It’s a New Year and a new beginning.  A time to reflect on God’s faithfulness in the past and to look forward with anticipation of His continued goodness and faithfulness in the future.   A LOT has happened in this past year.  Lots to still sort through.  I should be writing a real update (and I will one of these days–I promise!) but instead I’m just pondering.  This morning I’m pondering the subject of hope.

A Scripture that keeps going through my head these days is Romans 4:18 “Against all hope, Abraham in hope, believed.”  Against all hope, in hope, he believed.  A little later in Romans 8:24-25 Paul says, “…hope that is seen is no hope at all, for who hopes for what he already has? But if we hope for what we do not yet have, we wait for it patiently.”  

I don’t know how patiently I’m waiting these days, but when I remember God’s faithfulness, and really just remember the reality of who He is, I do have hope.    ”I wait for the Lord, my soul waits, and in His word I do hope.  My soul waits for the Lord more than those who watch for the morning–yes, more than those who watch for the morning” (Ps.130:5-6).  That’s always struck me so profoundly…those who wait for Him have a hope that is more sure than the fact that the sun will rise again in the morning.   And there aren’t too many of us who doubt the sun will rise in the morning.

He’s been faithful in the past…He has been causing that sun to rise every single day without fail for a long, long time…and He’ll be faithfull in the future.  This world languished for thousands of years under the weight of its sin, but at just the right time our Redeemer did come.  Just like He promised.  And if He came once…He’ll come again.

This morning as I face the new year I have a lot of uncertainty about a lot of things.  I’ve got tons of unanswered questions and more than a few doubts.  I’ve got a lot of things weighing on me that are undoubtedly clouding my vision.  But I’ve also got something else…hope. 

He has been faithful in the past.  He will be faithful in the future.  ”I wait for the Lord my soul waits, and in Him I do hope.  My soul waits for the Lord more than those who watch for the morning–yes, more than those who watch for the morning.” 

May it be a year of waiting on Him in unwavering hope.  He is faithful. 

Got Faith? I’m not so sure!  Sometimes I think I do. Sometimes I even, fleetingly, experience “feelings” of faith.   But mostly I just wobble along.

That’s been especially true lately.  In the midst of a lot of faith struggles and the difficulties of walking through the day to day realities of a new start up ministry, I have been getting discouraged—a lot.  I wish it wasn’t true, but it is.  I was never entirely sure I wanted to take this step to begin with and now that I have, I keep looking for a back door.  But there isn’t one.  God made sure of that.

In fact, He’s been cracking me up lately.  Yes, a lot of things have been hard.  I guess I expected opposition, but it has come in ways that are very different from anything I might have expected.  It’s taken me awhile to adjust.  Actually, to be perfectly honest, I don’t think I really have adjusted—I’m still working on it!  But in the midst of my “adjustment” God has been working, too.  The flip side of the “difficulties” has been His amazing faithfulness.  It’s embarrassing, really.  If I were to make a list of all the blessings, encouragements, responses to silly “fleeces”, specific words of knowledge, divine appointments, provision, perfectly ordered circumstances, not to mention specifically answered prayers, that I’ve experienced over the last couple of months, I’m sure it would cause anyone who heard me talk about “struggling” to scratch their head and wonder what on earth my problem was!  After all, how many times and in how many ways, can God confirm something?  Apparently lots … and I have needed each and every one of them.  Even though God has confirmed His will with lots and lots of “God stuff”, there has still been the little problem of having to see everything with eyes of faith because most of what I see in the natural is still “saying” something very different.

Yes, my faith is still faltering.  I’m still doubting.  I’m still questioning.  I’m not sure why, but I am.  I read something in one of my favorite devotionals, Streams in the Desert today about believing without seeing.  It was talking about Peter walking on water and made the point that you can’t have it both ways.  Peter needed to decide he was either going to walk on water to get to Jesus, or he was going to swim.  I think that’s my problem.  I started out with “great faith” and took a leap out onto the water, but now I’d rather get there a more natural way.  I’d like to swim. I’d like to do something I know how to do.  I’d like to see something that seems more “doable”—more tangible.  But God seems pretty committed to leading me in a way that is completely supernatural, even if I’m not!  He has been so faithful to keep me “hemmed in before and behind” –literally!   I am beginning to understand that the doors He opens really can’t be shut.

