The Power of Creation—Part 2

When you trust God you trust an almighty creator, who is able to help you, no matter how difficult your circumstances.  It will also be of great help to you to consider the providence of God.  Providence is but creation continued.  The same power that made all things maintains all things.  This is a great comfort and relief to the soul, because it shows us that God forever remains the same.  As the Lord continually upholds and governs His universe by His almighty power, so He continually works in the hearts of believers to accomplish His purposes.

We should also often recall specific, past instances of God’s grace and power in our lives.  This will give strong assurance to our faith.  In Ephesians 3:20, Paul asserts that God’s power at work in the hearts of believers is far beyond our comprehension.  He doesn’t speak of the power which made the world, or raised Christ, or produced the miracles recorded in Scripture.  He directs our attention to the divine “power at work within us.”  This is truly breathtaking!  More tomorrow.

The Power of Creation—Part 1

We must not limit God’s power to the measure of our strength or faith.  The power that He exercises on our hearts is to be measured by nothing less than the power He displayed in creating the universe out of nothing!  In Psalm 124:8, in a context of overwhelming troubles, David proclaims that “Our help is in the name of the Lord, who made heaven and earth.”  It is as if he had said, “As long as I can see heaven and earth, I will never doubt God; I will be able to trust Him.”  Whatever adversity we go through in life, we must always rely on God as “a faithful Creator” (1 Peter 4:19).  If our Lord does indeed have the power to create everythiing out of nothing, surely He can provide whatever strength we need, in any situation.  This is worth taking a few days to explore.

The Greatest Test—Part 5

To endure the greatest trials we must have faith.  Christians must understand the nature of biblical faith and how it is grounded on the promises of God.  Faith must have an object.  We must believe something.  Without a promise, faith has nothing to believe in.  Without God’s promises, there can be no biblical faith.  And what exactly are God’s promises?

The promises we find in Scripture reveal how far and for what God is to be trusted.  God’s loving purposes for believers are declared in His promises.  They show us the great blessings the Lord has in store for us.  They circumscribe the boundaries that our faith must operate within.  We cannot exercise faith on something that the Lord has never promised us.  Faith that is firmly grounded on divine promises draws our hearts away from worldly pleasures.  The great work of faith is to bring our hearts to God.  Faith cannot do this if our hearts are dominated by desires for the things of this world.  To break this domination, God’s promises reveal by how much the happiness of Christians excels that of unbelievers.  What a  tragedy it is when a person seeks for nothing beyond the pleasures of this life!  Faith in God’s precious promises breaks this fatal bondage by assuring believers of God’s unshakable love for them and by filling their future with hope.

The Greatest Test—Part 4

The Lord’s seemingly inexplicable command to Abraham (in Genesis 22) to sacrifice his son Isaac was a test of Abraham’s faith.  The patriarch would stand or fall by faith.  More than any other virtue, it is faith that determines the fruitfulness and usefulness of our lives to God.  Every Christian’s faith, like Abraham’s, stands on the great foundation stone of God’s power.  If you want to have strong faith, faith that glorifies God, you must think often about the power of God.  God’s almighty power is the great encouragement of faith.  The very life of faith lies in dwelling often on our Lord’s power to fulfill His promises.  Whenever we exercise faith, we must have a promise of God.  Without a promise, what we think of as faith is merely imagination.  Without a promise, faith has nothing to believe.  God’s promises are what we believe; the reason we believe them is His ability to fulfill those promises. If we truly believe that God’s almighty power is engaged when He fulfills one of His promises to us, we will regard faithful obedience to His will better than all the pleasures of the world.  No matter how costly the sacrifice, a Christian will never be a loser for having obeyed God.  Tested faith is more precious than gold (1 Peter 1:7).  

The Greatest Test—Part 3

How was Abraham able to submit to God’s command to sacrifice his son Isaac?  What was in the great patriarch’s heart as he contemplated killing his son?  Could such a deed really be God’s will?  The fulfillment of all God’s promises were dependent on Isaac.  Wouldn’t Abraham’s future be sacrificed along with Isaac?  Hebrews 11:19 tells us that Abraham “considered that God was able even to raise him from the dead.”  Here we are given an inside view of the working of Abraham’s faith in this trial.  Nothing is so great an enemy to faith as human reason, when it debates with faith for the throne of our hearts.  But when our reason serves faith, what a great friend it is!  In this passage, we see how Abraham reasoned in faith in this awesome trial.  He considered that God was able (don’t miss this!) to fulfill all the promises that concerned Isaac, no matter what obstacles were in the way.  He believed that God would turn the whole course of nature upside down rather than let one of His promises fail.  It was this belief that supported Abraham’s faith.  The patriarch believed what every Christian must believe—that God is able.  Our part is to trust God and obey His will in all things; it is on God’s shoulders to fulfill His promises.  Duty belongs to us; the burden of success must be left in God’s hands.  Simply obeying our Lord and leaving the consequences to Him eases our souls of a burden we were never meant to carry.  “Cast your burden on the Lord, and He will sustain you” (Psalm 55:22).  We don’t cast our duty on the Lord, trust and obedience remains our part.  But we are to cast all our anxieties for the outcome on Him (1 Peter 5:6).

The Greatest Test—Part 2

God will test us in different ways at different times.  He may at one time ask a Christian to give up something or someone very dear to them, as He did to Abraham.  You  may be called upon just once in your life to make such a costly sacrifice.  How you respond could determine the usefulness and fruitfulness of the rest of your life.  Will you respond with murmuring and impatience?  Or will you freely submit to the will of God, acknowledging His wisdom and sovereign right to deal with you as He deems best?

You will also be tested every day in regard to sinful desires that must be rejected.  It is in the things of the world we love most, the sins that we cherish most, that daily tests will come.  It is in putting to death the corruptions which are so contrary to spiritual life, and yet so deeply rooted in our nature, that we will be called upon to give up our Isaac.

The Greatest Test—Part 1

Certainly the greatest test of faith that Abraham ever faced was the command of God to sacrifice his son Isaac (Genesis 22).  Isaac was the son of his wife Sarah, the son of his old age, the son in whom all the promises of God were to be fulfilled.  Abraham loved Isaac above everthing else, well...almost everything.  Abraham proved by his willingness to obey God in this awesome test that he loved and feared the Lord above all.  Believe me, God will ask nothing less of His choicest saints!  I’m not sure whether or not He tests all Christians to this degree, but our hearts must be prepared for such trials if we desire His greatest blessings.  To stand with Abraham we must be prepared to sacrifice our Isaac—what we love most in this world.  I will take a couple of days to focus on what we can learn from such tests.