of Hebrews has this beautiful chapter (11) to remind us of our great examples of faith. These were not perfect people, neither are we. But like the people of God who have come before us, we believe God is who he says he is and does what he says he will do, but it takes practice and learning to trust and have faith in what we cannot see. We talked in the last post about belief coming before faith. But how did the people of old have such faith, especially when asked to do things that didn’t make sense. The first step was belief, the second step required obedience and trust. And those steps are the same for us today.

The old saying, “You’ve got to crawl before you walk, walk before you run…” is true, especially in the Christian life. When we begin the journey of faith, devoting our lives to God, it takes commitment and obedience. Learning about true faith takes time and studying God’s Word. It requires a daily devotion to seeking God in all aspects of our life. Then God will give you experiences, tasks to do, things to learn, to help you grow in your knowledge of faith, trusting in Him along the way. Some of these experiences will be easy and some, not so much.

Our great examples of faith from the Bible got it wrong sometimes, so will we. We will step into things and places God never intended. We will say and do things that God wouldn’t approve of. We will have times when we are confused and unsure. We will act out of fear. We will screw up , just like they did. We will sin, just like they did. But eventually we began to learn, through experience, what wholeheartedly trusting and having faith in God is all about.

Take Abraham for example. In Romans 4, we read that Abraham was counted as righteous from God because of his faith. If you know the story of Abraham, he is counted righteous because he trusted God when God tested his faith, asking him to sacrifice Issac on Mount Moriah. (Genesis Ch. 22) But before that happened, before Abraham learned how to begin having trust and faith in God, he had experiences, trials, temptations, and fears he had to overcome first.

In Genesis chapter 12, God had promised Abraham that He would be the “father of many nations” even though he and Sarah had no children. Instead of believing God, trusting Him and having faith, at the first sign of trouble in Canaan, Abraham flees to Egypt, convinces Pharoah that Sarah is his sister, and gives her to him for his haram. Why would he do that? Out of fear…because she was beautiful and saving his own skin was more important. His priorities were a bit backwards to say the least, and he hadn’t yet had experiences with God testing his faith. Do you think he learned from it? Maybe, somewhat, but not really. How do we know? Because he does it again in Genesis chapter 20. Abraham passes off Sarah as his sister to King Abimelech and gives her to him to be his wife. Why? Because he hadn’t fully learned from his mistakes the first time. But in the end God worked it out. King Abimelech had all right to have Abraham killed, but he doesn’t, he shows him God’s grace and mercy. Why would he spare Abraham’s life? Because being right in the eyes of God and righting the wrong was more important to him. In other words, he wanted a clean conscience. He ends up giving Sarah back to Abraham, gives him servants, livestock, money, and land. How did Abraham respond to all this? He fell on his knees in repentance and prays to God. He learned from it. As a result, God restores Abraham, heals King Abimelech, and heals Sarah and all the female servants of their infertility. Abraham had learned through this trial, through his fear and mistakes, how to humble himself and begin to trust that God is who he says he is and does what only He can do.

Along our journey, we too must learn faith through our trials, temptations, and fears. We will stumble, we will fall, and God wants us to repent and learn from our mistakes and experiences, no matter how big, or small they may be. God, in His grace and mercy, offers us a way to be reconciled to Him. If we repent, confess with our mouth that Jesus Christ is Lord, and believe in our heart that God raised Him from the dead, we will be saved. (Romans 10:9) Notice it says WILL BE saved. Not maybe, will. We seek Him with our whole heart and God will forgive our iniquities.

When we go through periods where things are foggy and unsure, we can be confident that God is with us even when we can’t see Him working or feel His presence. We take each day, one step at a time, in obedience, moment by moment, hour by hour. We choose to praise him in the storms. We choose to rest in Him knowing that His yoke is easy which makes our burdens lighter. We choose to put away the things in our past in order to follow God’s plan for us. We choose to love Him and seek Him even when we don’t understand. Why? Because he first loved us and laid down his life for our sins on the cross. Jesus says in John 15:9-17 that He loves us just as God loves him and we are to remain in that love. We did not choose him, he chose us to be in partnership with Him, under God’s command, in order that we might bring the love of God that we possess to our neighbors. He has called us to go into the world and produce lasting fruit. We are His chosen.

As we move through our journey of faith, these things become easier, even when we are in the midst of trials, temptations, or fears . We learn to walk…walking with God and relying on Him in everything we do. Then we can run the race with endurance, keeping our eyes on Jesus, in order to bring love and the Good News to those we encounter.

God loves you and so do I,

Leslie

photo courtesy of dailyverses.net