Got Faith?
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I write this in coming out of the most difficult roller coaster seasons of my life. Earlier today, while walking into my garage to get something out of my secondary fridge, the Lord said to me, “Well, are you going to hide in this blog or are you going to be honest?”
It stopped me in my tracks and confirmed once again that I can’t hide from God. He is always there. He sees and knows everything. Oh how easy it is to hide and act like I’ve got it all together when the truth is, God is the ONLY One who holds me together. God prompted me to start this blog in order to share my struggles and give hope to those who may need it. Acknowledging and owning one’s reality can be a very difficult pill to swallow. But to further share it with strangers is a complete act of faith.
I believe the bible is the incarnate word of God given to and written by His chosen ones. It is the infallible truth and is God’s love letter to us. God is who He says He is and He will do what He says He will do. God does not lie. He is only truth, life and love. Jeremiah 29:11 says that He has a plan and purpose for our life - plans of good and NOT of evil, to give us a future and a hope. My circumstances are my physical reality. But I have learned that it’s at my weakest that God is strongest in my life. The bible is packed FULL of God’s promises for our lives - no matter WHAT the circumstances are. God trumps every difficult, negative, tragic, heartbreaking or grueling circumstance. He PROMISES to give us BEAUTY for our ASHES. He will NEVER go against Himself - ever. To believe and trust this for ourselves regardless of our situation is what faith is. Hebrews 11:1 says faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen. So when you can barely see even one shred of good, faith says to stand and believe that the good will come; that you are NOT defeated by your circumstance but instead victorious through Christ who gives you strength to walk through it.
Faith is a funny thing. Since the beginning of time, God has continued to call His children to faith; to BELIEVE HIM and to TRUST HIM regardless of the gravity of a current situation.
For so long I have pressed through. I am well acquainted with brokenness and hurt. I know how it feels to have a sick heart because my hope has been deferred for so long. I know what it’s like to be a Christian woman wondering if the light of day will ever shine on my face again. I know what it feels like to doubt, and to wonder, “Where is God in all of this?” I know what it feels like to be incessantly crushed over and over again; to be unloved, unaccepted, criticized, and rejected on every level time and time again. I know what it is like to “lose” faith. And then I know what it’s like to have a thread of faith re-extended to me through a song, a sentence in a book, a lone scripture that seems to fall out of the sky, or a word from a trusted confidante - which for the moment is just enough to prompt me to not give up. The thread is like inhaling a huge gulp of air after swimming up from the bottom of a deep pool. It’s like a flashlight faintly illuminating only the next step ascending a very long staircase in the dark.
I made a choice so long ago to follow after God at any cost. The price has been very high. It has cost me everything. Picture a woman running after a hot air balloon leaving the ground and just before it lifts off with that last blast of propelling hot air, she makes the choice to grab the dangling rope and watches everything she once counted on quickly grow smaller and eventually fade in the distance. As she sails higher and higher, she has no idea where the balloon will take her but she knows it is her only promise of abundant life. She grips the rope for dear life, completely uncertain of her journey but trusting in the goodness it will bring. She looks upward and casts all her hope into the balloon, which is all she can see - when the reality is it’s the unseen wind that actually charts her course. That is me - and all of us who have chosen to follow Jesus.
Indeed, if people knew the details of my life I know beyond the shadow of a doubt, I would be deemed a nut case by the world’s standards. Many have questioned my choices to stand in faith - half the time with knees buckling - and believe for a seemingly impossible existence to one day turn around. My situation is so extreme that when I chose to grab the hot air balloon rope, I chose to abandon everything and mostly everyone I knew and trust in the only thing that was so much bigger than my impossibility - the Author and the Finisher of my faith; the only One who holds ALL the keys that unlock all the barricaded doors in my life; because only with God are ALL things possible. I’ve hung on not knowing where I would be taken but believing I would someday land safely and come out restored.
Finally, my balloon is landing and all around me I see the land of milk and honey. It is overwhelmingly sweet and beautiful and is the fruition of the scripture Galatians 6:9 Let us not become weary in doing good, for at the proper time we will reap a harvest if we do not give up.
