Trusting God
So also Abraham “believed God, and it was credited to him as
righteousness.” Understand, then, that
those who have faith are children of Abraham.
Scripture foresaw that God would justify the Gentiles by faith, and
announced the gospel in advance to Abraham: “All nations will be blessed
through you.” So those who rely on faith
are blessed along with Abraham, the man of faith.
–Gal 3:6-9
God is always at work in our lives. Situations come and go, but God directs our
paths. Joel Osteen (b. 1963), pastor and
televangelist said, “I believe if you keep your faith, you keep your trust, you
keep the right attitude, if you’re grateful, you’ll
see God open up new doors.” Jeremiah
11:1-5 urges us to obey the terms of God’s covenant
and be his people. Of this nature is the
love of God. 1 Peter 2:1-5 tells us to
rid ourselves of all malice, deceit, hypocrisy, envy, and slander. For those who have tasted the Lord is
good. On the theme of love, Desmond Tutu
(b. 1931), a retired South African Anglican bishop and social rights activist
reminded us: “You don’t choose your family. They are God’s gift to
you, as you are to them.” We therefore have
to accept – not some, but all of our family members, even when
it seems they have problems.
God’s View of Us
God loves us all. In the
world some give the impression that they have a special place with him. These individuals could be
self-righteous. Albert Einstein (1879–1955),
a German-born theoretical physicist wrote, “Before God we are equally wise –
and equally foolish.” But we could
enhance who we are if we heed the advice of Voltaire (1694–1778),
French Enlightenment writer, who said: “God gave us the gift of life; it is up
to us to give ourselves the gift of living well.”
It ought to be remembered that our talent is God’s gift to
us. We have to recognize God is wiser
than humans, and his weakness is stronger than ours (1 Cor 1:25-26). That’s why believers
should speak the Word of God with the strength he provides (1 Pet 4:11-12), and
they will be blessed.
Be a Blessing
The Lord is always with us and we should have no fear (Isa
41:10). It’s him who
gives us strength and power (Isa 40:28-31).
Joel Osteen said, “When you focus on being a blessing, God makes sure
that you are always blessed in abundance.”
But should believers pursue these blessings? Saint Teresa of Calcutta (1910–1997),
an Albanian-Indian Roman Catholic nun wrote, “We need to find God, and he
cannot be found in noise and restlessness.
God is in the friend of silence.
See how nature – trees, flowers, grass –
grows in silence; see the stars, the moon and the sun, how they move in silence
… we need silence to be able to touch souls.”
Trusting and loving God is a process that takes time. The Word of God is right, true, and faithful
(Ps 33:4-6). With dedication to God’s
Word believers could say like Joyce Meyer (b. 1943), a Christian author and
speaker: “I may not be where I want to be, but thank God I am not where I used
to be.”
No comments:
Post a Comment