The promise of God under attack!!

 

 

I could go on and on, but I’ve run out of time. There are so many more Gideon, Barak, Samson, Jephthah, David, Samuel, the prophets….Through acts of faith, they toppled kingdoms, made justice work, took the promises for themselves. Hebrews 11:32

 

I have been writing a series on faith for the past month or so and I have been meaning to finish it which I will do in this post. If you want to read the last post I wrote on faith please click here.

The word tells us the men and women of old obtained promised blessings by faith! God had promised them things but they could only obtain them by faith! There was no other way those things could be obtained!!

That got me thinking, what does it mean to obtain promises by faith? What does that look like? When the word says we need faith to obtain the promises He has promised us what does that mean? Why do we need faith to obtain what God has promised us?

The word is filled to the brim with answers. Let me show you a few.

• Abraham was given some amazing promises. (Genesis 17) But there was a slight glitch…..

Abram was ninety-nine years old when the LORD appeared to him again and said, “I am God All-Powerful.  Genesis 17:1

Did this very important fact slip God’s mind??? How could He call a ninety-nine year old man seriously? But this is God the Creator of the Universe we are talking about. He knew what He was doing. He knew the only way Abram would walk in what He promised him would be if he trusted in Him. There was no other way he would obtain the promise!

God knows what your situation is, He knows the circumstances you are in and He wants you to trust Him no matter how impossible things seem. Let’s face facts, without faith you will not be able to obtain the promise. I didn’t say “not willing” but “NOT ABLE”!!! You will not be able to no matter what you try. God’s calling for your life is too much for you to accomplish on your own which would mean in your flesh! You will fail….. Yes, you just heard me say you will fail. I didn’t make a mistake or mix up my words! You will fall and not be successful.

Let us look at another example:

• The Israelites were in a hard place. On one side there was the Red Sea and on the other side the Egyptian army! There was no way for them to turn back and fight the Egyptians because they had no weapons and they were not trained warriors! They would be massacred….In front of them was the Red Sea. They didn’t know how to swim, they would surely drown but by faith the word says, “They walked through the Red Sea on dry ground.” (Hebrews 11:29)

I hope you are beginning to see how important a role faith plays in you obtaining God’s promises. Without faith you will not be able to obtain what God promised! The Egyptian army thought they could walk through the Red Sea but like we all know, they couldn’t! The water crashed in on them and killed them! They didn’t know about faith! And without faith they died…..Is that the reason things don’t seem to be working out for you? Maybe you have been trying to do this in your own strength when God wants you trusting in Him. Sometimes doing nothing and waiting patiently for the breakthrough is what you need to do and at times that is so much harder to do. Anyway let’s move on….

• The Israelites thought taking the promise land was a small thing. They thought they were strong enough but that was quickly proven wrong. The Israelites were finally at the gate of the land flowing with milk and honey. All they had to do was obey the word of God and storm the city but they believed the ten spies! They believed them and were filled with fear. There was talk of appointing a new captain to lead them back to Egypt and there was talk of stoning Joshua and Caleb! But God stepped in and everything changed. The Israelites repented but it was too late, the damage was done! Let’s pick up the story in Numbers 14:39

 

When Moses told all of this to the people of Israel, they mourned long and hard. But early the next morning they started out for the high hill country saying, “We’re here; we’re ready – let’s go up and attack the land that God promised us. We sinned, but now we’re ready.”

 

As we know, the Israelites were defeated. Without faith, without God they couldn’t obtain what God had promised them! Let that be a sober reminder for us all…….I am going to stop here in the hope you got the heart of what I was saying!. God has some really amazing things in store for us but we will need to exercise our faith to obtain those amazing things. If you don’t know what God has planned for you know He has great and amazing things in store for you, things that are too big for you alone to handle and accomplish. If you can accomplish it on your own it’s probably not from God! It is clear in scripture that God called the men and women to a greater vision one that was too much for them! But with God and faith in God they accomplished what God had planned for them. It was not because of their wisdom or their good looks, or their strength but it was through faith!

 

I could go on and on, but I’ve run out of time. There are so many more Gideon, Barak, Samson, Jephthah, David, Samuel, the prophets….Through acts of faith, they toppled kingdoms, made justice work, took the promises for themselves. Hebrews 11:32

 

God has a plan for us, so may we take it by faith!

 

Rolain

The world will know the truth by faith….!!!

And what shall I say further? For time would fail me to tell of Gideon, Barak, Samson, Jephthah, of David and Samuel and the prophets, [Judg. 4:1-5; 6:1-8, 35; 11:1-12, 15; 13:1-16; I Sam. 1-30; II Sam. 1-24; I Kings 1-2; Acts 3:24.]

 Who by [the help of] faith subdued kingdoms, administered justice, obtained promised blessings, closed the mouths of lions, [Dan. 6.]

Extinguished the power of raging fire, escaped the devourings of the sword, out of frailty and weakness won strength and became stalwart, even mighty and resistless in battle, routing alien hosts. [Dan. 3.] (Hebrews 11:32-34 AMP)

In my previous post (you can read it here) I spoke about some of the insights I got about faith from reading Hebrews 11. This is part two of that post. In the first part I asked if we really understand what faith is. I concluded that we don’t and upon reading Hebrews 11 I realized how true that was. So let me move on.

