Do You Believe?

What does it mean to believe? And in what should we believe? Is it enough to believe that there is a God? A lot of people agree to the presence of some supreme being in the universe, and many will call him God. And many believe that a man named Jesus taught the ways of God and exemplified His heart of love, compassion, and grace. But what makes one’s belief right or wrong? John explained the difference: “Anyone who does not believe God has made Him out to be a liar because he has not believed the testimony God has given about His Son” (1 John 5:10).

The heart of the Christian faith is to believe what God has said about Jesus Christ. God declared, “This is my Son” (Matt 3:17: 17:5), and that gave divine weight to everything Jesus said and did. John said that when men reject Jesus and His words, they are saying that God is not truthful nor trustworthy. When I say I am a Christian, I am not making a statement about my assent to the truths of Christianity; I am making a statement about God’s trustworthiness through His Son.

When I was younger in my faith, I thought my salvation depended on how hard I believed. It finally dawned on me that it wasn’t my dogged determination to hang on that saved me. It was God’s faithfulness to do what He promised to do. God said that Jesus is His Son, that His death was sufficient to cover all my sins, and that His resurrection ensures my eternal destiny. I believe what God said. It is the foundation of my faith.

Beloved, if you believe what God has said about Jesus, you are blessed in every way; for this life and life eternal. You are blessed because you stand on the confidence of God’s testimony, not on the traditions of men. You are blessed because “you will see the glory of God” (John 11:40). Your faith will be made sight and your hope in Christ will be confirmed. In heaven’s chronicles, your name will be recorded among the great saints of human history, and you will be commended with those who pleased God by their faith. What a blessing it is to believe!

Lean on God

My son called us early this morning fully dressed in his army uniform and hat with an anxious expression on his face. I remember that look well. I saw it on his first day of school. I saw it when he was a teenager and had to explain his actions to a police officer. I saw it when he faced things that were scary and unknown. That look of “I don’t know if I can do this.” He’s a grown man, but the boy was there on the screen, wiping away a tear from his eye. He starts the full run of basic combat training. It’s going to be hard. They will break him. The worst part, he said, is he won’t be allowed to call home for the first couple of weeks. Talking to his wife and daughter and mom has gotten him through. But we won’t have us for a while.

This will be the hardest thing he’s ever done, and he’s overwhelmed. Maybe you understand. You might be in the middle of the hardest thing you’ve ever faced right now and you don’t know how you will make it. I will tell you the same thing I told him. This is when you lean hard on God. When grief and sorrow overwhelm you, lean on God. When your body is racked with pain and fever, lean on God. When you walk out of your workplace with your possessions in a box, when the gas tank, the pantry, and your purse are empty, when the one who vowed to love you walks away, when you sit helplessly beside your loved one’s hospital bed . . . lean on God. When you head off to boot camp, lean on God. And when my son wipes away tears of anxiety 425 miles away, I’ve got to lean on God too.

What does that look like? A lot of prayer. A lot of time in the Word of God. And more prayer. And when the wave of anxiety or depression or anger or grief hits I pray more and read more and lean more. Because God is faithful. Every scenario I mentioned, I’ve lived through – or I should say God carried me through. He was with me in every one. He was my strength and my comfort. He was my hope and my peace. And now, I am entrusting my son into His hands. I reminded Troy of that before we signed off the call together. I’m reminding myself of that too. Beloved, whatever you face right now, lean hard on God. “Trust in the Lord with all your heart . . .” (Prov. 3:5). You’re in His hands – and there’s no better place to be.

I Can’t . . . But I Know Who Will

In our Scripture writing group, we are working our way through Genesis, specifically the story of Joseph. You know the kid who was sold to slave traders by his brothers, then to a powerful man in Egypt whose wife accused him of attempted rape and he was thrown in prison. While there, he correctly interpreted two of his prison mates’ dreams. When Pharaoh had a dream of his own two years later one of the men suggested Joseph could interpret the dream. He was brought before the highest man in the land who insisted that the prisoner do the same for him. Joseph’s reply is resonating deep within my soul this morning. “I cannot do it,” Joseph replied to Pharaoh, “but God will give Pharaoh the answer he desires” (Gen 41:16).

And that is the story of my life: “I cannot . . . but God will.”  I cannot save myself . . . but God will.  I cannot make a masterpiece out of the mess of my life . . . but God will. I cannot heal my broken heart . . . but God will. I cannot love others who have hurt me . . . but God will. I cannot speak wisdom and truth . . . but God will. I cannot produce the fruit of the Spirit . . . but God will. I cannot be strong in my weakness . . . but God will. I cannot be the wife, mother, grandmother, employee, friend, teacher, and writer that I was created to be . . . but God will.