There is no one that I can find who has experienced the fire I have continued to walk through and come out the other side successful. I have searched. I have found no one to use as an example. No human within my scope to question, how did they do it? Did it work? What was the secret to their success? There have been many valued encouragers along the way but none who have walked my road to the degree I have walked it. None except the ancient heroes of the bible - Noah and Moses to name only two.
Some modern day amazing person has actually built a replica of Noah’s Ark in Williamstown, Kentucky!
Noah was a righteous man who walked faithfully with God (Genesis 6:9) The Lord spoke to Noah and told him to build an arc. Seriously? Can you even picture that? In those times they had no running water, no markets, no conveniences - not one. And here Noah hears from God to build an ARC! What’s more, GOD GAVE HIM THE MEASUREMENTS!!! There were no lumbar yards, no boxes of nails, bolts, screws or hinges and no one in Home Depot to ask for help! And amidst CONSTANT public ridicule, he didn’t question. He obeyed and believed God IN SPITE of how crazy he appeared to the world he co-existed with. Am I the only one here who can not even FATHOM the enormity of that task? Moreover, Noah was 600 YEARS OLD when the flood came! The man was no spring chicken by any means! But he was obedient and faithful to what God called him to do and because he BELIEVED God for what appeared impossible if not CRAZY, he and his family and a ton of animals were spared and allowed to repopulate the earth. Hmmmm…called to a seemingly impossible task, stayed the course amidst incessant public scrutiny, and came out WAY ahead of the game. Big challenge, crazy odds, blinders on, stayed focused, HUGE payoff and reward. That’s what I want and am trusting God for.
Moving onto Moses. I love the story of Moses. First of all, Pharaoh, the king of Egypt had ordered a decree to kill all male babies born to Hebrew women because the Hebrew population was growing larger than the Egyptian population and Pharaoh was having a heck of a time keeping them at bey as slaves. Moses was born and his discerning Hebrew mother was able to hide him for 3 months. Knowing he would eventually be found and killed, she physically MADE a basket, put Moses in it and sent him down the river. WHAT??? I would be FREAKING out if that was my only option! Anyway, Pharaoh’s daughter found him and brought him in to be raised in the palace. So Moses was an Israelite (a Hebrew) - a culture HATED by the Egyptians, yet he was raised as an Egyptian in Pharaoh’s palace until God began to impress upon him this weird vibe and connection to the slaves - his own people. When Moses had grown up, he was watching the slaves at their hard labor one day and saw an Egyptian beating one of them. Well that was the last straw for Moses so he “whacked” the guy and buried his body in the desert. Pharaoh found out, tried to kill Moses so Moses high tailed it out of there, ended up in Midian, where he met his wife, had a son and was happy as a clam living as a shepherd until…..God came knocking on his door - THROUGH A BURNING BUSH THAT WAS NOT BURNING!!! WHAT???
So God proceeds to tell Moses, “Dude, you are my man and I want you to go BACK to Pharaoh and tell him to LET MY PEOPLE GO”. I would have peed my pants or fainted or both. Pharaoh hated Moses, tried to kill him and God wants him to go back there and tell him TO LET HIS PEOPLE GO? Crazy? Seemingly IMPOSSIBLE? Now I have to give Moses props for actually asking God all these “What if” questions and then telling God he picked the wrong guy because he wasn’t a good speaker. Good grief! Think about this for a second, against high odds, Moses was spared as a baby, raised in the palace as royalty, and then is called to be THE ONE who frees the Hebrew slaves from Egyptian captivity. Does any of this make any worldly sense? Heck NO! So like Noah, against insurmountable odds, Moses TRUSTED and BELIEVED what God told him. He WALKED IN FAITH back to Egypt and with God’s help, eventually freed all those slaves.
