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His Words
If we are faithless,
He remains faithful;
He cannot deny Himself
2 Timothy 2:13
(Wrote this post this past weekend). This verse didn’t make sense to me. I thought about it for an hour or two
while trying to go to sleep the other night. I get that I’m faithless (particularly so on this night);
and I get that God is faithful, of course. But what does that have to do with Him denying himself? Not making sense to me.
Then I got it.
God doesn’t act faithfully at times. God is Faithful.
In the same way that Traci is brown, God Is Faithful. That’s what He Is. To be any other way would be to deny
Himself. And that’s
impossible. So theologically I get
it. But you know what? Sometimes it doesn’t feel like God is
being very faithful to me.
Sometimes I feel like He’s being the exact opposite of that. I feel forgotten, abandoned, wronged,
neglected, hurt, uncared for, slighted, passed over. By Him. My
“Father”. Yes, I put that in
quotes. Because it’s how I feel
sometimes. And, well, He knows what
we’re thinking anyway…right?
My earthly father is love, he shows me that in countless
ways time and time again. He would
never hurt me in any way and I know that.
So why don’t I always know that about my heavenly Father? We all know that verse that says if we,
being evil, know how to give good gifts to our children, then how much more
will our Heavenly Father give…[and this is the key I think]…the Holy
Spirit. What?? I’ve always filled in that blank with the word gifts because I thought that’s how the verse went. But God doesn’t promise to give gifts. He promises to give us the Holy Spirit. Sometimes I would just like gifts. The ones I ask for. Watching a vlog by Mark Driscoll. He says, talking about the early days
of his church planting:
“I remember in some of those really
dark, difficult days, wondering if God was good. I’ll be honest with you. I knew that God was sovereign, that He was in charge, that
He is Lord, that He is King, that He’s the boss. But there were days, if I’m totally honest, I wondered if
God was any good. If God is
sovereign and not also good, boy, that’s a really scary place to be in your
understanding or misunderstanding of God.
And it led me into asking some really bad questions as I reflected on
this.”
Yep, been there.
Asked many bad questions. What
good is serving You anyway? Why
have You forsaken me? Why is
everyone else getting certain blessings but me? So many times I’ve prayed for something, and then Something
happens. And it’s totally not what
I prayed for. And it’s totally not
what I want. And let the
wallowing began.. doubts turning my effectiveness into nothingness. My ministry into misery.
As I’ve said, one of my favorite verses is "Lord I believe;
help my unbelief". But at some
point that has to end, doesn’t it?
At some point I have to stop requiring the milk of obvious blessing, of
immediately delivered demands. And
decide who me and my house - whom I - will serve. No matter what, no matter where (the where part is a pretty big deal for me). I have to start putting my hand to the plow and stop looking
back. Oh my goodness, stop looking back. I have to stop letting every
little tremor turn me into a pillar of salt. And mostly, I have to decide once and for all – will I let
His Kingdom come, His will be done – in me?
The other day we made a fire in our fireplace. It was so nice and cozy. We had been out of town, so Chip had to
bring wood in from the pile outside. As
we were warming by the coziness, we saw an ant frantically running around the log Chip put in the middle of the blaze. It was really sad. That little guy definitely could have
escaped the fire, if he would have just run to the other side of the log and
then out the side of the hearth.
But instead he ran as hard as he could underneath the log. Ant fritters anyone? I felt the Holy Spirit speaking to
me. God’s view of things is so
much higher than mine. He knows
where the fire is, and where it isn’t.
And if I’ll listen, He’ll tell me. But that best part is that even if I don’t listen, He’ll still get the message across. Because when I am faithless, He is
Faithful.
To CP – I’ve been cyclical, and I know it, and I’m
sorry. But I promise to never turn
into a pillar of salt again. ILYS
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