Multiple friends of mine have confided this week that they’ve been on the verge of giving up their faith in this season. They feel hopeless, worn down, disappointed, disillusioned, and angry with God.
Didn’t he say he would do X, Y, Z? Didn’t he make me a promise? Where is he now? Maybe that’s you right now.
I exhort you today: don’t give up.
I know it’s hard. I know it’s tiring. I know you’re hurting and maybe even feeling resentful. I know God’s promises seem far off or too good to believe. I know your hopes may have been deferred so long that you’ve begun to doubt you heard God right or whether he even exists. Whether his words in the Bible are true.
You’re not alone.
We all go through times of doubt, and we all receive promises from God that require us to wait. Most of the time the wait ends up to be longer than expected.
I’ve been there. When I had a chronic illness, God told me he was going to heal me. I don’t remember having any idea of when at first, but at some point, I knew he specifically said he’d heal me in 2016. 2015 ended and I began the new year with high hopes. It could be any day! Any moment!
Tick-tock. The clock kept moving and the days kept disappearing, one by one. I didn’t get healed; I got sicker. I saw doctor after doctor, I ate as healthy as I could, I guzzled water, I guzzled caffeine, I quit my job, and I was ultimately sleeping up to 20 hours a day by the time summer arrived. I felt like I was dying.
And then, one day, long after I expected it to happen, God told me to do something kind of weird and when I did, he healed me completely. Not one symptom resurfaced. I’ve been fine ever since that day. (It will be five years ago this week!)
It took longer than I thought and some days I doubted it could happen or that God had really said it, but, true to his word, God did exactly what he said he was going to do and my body was completely healed.
I’m not the only one with a story like this! The Bible is full of them. God told Abraham and Sarah they would have a child. Lonnnng after that seemed physically or logically possible, Sarah gave birth to their promised child, Isaac, when she was 90 and her husband was 100 years old. 😳 It would’ve seemed unlikely 14 years before that when they were given the promise, but it really doesn’t get much more impossible than delivering a baby in your 90s!
Don’t TELL me God can’t do it. He is the God of the impossible!
In the middle of a drought, God told Noah there was a big rainstorm coming and that he should build a giant boat. Noah looked like a fool, hammering his ark together in the desert, but sure enough, the floodwaters came, and guess who was saved while everyone else perished? Noah and his tribe. It might sound dumb to the world when God says something, but as Scripture says, “No word from God will ever fail” (Luke 1:36).
Moses’ family left him in a basket to save his life and he became the prince of Egypt (cue the Whitney Houston song). The Israelites stood in front of a sea and saw it split in two so they could literally walk through it on dry land. God told Mary that she would give birth to a baby – the Savior of the world, no less – as a virgin, and she did.
Read Hebrews chapter 11. You’ll find many of these stories and more. In each one, God said it, and he did it!
I know it looks unlikely and feels hopeless. I know life has been heavy lately. I know the journey is rarely easy when God gives you a word and you choose to obey it. But your reward is coming! Your deliverance is coming! You will receive what has been promised if you do not give up. Sometimes perseverance is all it takes.
Don’t throw everything away that you’ve already fought for, worked for, and waited for. It’s generally darkest just before the dawn. Keep believing and keep putting your trust in God. His timing isn’t always the same as ours, but it’s perfect. His methods aren’t always conventional, but they are strategic. His logic doesn’t always seem logical to us, but his wisdom is greater than ours.
Suit up in God’s armor and STAND ON HIS WORD! He’s done impossible things before and he’ll do them again. You serve the God of the impossible. Don’t give up. You shall SEE the goodness of God in the land of the living if you do not give up.
I remain confident of this: I will see the goodness of the Lord in the land of the living.
Psalm 27:13 NIV
My fellow believers, when it seems as though you are facing nothing but difficulties, see it as an invaluable opportunity to experience the greatest joy that you can! For you know that when your faith is tested it stirs up in you the power of endurance. And then as your endurance grows even stronger, it will release perfection into every part of your being until there is nothing missing and nothing lacking.
James 1:2-4 TPT