I hear echoes of Jesus’ words in John 5:19: “I tell you the truth, the Son can do nothing by Himself . . .” If Jesus can do nothing by Himself then I should not be ashamed that I can’t either.  It’s what made Jesus human – He had to rely on His Father – just like me.

In this culture where all of our focus is on me, myself, and I, it’s time we shift our attention from what we can’t do and start declaring what God can – and will – do. And of all the things that God will do, the one I count on the most is that God will be faithful. He knows that I am fallible, He knows that I get weary and my shoulders are not strong enough to carry all my burdens. In all the things that I cannot do, God will be faithful to do it. In me. Through me. Despite me. And He will do the same for you. You cannot do it, Beloved . . . but God will.

Hebrews: Who Will You Follow?

Today we’re looking at one of those verses folks love to lift out of its context and make it say something quite different on its own. Hebrews 13:8 says, “Jesus Christ is the same yesterday and today and forever.” I understand the church’s application as a condemnation of lifestyles that were once rightfully regarded as sinful and are now accepted and even celebrated in many denominations. What God once called sin is still sin today. He hasn’t changed his mind to fit the culture. But that’s really not what this verse is all about. 

The message of the whole book of Hebrews is “Don’t abandon Christ.” From the first chapter to the last, the writer has declared that Jesus is the only way to redemption and eternal life and any other way is a lie that leads straight to hell. He is encouraging his audience to stay with the One who is superior to the angels, greater than Moses, whose ministry was more effective than the priests, who was made like men but wholly unlike men, who presented Himself as the perfect sacrifice and was the object of the faith of their past heroes. “You started with Christ,” the author says, “you must stay with Him to the end.”

So, let’s put this verse back in its original context. Verse 7 indicates that the leaders they had followed had died and they likely felt adrift now. But they were not without a holy and righteous example. They had Jesus Christ who “is the same yesterday and today and forever.” I followed the cross-reference back to Psalm 102:25-27 which declares the eternal nature of God – not only that He lives forever, but He is the same forever.

The Church has been rocked in recent years by very public Christians who have abandoned their faith and “deconstructed.” A powerful apologist and evangelist was posthumously accused of living a sinful life that belied his testimony and teaching. A popular female Bible teacher has shaken her followers recently by changing her personal religious affiliations and taking an unbiblical stance.  Even our beloved local pastors are human – and fallible. So is this Bible teacher. If I haven’t disappointed you yet, stick around. That’s why I want to always and only point you to Jesus Christ. You can follow Him with confidence that He was and is and will forever be faithful and true. Men (and women) will almost certainly let you down. But you really can trust Jesus, Beloved. All the way through eternity.

Say Your Prayers

Do you believe God answers prayers? How about your prayers? Do you believe God even hears you when you pray? I think about the mighty prayer warriors of the church. People like George Mueller, an evangelist and the director of Ashley Down orphanage in Bristol, England. Mueller lived on his knees. Anytime a need arose at the orphanage he didn’t make a public plea for help – he prayed. On one occasion, thanks were given for breakfast when all the children were sitting at the table even though there was nothing to eat in the house. As they finished praying, the baker knocked on the door with sufficient fresh bread to feed everyone, and the milkman gave them plenty of fresh milk because his cart had broken down in front of the orphanage. That’s giving thanks for your daily bread – even before you get it.

I also think about the saints in the Bible. They never walked away from prayer doubting God had heard and would answer. David said, “In the morning, O Lord, You hear my voice; in the morning I lay my requests before You and wait in expectation” (Ps 5:3). David prayed and then he waited, but it wasn’t waiting with anxiety, it was waiting with the expectation that God heard and God would act on his behalf. The New King James Version of Psalm 5:3 says, “I will look up in expectation.” I will not look around at my circumstances.  I will not look for ways to answer my prayers myself. I will look to the One to whom I am praying and I will keep looking at Him until He answers.

I believe the key for David and George Mueller is that both men knew to whom they were praying and they knew that the Lord would be faithful. That sounds so simple, doesn’t it? This is one of those devotionals I’m really writing to myself because I so often follow up my prayers with worry. Did He hear me? Did I say all the right things in the right way?  Will He or won’t He? All those questions add up to one: “Can I trust Him.” David and George Mueller and a host of other saints will tell you without hesitation, “YES!” And when I look back over my life, when I read my old prayer journals and see the history of God’s faithfulness in my life, I can say the same. You can trust God, Beloved, say your prayers, and keep looking up.

