Thursday, October 19, 2017

Finding Faith in a Weary World

Huntsville Botanical Garden
What does a Christian do when faith is hard to find? World injustices or the evil days in which we live can make it harder to believe Christ is on the throne and in control. Maybe your pain is much closer to home, a divorce, a financial disaster, the death of a loved one for whom you diligently prayed over.

When we walk through life seasons that are heartbreakingly painful, we have to make the conscious choice to believe what the Word of God says. In the bad times, clinging to the scriptures is crucial. It is just as important in the good times, but when we are brokenhearted, often the last thing we want to do is pray.  We may open the Bible only to find the words bouncing off our eyeballs and into the abyss.  Find one scripture that speaks to you and believe it, hold on to it; it is your lifeline.

Fear plays a big part in our moods and emotions. Fear doesn’t always creep in, often it walks up and slap us, stopping us dead in our tracks. We can’t let these days filled with divisiveness, threats of North Korea bombs, war, or people doing unspeakable evil to each other cause us to forget that God already knew about such things. He said there would be wars and rumors of wars, nations rising against nations, famines and earthquakes in various places, and he warned us that because of the increase of wickedness, the love of most will grow cold. But He also told us not to be afraid.

Not being afraid isn’t easy, but the more we learn to put our trust in Him, the clearer things become. When we are clearly thinking, we can see things for what they are. We aren’t fighting people…flesh and blood…we are fighting satan and his evil crew, and they use people as tools to kill, steal, and destroy.

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I saw this on Facebook: 
Fear does not stop death, it stops life.

The Bible tells us repeatedly, “Don’t fear.” But how do we do that when faith is slipping, and there are real threats surrounding us? How do we trust Him?

The answer is relationship. When we draw near to Him, he draws near to us. The closer we are to our Source of life, the more we trust Him. The more we trust Him, the less fear we have, and we are able to love Him with our whole hearts. The more love and less fear we have, the more we are willing to do the things we are commanded to do for the kingdom of God:

Love our neighbor as ourselves
Feed the hungry
Care for the orphans and widows
Proclaim the good news of Christ

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We know life isn't easy, and we don't always understand our heartaches. But God promised to save us, to be our peace, to comfort us, and to hold us in His hand.   We have to not only read the words written in the pages of the Bible, we must believe them with our entire being.

The eyes of the Lord are on the righteous,
and His ears are attentive to their cry

The righteous cry out, and the Lord hears them;
He delivers them from all their troubles

The Lord is close to the brokenhearted
and saves those who are crushed in spirit.

The righteous person may have many troubles,
but the Lord delivers him from them all
(Psalm 34)

Don’t focus on the problem. 
Focus on the Solution. 
His name is Jesus.


2 comments:

  1. Amen to keep the focus on Jesus. That was my word of the year "focus". I need to keep reminding myself to turn my eyes to him. It is only then that I find true peace and can dust myself off so to speak and keep living in this world the way he would want me to.

    betty

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