Faith, Hope and Joy

I wasn’t going to blog today but God has encouraged my soul – I feel joy and I want to share it. My boy is now 9 days overdue and impatience has been challenging my joy.

A few days ago Sarah read Hebrews 12 and was encouraged by the rhema thought that while we ask God for perfect circumstances, that He is looking to develop perfect faith within us.

We can be so focussed on circumstances, results and achievements that it’s possible to let them define our lives and our joy. God is focussed on our hearts, He is looking to perfect our faith so that we grow in maturity, fully trusting in Him.

The circumstances around the first birth in our family were quite difficult. But we are encouraged to remember that throughout that time we didn’t give up our faith and we didn’t give in to the circumstances. It became our family’s defining moment and testimony of faith. God is good.

Sometimes things don’t happen at the time according to our plans and our prayers. But who are we to say that they didn’t somehow happen according to God’s plans? So our faith, our hope and our joy cannot be limited to times of favourable circumstances.

Our faith, hope and joy are based on the goodness, the power and the promise of God, regardless of the circumstances. So we should keep our eyes on Jesus, who is perfecting our faith – especially in and through difficulty.

Thinking that success is a set of circumstances, results or achievements will do our heads in and could even destroy our faith. God is responsible for the results. So ‘success’ for us is in never giving up and always looking to Jesus.

Abraham had an amazing promise (a son) in the most ridiculous circumstances (barrenness and very old age). He is remembered as a man of faith not because he had a son (God did that) but because he didn’t weaken his faith (Romans 4:19), and he did not waver through unbelief but was strengthened in his faith in God (4:20).

Abraham was, “fully persuaded that God had power to do what he had promised” (4:21). The Bible says that this was a credit to him in his relationship with God.

By entering through faith into what God has always wanted to do for us—set us right with him, make us fit for him—we have it all together with God because of our Master Jesus. And that's not all: We throw open our doors to God and discover at the same moment that he has already thrown open his door to us. We find ourselves standing where we always hoped we might stand—out in the wide open spaces of God's grace and glory, standing tall and shouting our praise.
There's more to come: We continue to shout our praise even when we're hemmed in with troubles, because we know how troubles can develop passionate patience in us, and how that patience in turn forges the tempered steel of virtue, keeping us alert for whatever God will do next. In alert expectancy such as this, we're never left feeling shortchanged. Quite the contrary—we can't round up enough containers to hold everything God generously pours into our lives through the Holy Spirit! (Romans 5:1-5 The Message)

God is good. God is able. God is perfecting our faith. Let’s believe.