In the scripture I just shared we see some pretty amazing things. Look at what faith did for the men and women of old:

– By faith they subdued kingdoms

– By faith they administered justice

– Obtained promised blessings

– Closed the mouth of lions

– Extinguished the power of raging fire and a host of other things……

By faith they administered justice! The principalities and powers in the time of the men and women of old worshipped idols, burnt their children in honor of them, and committed other atrocious things but by faith the men and women of God administered justice! They never stood by as the world committed unspeakable acts. God called men and women to speak out, and do something. They were the voice of Justice to the world at that time!  When their home was destroyed they looked to Him to repay them for what happened. By faith they administered justice!

Today there are things happening that need to be stopped. ISIS freely killing Christians in Iraq, trafficking is at its highest, Israel is at war and so on and so on. There is just so much injustice happening but by faith justice can be administered! How exactly, I don’t know! Maybe through prayer or maybe through speaking out I don’t know but if the men and women of old administered justice through faith so can we!

We see faith in action in a way we have never understood and have never tried ever. The men and women of old understood much more about faith. They were looking at a much bigger picture, and maybe it’s like that because someone never showed us and told us how to REALLY use our faith, I don’t know, but what I do know is our faith can do much more than heal the flu we had two days ago!! We can use it to affect change in the world. But realize something; the person making the change is God! We are the ones who come to Him in faith and He is the One who does the changing…..!

Faith was used to subdue kingdoms, obtain blessings (which I will talk about in more detail in an upcoming post), administer justice; close the mouth of lions………

It has been hard writing this post because Hebrews paints a very foreign picture of faith. It paints a different kind of faith, a faith that can subdue kingdoms, administer justice, close the mouth of lions; obtain promises and so much more. But what does that mean in our everyday life? If the faith we have been given is so powerful what does this mean for us?

It means we can make a difference. As we have faith in God we can make a difference in the affairs of earth. We don’t have to sit back discouraged and helpless. Our faith can make a difference in a broken world if we only believe in Him. Apart from faith we can do nothing. Apart from God we are powerless. As I think about the things the men and women of old did, they were on their own. They were alone most of the time, abandoned, cast out, persecuted, betrayed, unpopular, considered weird, uneducated, poor and so many other things but because of their faith in God they did amazing things, things that would impact the world forever!! May God give us understanding and may He open our eyes to see the truth. We have been called to do great things but that will only happen when we have faith in God. Trust that He can and WILL do great things through you!

Stay tuned for part three which will be coming soon……..

 

Rolain

 

Cry Out For Justice!

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What is justice? To be fair I think we have a pretty fair idea of what it is. I am not going to write a whole post defining what justice is….My goal in this post though is to bring more understanding about what justice is. The word says this about justice:

The Lord loves righteousness and justice; the earth is full of His unfailing love.    Psalms  33:5

The last scripture says:

Evil men do not understand justice but those who seek the Lord understand it fully.    Proverbs 28:5

By the end of this post I hope you will have a clearer idea of what justice is. Very simply put justice is defined as, “the quality of being just, impartial, or fair but this morning after my quiet time I was reading a book written by Bob Sorge entitled “Unrelenting Prayer” which I found very interesting, especially when he spoke about Justice. This is what he had to say about justice:

“We may tend to think of justice in a very narrow way, such as punishment for a crime. But justice is a far reaching term, as wide in its scope as every conceivable form of evil. Even as injustice afflicts men and women in virtually every arena of life, justice is the righteous answer to every wrong”.

– When justice comes to sickness, there is healing.

– When justice comes to poverty, there is provision.

– When justice comes to infirmity, there is wholeness.

– When justice comes to loss, there is restoration.

– When justice comes to torn relationships, there is reconciliation.

– When justice comes to anarchy, there is order.

– When justice comes to imprisonment, there is release.

– When justice comes to reproach, there is vindication.

– When justice comes to rejection, there is acceptance.

– When justice comes to abuse, there is comfort.

– When justice comes to prejudice, there is equity.

– When justice comes to oppression, there is liberty.

– When justice comes to slavery, there is freedom.

– When justice comes to tyranny, there is compassionate leadership.

– When justice comes to crime, there is punishment.

– When justice comes to wrong, there is right.

– When justice comes to indebtedness, there is repayment.

– When justice comes to death, there is resurrection of life.

– When justice comes to destruction, there is reparation.

– When justice comes to calamity, there is relief.

– When justice comes to hunger, there is nourishment.

– When justice comes to weariness, there is rest.

– When justice comes to fear, there is peace.

– When justice comes to violation, there is dignity.

– When justice comes to barrenness, there is fruitfulness.

– When justice comes to abortion, there is protection for the unborn.

– When justice comes to darkness, there is light.

– When justice comes to pain, there is alleviation.

– When justice comes to blindness, there is sight.

– When justice comes to families, there is unity.

– When justice comes to dysfunction, there is health.

– When justice comes to loneliness, there is companionship.

– When justice comes to depression, there is joy.

– When justice comes to anxiety, there is confidence.

 

Please note, this is not a nice poem just to warm your heart. This is what justice is. When I read this I cried out to God for justice. I need justice. The enemy has come and plundered me and he cannot get away with it. You cannot let him get away with all the wrong things he has done in your life. He needs to pay for what he has stolen. He needs to account for all he has done and that is why you should cry out for justice. God is truly the God of justice!!!! I hope you see the power justice has in your life when you cry out for it.

Rolain