Faith
Today during QT a familiar voice spoke again, a message that did not change its tune despite my having first hoped it would before i repeatedly ignored it over the next few months. It was a reminder, and listening this time ironically made me a little less restless. There was peace, there was always peace, but this one thing is hard to comprehend, harder still to obey. There was no insistence, but it was a gentle statement of fact, said with tons of love, and there was even a genuine smile on the face of its speaker, to a rather uncertain fugitive. But He quieted me with His love.
Can this really be? Is this really God?
In that short conversation that I finally allowed Him on this matter, I was simply brought to rest in Him on this. The central conclusion was to walk in faith, because of Who had spoken, not because of what spoken contents entailed. Fully aware I was in no position to bargain with God, I had the audicity to ask that a few conditions be satisfied. I needed to know, I wanted to know by these things, to my human wisdom it seemed best that these conditions were satisfied since they seemed best for what He was asking. But He was silent on this. I do not know what the future holds, but it is a matter of taking one prayed-over step at a time. I shall do as His peace bids.
On a train ride later I thought of the questions i'd asked again.
Can this really be? Is this really God?
Those must have been the questions that rung through Abraham's mind with Issac on the altar. caught between morality and honour on one hand, and faith in the creator of both these on the other, he chose the latter and his faith was credited to him as righteousness.
Meeting a dear friend for bible study brought us to a focus on Rehab, who lied to save Israel. Perhaps His way of hammering the message home. There were about 7 or 8 theories postulated on why her faith was also credited as righteousness. In brief they surrounded a possible hierarchy of principles, higher plans, theology trying to reconcile a perfect God's apparent pleasure in her having done what He'd explicitly said displeased Him. In short, they were focused on excusing her deceit. All felt rather humanly argued.
I closed my eyes and asked Him to show me.
There before me was Rehab, broken and internally destitute. Perhaps not too different from me without Christ. Standing before her at the inn that night she saw in living testimony two men out of the nation God Himself had parted the red sea for. She had heard of Him and feared for herself and her people what He had done to the kings and peoples of Og and Sihon. She acknowledged the Him as Lord God in heaven and on earth below. She knew of His unwavering love and favour on Israel. She put her trust in this goodness, and counted all things lost. What hope did she hold if this God she believed in was going to destroy all who came against His beloved? If the God who determined what was good and evil determined also whether you lived or died, what else counted besides His opinion of you? So she set about to please Him, doing as she knew best to preserve that goodness. She believed only He could spare her, and even if in His justice He did not spare her life, to die believing what she knew of Him was better than to die destitute, for in Him was her only chance of absolution and hope. It is this faith in Him, in trusting His heart, sold to His brand of goodness and justice, should it even cost her life, that pleased Him. Just as we are not saved through works, what Rehab did did not matter because it was done to His glory in an attitude of faith. Deception was never the focus, He was.
As the hours unfolded that evening two Israelite men crept out to safety. Through her household came a line of kings, culminating in my Jesus Christ.
On a seperate matter, here are some portions of the word that I was led to, and which spoke to me.
-Zephaniah 3:17
-Isaiah 54.
| e.s.t.h.e.r in the arms of Jesus @
7/15/2005 09:20:00 pm |
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