I prayed for seven years for a baby. Seven long, lonely, heartbreaking years of expensive fertility drugs and tears on Mother’s Day, hosting baby showers for my friends and making baby blankets to give away. I clung to one verse: “Hope deferred makes the heart sick, but when dreams come true at last, there is life and Joy” (Pvb 13:12). And then it happened. To say that I was overjoyed would be a huge understatement.
Abraham and Sarah could relate. They waited a lot longer than I did, and did some pretty drastic things to fulfill their desire. Things that are still rocking our world today. But in his heart, Abraham never gave up. “By faith Abraham, even though he was past age—and Sarah herself was barren—was enabled to become a father because he considered Him faithful who had made the promise” (Heb 11:11). Did you see it? The key to faith is knowing that God is faithful.
Faith isn’t some mystical quality that we conjure up within ourselves. In fact, faith has little to do with us. It has everything to do with God. The writer of Hebrews said, “[Abraham] considered God . . .” The word “considered” means to think and esteem. Abraham’s faith was built on thinking about God. And his thoughts naturally led him to esteem God – to see Him as great and mighty and thus, believe Him to be trustworthy. Abraham heard the promise of God and, after thinking about the character of God, determined that God would do what He had promised. That is faith in a nutshell.
I’ve been told I am a woman of “great faith.” I don’t agree. What I am is a woman with a great God. Any ounce of faith I have is because God has proven Himself trustworthy in situations that demanded I either trust Him or get devoured by the enemy. He has never let me down. Not. One. Time. I’m in another one of those battles right now. I will either trust Him or I will be one more bleached skeleton in the desert. I’m putting my confidence in the one who has been faithful again and again and again. Beloved, whatever your circumstances I encourage you to have faith. Put your hope in the One who is forever faithful. The one who brings life and Joy.