I was wrong

Faith.

For so long I got it wrong.  For so long I thought I didn't believe enough and that's why I wasn't getting what I wanted.  For so long I was a miserable Christian, feeling like I didn't measure up because my life wasn't turning out the way I had envisioned and that if I just could muster enough faith, God would grant me my wishes.  In my mind, God was the all-powerful, gracious genie who existed to serve me and make me happy.

And then finally when my faith was disappointed one too many times and when I was so unhappy and dissatisfied with my life that I thought maybe he didn't exist at all, I decide it:  maybe I was just concocting this idea of God in my mind and if I stopped thinking about Him and going to church and trying to read the Bible and live a "holy" life, God would cease to exist.  This "genie-God" who had failed to come through for me so many times would simply leave me alone and allow me to find something else to make me happy; something that would give me the freedom I longed for and the satisfaction of soul that let me rest from the constant craving of more...something...anything...

And I stopped.

Caring, believing, hoping, seeking, loving.  Genie-god died and I simply survived.  Life took some very drastic, fast, and furious turns towards chaos and one day I stopped again.  I noticed that I was one foot in the pit, one foot in the grave.  One more step and I would be gone and there would be no turning back.

And that's when He came.

In all His overwhelming love and senseless grace and pulled me up onto solid ground.  He gave me a new name and a new heart and a new song.

He showed me that faith is believing in His goodness, trustworthiness, righteousness, lovingkindness, mercy; believing in His character to come through in the good times and the bad; trusting in Him because you KNOW Him and He KNOWS you.  You can't have faith in someone you don't know...it would be stupid to place your life in the hands of a stranger.  Jesus is a person.  To have faith in Him is to know Him and believe that He is who He says He is and that He is true to His Word and that NO MATTER WHAT, He is still good.

When circumstances around me seem to point to His not loving me, I don't buy it because I know He died for me and so He will graciously give me all things (Rom. 8:32).  When my emotions betray me and make me feel abandoned by Him, I reject that and cling to His promise to be with me always, even to the very end of the age (Matt. 28:20).

Faith is NOT asking and hoping that He will grant my desires.

Faith IS believing He is my desire.

Faith is the blessed assurance of what is to come.  It is the conviction of the reality of Him and everything He has promised. (Heb.11:1).

Faith is our lifeline to the Faithful One (2 Tim. 2:13).