Pause for effect: the Hebrews had always lived in FLAT terrane. There were no mountains. It was hot desert sand. But after they were released, God led them through an absolute maze of mountainous valleys. NO person would have EVER found the outlet to the Red Sea, had they not had a guide along to direct them. So HOW did all those people get to the Red Sea? God was their guide. Exodus 13:21 says the LORD went ahead of them. He guided them during the day with a pillar of cloud, and he provided light at night with a pillar of fire. This allowed them to travel by day and by night. When did they rest? Were they ever able to stop? How far can you walk without stopping? It’s CRAZY to think about the details of the dynamics involved!
So they are all making a break for promised safety - thousands of them mind you - and here they successfully get through the mountains, which spills them out to the beach of the Red Sea - an obvious dead end. Now what? I’d be like, “Yep, that's it, we're done” which is probably close to what the Israelites were saying while panicking and thinking for sure they were going to die. After all, Pharaoh had 600 of THE BEST chariots in addition to all the other mediocre chariots hauling after them in order to annihilate the Hebrew escapees.
Moses tries to calm the people and assure them God is delivering them and God tells Moses to raise his staff and PART THE WATER so the people could walk through on dry land. WHAT??? One hundred feet of water spit in half. Ok folks walk on through! Can you EVEN imagine?
This is crazy! How is this possible? It’s unbelievable, truly. But it happened because God is in the business of making the impossible POSSIBLE. If you’re skeptical at all, scratch your head a bit longer. Going back to Creation, as God spoke the world into existence, He created a land bridge across the Red Sea as He was forming the earth connecting Egypt with Saudi Arabia. On the left side of the land bridge, the depth of the Red Sea is about 1700 feet deep. On the right side, the depth is just shy of 1000 feet. The land bridge itself if just over 100 feet deep. God had planned for this entire event to happen even before He created the world! But wait, it gets EVEN BETTER! Less than twenty years ago, golden chariots and wheels had been found, along with human and horse remains at the watery bottom of the land bridge. Remains were scattered along the entire 8 mile stretch. It’s one thing to read bible stories, but to have those seemingly fairytale stories backed with physical evidence is almost too phenomenal to comprehend.
There are archaeological remains scattered across the globe supporting biblical truth. You can not see God but you CAN see and often times touch proof of His Word which points all fingers back to God. He is amazing. His intricate love is beyond mortal comprehension. But when we reach for Him in the slightest way, He reaches back. He matches our devotion, belief, curiosity, boldness and trust. And then He surpasses it.
When everything in front of you is screaming there is no hope and more than anything you want to run and give up - DON’T!!I God shows up! He shows up if you continue to remain steadfast in believing He will show up. His word says in Deuteronomy 31:6 that He will NEVER leave us or forsake us. He tells us to be strong and courageous and to not be afraid or terrified because of them (our enemies or circumstances), for the LORD our God goes with us; he will never leave us nor forsake us.
Keep trusting and keep believing for your breakthrough. God will show up….at 11:59pm. More often than not God shows up at the last minute. His timing is perfect and He allows us to go through the fire because if we desire to grow, then we have to be willing to go through the difficulties - and they take time - on a clock of 60 minutes, He allows us to struggle, hurt, learn and grow for 59 of those minutes. And then, in the final minute - that’s when He shows up. Had I not been through the fire, I wouldn’t be where I am today. And although seemingly impossible, I’ve made it. I’ve crossed the Red Sea, suffered in the wilderness and am now crossing into the promised land of Milk and Honey. And it’s beyond what I ever thought it could or would be. God has come through above and beyond.
He wants to do the same for YOU.
Be willing to go the distance.
It’s worth it.
Father, I pray the blood of Jesus over each person who has read this very long blog. Show up for them, Lord. I pray stamina, endurance, and steadfastness. Bless them with fresh vision and perspective and when everything in them cries out to quit, give them new revelation about themselves and inspire them to learn about where they need to grow. Instead of focusing on their difficult circumstance, let them ask You what You want to teach them through the situation. Grow their belief in Your power, Your mercy, Your grace and Your love. Deepen their trust and their willingness to do things Your way instead of what they think they should do. In Jesus name, amen.