"FAITHING" IT

“You’ll be alright”, “everything will turn out okay”. “Ahn why are you worried. Don’t you know that when it seems darkest, that’s when God works?”.  We have all heard a version of these phrases and I daresay we have all used a version of them. These are the go to phrases we use when we want to encourage someone. Sometimes we say them without really thinking of the situation, but these phrases have a lot of truth in them regardless of whatever situation we find ourselves in. The challenge comes in believing the truth of these words in difficult times and taking that bold step towards the impossible.

In my mind, I have this picture of God as my personal cheerleading squad. That when life throws curve balls at me, He is literally cheering for me and shouting “go Adim, we will get through this”.  Proverbs 24:16 tells us that “although the righteous man falls seven times, they rise again”. God makes sure this verse is a reality in my life but the truth is that sometimes I just want to wallow. I do not want to get up and in my mind I am low-key side eyeing God and asking, “but did I have to fall?” It’s hard to stay mad at God because He has loved me well. The decision to trust God against all odds, to believe His word in the face of the impossible, to run towards Him when circumstances beg you to take the way that seems easier…. that is walking in faith: faithing it.

Hebrews 11 gives us a short list of some people who walked by faith.

Verse 7 tells us that “By faith Noah, being warned by God about events not yet seen, in reverence prepared an ark for the salvation of his family.”

Verse 8 tells us that “By faith Abraham, when he was called by God, obeyed by going to a place which he was to receive as an inheritance; and he went, not knowing where he was going”.

Noah and Abraham believed against all odds. They could easily have been perceived as mad. Can you imagine how much Noah must have been mocked for building that ark and for telling people that there was going to be rain? There had been no rain before that! Picture telling someone that the ground would split open and rain will shoot out from it and reach the skies. It does not make sense. Noah built the ark anyway because he understood that when God speaks, the seemingly impossible becomes possible and the unusual becomes the norm.

Abraham had no idea where he was going. He was old and without a child yet he journeyed with his wife to a land he did not know of. He knew that if God had promised him an inheritance, it was only a matter of time. He did not try to figure out if he had enough connections to get the inheritance that God had promised him. He just moved on a Word from God.

How do we faith it? By doing. “Faith without works is dead” (James 2:17). The righteous man does not just fall out of the blue. He needs to be in motion to fall. Notice how the righteous man also rises. He makes the decision to move and he follows through with that decision by rising. We faith it by acting on what we believe and where we believe God is leading us to. I have heard the Bishop T. D. Jakes say a few times that God does not give us furniture, but He gives us trees and we turn the trees to furniture. When we act, we see results. When we do not act, we keep hoping for something that we have been given the ability to make a reality.

Writing this article was an act of faith. I had the idea in my head but without sitting down to type it, it would have remained an idea. The result of doing what I needed to do is this article. I have noticed that the more I practice faith in a certain area of my life, the easier it becomes. The more readily I trust God with that area of my life. 

The Bible tells us that faith comes by hearing and hearing by the word of God. I think the same principle goes for maintaining the rhythm of faith. If we do not do what God tells us to do, then we would not have the results that He wants us to have. Without those results we do not have anything to fall back on when we need to take a step of greater magnitude. Long after Abraham died, God would still refer to Himself as the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. He is reminding the Israelites of the people that had trusted them with everything. 

Faith is understanding that God does not lie or change His mind; that if He has said it, it is done. It may take some practice to get a hang of it; sort of like testing the waters. However it is a body of water you will never wish to be rescued from. After all, trusting God and believing in Him against all odds is what pleases Him the most.