FAITH

For some people faith is a flash in the pan. They suddenly get interested in God, but just as suddenly the interest wanes and they do not think about God again. Lucky for us God is not an “off and on” God at all.

Confusing as the events of present-day history are, a Christian believer will try to discern the hand of God in them. Sometimes this will be fairly clear. Often it will not. On many occasions sheer faith will hold to the claim that He is in it all and will guide it to the destiny He has prepared.

This statement is well demonstrated in the history of the Israelites who languish in slavery in Egypt for almost 430 years. Their faith was driven to despair as they thought that God had forsaken them. On the contrary, God is not about a flash in the pan when he wants to do something. When he decided that it was time for the Israelites to leave Egypt it was not a case to get a job done to create a stir in the world. No, it was a case of proving to the Israelites that he was a powerful God and that he could be trusted.

The plagues were about far more than natural events. Egypt had a number of nature-Gods and their Pharaoh was worshipped as a god-man. So the plagues God visited upon the Egyptian nation were about the superiority of God against the ineptitude both of the Egyptian Gods and of Pharaoh.

Along with the promise that they were on their journey to the Promised Land, God gave the Israelites a pillar of cloud by day and a pillar of fire by night. They were going into a desert that even today is a very inhospitable place. God knew that they would easily lose heart and probably turn back. So he led them by signs so that they had the firm assurance that God was with them all the way. However severe their doubts, God never left them. The continuous presence of God enabled them to persevere on their journey right to the very end.

This personal presence of God and his special guidance was not given while the people were in Egypt. It began only as they set out on the pilgrim journey in faith and trust.

There is always one supreme question in matters of faith – God. Who he is, what his name and character are, and what he does. It was a lot easier in the days of the Bible to answer this question because each nation had its own god or gods and everybody despised the gods of other nations. These gods were merely figments of the imagination. Nevertheless, the Egyptians holding them in honour while the Israelites had nothing to show. How much better off the Egyptians would have been if they had seen the hand of the living God in the plagues and the rescuing of his people.

It is difficult to be consistent in our faith and loyalty to God. Often our faith is buffeted by external events over which we have no control. However, when things go well with us then we think life’s wonderful and God is good. Adverse circumstances often come as a test of our faith and we quickly go back to thinking that God must have abandoned us.

When the Egyptians followed the Israelites in hot pursuit it became a test of the Israelites faith in God. A test that they failed! They should have put the lessons of the plagues into effect and trusted in God to protect them from the Egyptians, but no they panicked.

Trust in God is a hard lesson for us to learn. We have a short memory of God’s goodness to us in the past. As soon as something happens our first thoughts are that God has forsaken us. When we learn to trust in his goodness and mercy, disregarding our own merits, we have faith. As long as the Israelites looked back at the oncoming Pharaoh and his army they were overcome with fear but when they turned to the Lord and trusted him salvation came. The repeated miraculous acts of God in the events leading to the exodus, as well as the event itself, opened the eyes of the Israelites to the awesome powers of their God. The Egyptians failed to see this and cling to their gods; The Israelites’ God was a god of action. When the Lord their God showed the power of his might and his great love for them in rescuing them from their bondage they could but only responded by putting their trust in him and to have faith in him.

Make Jesus Christ the one to whom you look for real, deep, meaningful life. Do not settle for less. Fight against the evil of the world and uphold Christian standards in all things. Evil is with us today and will continue to be with us. Go forward in faith and in trust, knowing that His salvation is sure.

Lord, help me to become a God-fearing disciple of God and help me to avoid temptation to put my rust in pseudo-gods.