Bottom line, I guess that means I don’t always have a whole lot of faith.  Nor do I have a whole lot of perseverance.  I definitely don’t have a whole lot of patience, and I don’t seem to have much persistence, either. But it doesn’t seem to matter all that much.  It doesn’t matter because I’ve got one thing that seems to trump everything else…I’ve got Jesus.  I have His heart. What’s more…I know it.   Since I long ago gave Him mine, I know He has given me His.  I ask Him for something and, basically, He gives it to me.  Without the slightest hint of disappointment or condemnation for my lack of faith or steadfastness, He simply gives me everything I need—along with just about anything else I desire as long as it doesn’t mess up His plans for something even better down the road. Furthermore, I know it absolutely delights Him to do so.   

That’s the key.  It delights Him.  There are moments when I truly “get” that it’s not about me.  I’m really am just along for the ride.  My flesh has a long way to go before it completely dies and quits whining so stinking much, but my heart has already been spoken for.  My spirit is already seated in the heavenlies with Christ.  My destiny is already sealed in the blood of the Lamb. The end is already determined because I said “yes” one time too many and meant it.   So it really doesn’t matter if I decide, for a moment, that I want to see before I believe.  It really doesn’t matter if I decide, for a moment, that I want to swim rather than walking on water.  It really doesn’t matter if, for a moment, I don’t have much faith.  It doesn’t matter at all—as long as I have enough faith for “One thing.”   As long as Jesus has my heart—I have His.   My life is hid in His.  And I’m pretty sure He’s going to help me keep it that way, because I get the distinct impression He likes it that way. “He will perfect that which concerns me.”

So…got faith?  Sometimes yes—sometimes no.  But if the question is “Got Jesus?” the answer is different.  The answer to that question is always “yes.”  

If you are reading this—whoever you are—I have a request:  Pray for me.  No really, PLEASE, pray for me.  I realize that we all need prayer all the time.  Since I spend a significant amount of time praying for other people (with no regrets, I might add)—trust me, I am well aware of the great need.    Right now there are undoubtedly bazillions of people all over the place going through all kinds of trials with needs MUCH greater than mine.  Even in my own life I have been through many, many, many seasons where the actual circumstances were far more difficult than what I have been dealing with lately.  But I can honestly say I have never felt like I was in such desperate need of prayer to simply keep standing in faith right where I believe God has planted me.  A majority of the time over the last couple of weeks, it has literally taken every ounce of my energy to simply stand.

I am not a stranger to spiritual warfare.  And I am definitely not a stranger to having my faith tested. But this is different.  There is something MUCH bigger going on.  In the “spirit” I know it like I know my name, but it is not something I can articulate well in the natural.  The irony, of course, is that in the natural there doesn’t appear to be all that much of anything going on.  That fact simply adds to the battle.

When I say there is something “much bigger going on”—I’m not necessarily talking about something “big” in the eyes of man. I’m talking about something big in the heart of God.  He has actually confirmed this to me some amazingly supernatural ways.  You’d think that would be enough.  But for some reason the encouragement never seems to last long and the pull of what I see (or don’t see) in the natural starts pulling me down again.  It is humbling to admit, but despite His previous assurances, I keep finding my gaze drifting away from His.  And when that happens—I start sinking like a lead balloon.

There are lots of specifics I could share—many of the “whys” of the difficulties—but I really don’t think it is necessary, or even wise.  The “whys” in my eyes are probably the least of it, and besides, I don’t need any practice rehearsing all the things that discourage me!   What I have been “rehearsing” is His faithfulness.  I have been praying every prayer of faith I know to pray.  I have been proclaiming His Word and speaking out every promise I can find that is relevant.  I have been praising Him with my whole heart and seeking Him as diligently as I know how to seek Him.  And, although my attempts are obviously weak, I have been as faithful as I know how to be in my actions and attitude.  But I still need help—and I need to know others are praying.      

Even as I’m writing, I am reminded again that Jesus Himself is at the right hand of the Father interceding for me.  Who better to have praying!  He knows my weakness, but He also knows that despite my human frailty the desire of my heart, above all others, is to honor, bless, and glorify Him.  If He wants me to keep standing here, then somehow, someway, I will—not because of me, but because His grace is sufficient.   But … I am also reminded that even Jesus desired that others would “watch and pray” with Him.   That is my desire, too.  And, as He leads, I will most humbly and gratefully receive your prayers for the grace to “endure as seeing Him who is invisible.”

Many thanks and blessings to each of you.

Waiting for Him,

Cindy