All tagged doubt
Please join me today as I contemplate God's ability to do those things we ask of Him, and the faith it requires for us to trust that He not only can but will do them.
“Now to him who is able to do far more abundantly than all that we ask or think, according to the power at work within us, to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, forever and ever. Amen.”
Ephesians 3:20-21 ESV
As I thought about how we sometimes come face to face with our doubts, or suffer from a dwindling faith, I looked back on my own life as a Christian and could see how I had experienced moments like this too. Then I would come to the point where I realized that moving about and doing works doesn’t insure that I am devoted to my faith in God and Jesus. Over the years I have watched as people professed their faith, began frantically working in the church, and for church causes, then suddenly disappeared from the pews. They had missed the most important part of their conversion... that we can't earn it... it is a gift, and a free gift at that.
Has Jesus ever given you a word? Has he asked you to do something that shook you or something you have convinced yourself couldn't possibly come from Him because it seemed impossible for you to accomplish? Well, think about this for a moment and then read on.
Our trust should be in the Lord, but more than that, all of the confidence we exhibit is comprised of Him. If we trust in Him and exhibit His confidence, then we will be truly blessed. The doubt we once had will be gone, and the fear will have been overcome by the confident nature of our Lord. Oh, what a blessing this would be.
When we are set upon by trouble, and we are pierced through by life’s talons, what is it that we scream out in pain? When we are struggling in the world, and are wounded, do our cuts cause us to cry out desperately in our suffering like a young hare in its distress? In those darkest moments do we doubt God, and ask Him loudly, “Why have you forgotten us?”
One of the most frequently observed character flaws that one observes in Christians is anxiousness. It seems that as hard as we might try to suppress it we find it bubbling right back up. So what can we do when things around us begin to make us anxious? We know that God is there to help us, so why do we worry, fret, and become anxious? Yet we do, and quite often it isn’t just the big things in our lives that cause this, but the small and trivial ones too. So we turn to scripture for hope, and find three ways to combat this… prayer, supplication, and thanksgiving. In this way we ask God that His will be done, and to take away whatever is making us anxious.
Have we ever stepped out in faith, and then somewhere along the way let doubt overcome us? Have we had a moment like Peter did in which he started walking across the water in obedience to Jesus, but let what was happening around him, the wind and the waves, undermine his faith? Perhaps our moment was different, maybe we were called to answer a mission need in a foreign country, but some danger in that country caused us not to go. Or just maybe it was a small still voice telling us to talk to someone about the Lord, and at the last minute we feared that they might have an adverse reaction, and turned away. How strong is our faith today, and are we still walking on the water?
We have learned to never stop praying, but are we sorrowful in our prayers? Our troubles often prompt us to come to the Lord broken, with great despair, and our needs hanging around our necks like heavy weights. But, although these are things we can’t solve for ourselves, they are nothing that our Lord God can’t easily solve, or lift from us. When we are praying before God there is no need to lament. We should rejoice to be in His presence, and we should be filled with joy and thanksgiving because as Christians our God defends us, and provides for us. What is our mood when we pray?
Having a conviction is to have a firmly held belief in something. Is this how we describe our belief in Jesus Christ? Is this how we confessed it to be on the day we first accepted Him as our Lord and Savior? On that day did what we were unable to see become alive to us? Well it is Eastertide, that time between Easter and Pentecost, and what better time to reaffirm our core belief, and conviction, in Jesus Christ.
What is the condition of our hope in Jesus Christ today? Are we dejected, walking disappointedly, and in possible disbelief, towards Emmaus, or are we facing life with hopeful prayer on our lips, and with our eyes fixed on the sky as we anticipate His imminent return? Sometimes the world deals us a terrible blow that knocks the wind out of us, and we find ourselves facing a crisis of faith, but the proper way to deal with those occurrences is to redouble the intensity of our prayers, and lean on the Holy Spirit for the remembrance of all we have been promised… “I am with you always”, and “I have overcome the world.” to mention just two.
How many times has Jesus blessed you by pouring the grace of God over you as He interceded on your behalf? Sometimes though we have to wait, and on such occasions it becomes easy for us to wrongly reach the conclusion that God’s blessings are not eminent, are uncertain at best, or perhaps that He is granting them sparingly, one drop at a time. In truth His blessings flow like a gushing spring if we will only believe, and have faith in His promise to provide for us. The Lord sent his own Son to redeem us by His suffering and death so why would he not give us the relatively small things we ask for in life?
Second only to fear, doubt causes us to hesitate in our faith more than anything else. When God asks us to step out for Him, we may be reluctant to because we are afraid, but almost as likely as the feeling of fear, what freezes us in our tracks is doubt. When we are uncertain if He will act and see us through our tough spots it is very hard to take those bold steps of faith. Trusting in God requires that we defeat the doubt that is crippling us.