Faithful
I LOVE the word of God. It’s amazing how the same verse you’ve read many times can all of the sudden have a fresh new illumination for you. It’s the living Word so it shouldn’t be surprising.
It was a rainy afternoon a few weeks ago and I wanted to curl up and read. I grabbed one of my Bibles and made myself comfy on my bed. I started reading in Hebrews 11 about all of the heroes of faith. These are the ones that believed God even when they waited their lifetimes for the faith to become sight. Some never saw their faith become reality. I love these stories because they remind me that my job is simply to believe God’s promises, and I’m one that likes to know my part in the equation.
I read through some chapters a few times, but I kept going back to Hebrews 11:11 where it says, “By faith Sarah herself also received the ability to conceive seed, and she bore a child when she was past the age, because she judged Him as faithful who had promised.” The last part specifically grabbed my attention and held on. “She judged Him as faithful who had promised.” Even as I write this piece those words are stirring in my heart. You see, it hasn’t always been something I understood in my forty years of walking with the Lord.
The word judged in this passage basically means to esteem or count it as. Can you imagine being way past child bearing years being told you would have a child? Think through that for a minute and how outrageous that would seem. How long had she prayed and asked for a child? Had she finally after many years given up on that hope? But it says, Sarah esteemed God as faithful who had promised. She heard the promise given to her husband Abraham and decided right then to believe.
We pray and wonder if God hears us, cares about our issues, or will answer us. What would change in our lives if every time we brought our hearts and petitions to the Lord we reminded ourselves that He is faithful who has promised? I learned a long time ago not to waste my time praying about something until I could go in faith to ask. This however, takes it further than the decision to go in faith. When we are convinced of His goodness, and know His promises we can go before Him with such faith and hope that we can esteem Him as faithful who promised.
