The basis for our relationship with God is His absolute integrity. God is who He says He says, therefore, we can trust Him.
Nowhere is this seen and experienced more clearly than His complete faithfulness to what He has promised. The 7,000 promises in God’s Word form the basis for His operating system with man. He tells us what we are to do and what He will do in response. Then, He looks to see if we will believe Him.
Our faith is not mere head knowledge, but is “walking and talking like what God says is really true” as one of my mentors, Manley Beasley used to say. Real faith is always accompanied by an action verb: Noah prepared an ark; Abraham obeyed God and went out as the Lord instructed; Moses refused to be called the son of Pharaoh’s daughter; Daniel continued to pray against the world’s commands.
If we will take Him at His word, we will find Him always faithful to His Word. Our faith will grow and the world will see continued demonstrations of the reality of God.
A FOUNDATIONAL ILLUSTRATION
One of the early pictures of this exchange is found in God’s promise to give the childless Abraham a son at the age of 99. It was humanly impossible (which God loves to specialize in). Yet God made a promise.
Abraham and Sarah’s faith was the righteous response. Even their physical intimacy at this past-child-bearing age was an act of faith.
And then we read this result ...
Then the LORD took note of Sarah as He had said, and the LORD did for Sarah as He had promised. So Sarah conceived and bore a son to Abraham in his old age, at the appointed time of which God had spoken to him … Now Abraham was one hundred years old when his son Isaac was born to him (Genesis 21:1-5, emphasis mine).
YOUR STORY
… should carry faith-markers such as this. God is calling you the rest of your life to trust Him, based on His promises, and walk and talk like what He says is really true. If you do, you will discover the absolute integrity of our promise-keeping God and the world will see God through you.
Faithful Father, open my eyes to the daily promises from Your word for me. Challenge me to greater faith. Allow circumstances that place me, like Abraham, in positions where I must trust You. Give me the grace to believe and the continued response of faith to Your promises. May my life carry hundreds of stories of Your faithfulness to show to the world the integrity of our Everlasting God!
As a pastor for the last 55 years, I have had the joy of being encouraged and blessed and prayed for by so many people. It is what carries you in your task of shepherding people. As I look back over five decades of ministry, their love has dramatically enriched my life.
But also, a pastor leads. And when anyone leads, there are almost always some who disagree.