I [Don’t] Got This!

“You hang in there, girl. God will never give you more than you can handle.” I never wanted to call someone a liar as much as I did the woman who made that statement to me.  But I’m southern and we don’t call our elders liars, so I thanked her and hugged her, and flushed her counsel from my brain. While that may sound full of warm fuzzy faith, there’s not a shred of support for it in Scripture. The Bible is clear that God often gives us more than we can handle.  Paul said, “We do not want you to be uninformed, brothers, about the hardships we suffered in the province of Asia.  We were under great pressure, far beyond our ability to endure, so that we despaired even of life.  Indeed, in our hearts we felt the sentence of death” (2 Cor 1:8-9a). Not so warm and fuzzy, is it? Friend, if you’re hanging onto that opening statement as a rock for your life, you are going to be very disappointed.

If you’ve walked with Him for very long you know that God indeed allows situations and hardships that are more than we can handle. He does it so that we will turn to the only One who can. Paul continued, “This happened that we might not rely on ourselves but on God, who raises the dead” (v. 9b). I almost stopped that verse after the comma but I realized that those last four words are pivotal to the passage. What is harder to handle than death? And who is it that overcame death? If you’ve got a problem that’s bigger than raising a dead man to life, then you may have reason to worry.

Paul goes on to say, “He has delivered us from such a deadly peril, and He will deliver us. On Him we have set our hope that He will continue to deliver us” (v. 10). He has. He is. He will continue. He has been faithful. He is still faithful. He will continue to be faithful.  Your circumstances do not define Him. He defines your circumstances. I can’t stress this enough – God WILL give you more than you can handle. But He will never give you more than HE can handle. Stop trying to carry it all yourself, Beloved. Hold tightly to God and He will carry it – and you through. That’s why it’s called FAITH.

Hebrews: Be Faithful

The Bible is the perfect, infallible Word of God. It is complete and lacks nothing. But we’re going to add something. Hear me out before you hang me as a heretic.

For several weeks now, we’ve been studying the Hall of Faith in Hebrews, the stories of men and women whom God found faithful. I hope it has been as rich and encouraging to you as it has been to me.  But here’s my question: did faith end with these ancient saints? Is there room for your name and mine on this list?

Maybe we haven’t built a massive boat or nearly sacrificed our children or led two million plus people out of slavery. I suspect none of us have witnessed the seas part or shouted down a stone wall or defeated your nation’s enemy with a sling and a stone. I don’t believe we’ve faced off against hungry lions or walked out of a fiery furnace. But that doesn’t mean we haven’t been faithful.

If you’ve trusted God in hard circumstances, you’ve been faithful. If you endured insults for being a Christian, you have been faithful. If you have resisted temptation or been truthful when a lie would have been easier, you have been faithful. If you’ve wept on your knees and got up and pressed on, you, my friend, have been faithful. If you’ve been gentle in the face of anger or loved the one who hated you, or been patient with the grown kid who keeps failing over and over, you have been faithful. If you’ve kept at your calling, even if no one else notices, you are faithful. If you’ve walked into unknown territory because God said go, if you’ve gone the extra mile (or several miles) – you’ve been faithful. If you have looked into an empty pantry or an empty gas tank and said, “God I will trust you to provide” – there’s no doubt you are faithful. If you’ve gotten up early to spend time in the Word and prayer – you have been faithful.

I want you to do something this morning. Open up your Bible to the end of Hebrews 11 and write (yes, it’s okay to write in your Bible) “By faith (your name) . . . ” then ask Him how you have been faithful and how you can be even more so. Beloved, it’s time to add our names to the Hall of Faith and continue the legacy of God’s faithful people.

Faithful

Do you remember when grown-ups would ask you as a kid, “What do you want to be when you grow up?” It often changed for me from year to year. I wanted to be a dancer, a teacher, a garbage collector (what?), a singer, a mommy, and a writer. I often look at Joy and wonder what the future holds for her. We have already determined that she will be a preacher (I know, she’s a girl and we’re Baptists), a dancer, a singer, a chef, and the President of the United States. And she’ll be awesome (and cute) at all of them.

I didn’t follow all those dreams and went in some very different directions at times. I’ve had stints working in retail and the medical field and enjoyed a year as a floral clerk. I hung onto writing and teaching as my calling and I’m exploring the idea of counseling. but I’ve worked in religious administration for most of my career. It’s been sweet and a perfect fit for my skills.

But I’ve discovered something else I want to be. Faithful. Just faithful. Not only in a career or ministry but faithful in my life. I want to love God with all my heart and mind and soul and strength (Mark 12:30). I want to find hope and Joy and peace in Christ (Rom 15:13) and walk in step with the Holy Spirit (Gal 5:16-18). I want an undivided, unrelenting, unquenchable zeal for my Creator (Rom 12:11). I want to pursue Him with reckless abandon (Phil 3:12-14). Then I want to rest in Him (Mark 6:31). I want Christ to be my life (Col 3:4). I want my life to be all about Christ (Col 1:10-12).

One day I will stand before the Lord. I don’t want Him to compliment me on the pretty bouquets I created or the nice bulletins I produced or how well I managed the faculty files and textbooks at the college.  I don’t Him to tell me how much He enjoyed my writing and that I was a solid teacher of His Word. As much as I love her, I don’t even want Him to tell me I was a good grandmother to Joy. I only want to hear one thing: “Well done, good and faithful servant!” (Matt 25:21). That will be enough. That will be everything.

Hebrews: Perseverance

I didn’t come from wealthy folks so there wasn’t any inheritance for me or my brothers. But I do have some treasures that were passed along to me like some of my dad’s military memorabilia and my most precious possession – my mom’s Bible with notes in her handwriting. I also “inherited” bags and bags of fabric, much of it leftover scraps from clothes my Mom made us when we were kids. One thing she and I have in common is our refusal to give up on half-done craft projects. Notice I didn’t say we finished them, we just tucked them away to “come back to later.” I have boxes now of hers and my own.

The Bible has a lot to say about not giving up but I don’t think that is what Scripture means. The writer of Hebrews said that Moses “persevered” in his calling to rescue the Hebrew people out of slavery (Heb 11:17).  Remember that this letter is written to Hebrew Christians who are facing extreme persecution for their faith. Every one of them knew the story of Moses and the exodus out of Egypt. They knew that Moses had repeatedly gone before Pharaoh to demand the release of the Jews and he had refused. He made ten visits to Pharaoh – each more contentious than the last. But Moses persisted. Why? Because He had God’s name and promise. God had revealed Himself to Moses as “The Lord” and promised on that very name to deliver the people out of their misery. (Ex 3:15-17). Through all of the trouble that Pharaoh caused, God’s name and promise continued to give Moses strength.

That’s what the word “persevere” means – a strong, steadfast assurance that fuels endurance. It also means a word we often steer clear of. Patience. You’ve probably been told you should never pray for patience because the way to get it is through hardships, but Moses proved that the way to patience and perseverance is “by faith” in the name and the promise of the Lord.

When God calls you to a task, that calling comes with His promise to finish the work. Paul said, “The one who calls you is faithful and he will do it” (1Thess 1:24). His calling and His promise rest on His Name. So can you, Beloved.

God is . . .

Some of you know me as Dorcas. Some of you know me as Beth. My Dad called me Sis and my brothers called me Dorcas deLizard. Some of my classmates called me Dorky Dorcas. My husband calls me Sweetheart or Bubba and my son calls me mom. But my favorite name is Nana. I’m all the same person, but I fill different roles to different people. I love to study names. Names in the Bible were not just a tag, they defined people and their lives.

I have spent years studying about God in textbooks. But I have learned more about Him by experience – and struggle – than I ever could from a book. I came to know God as Jehovah-Jirah – The Lord my Provider, when my pantry was bare. Jehovah-Rapha – The Lord my Healer, came to me when I was very sick.  I discovered that He is Jehovah Shalom – The Lord my Peace during a time of turmoil and chaos, and that He is Emmanuel–God With Us, when I felt abandoned and alone. He is Yahweh Tsuri–The Lord my Strength when I am at my weakest, and He is Jehovah Ori –The Lord my Light when the darkness of depression surrounds me. When the enemy is attacking me, I know that Jehovah Gibbor Milchamah–The Lord Mighty in Battle is at my side. David wrote in Psalm 9:10, “Those who know Your name will trust in You.” God’s name reflects His character.

He met me in the hard places and showed Himself to me. I trust Him in the difficulties I face today and tomorrow and all the days to come because I know Him by name and by nature. My favorite names for God, the names that mean everything to me, became most precious when my life and heart fell completely apart. It was there that He came to me. El Emunah, the Faithful God. El Hayyay, the God of my life. He has proven Himself to be so ever since. Beloved, He is all this and more for you too.