Tag Archives: bigger picture

We Had Our Hopes Up

Christian Life, , ,

WE HAD OUR HOPES UP

“He said, ‘What has happened?’

“They said, ‘The things that happened to Jesus, the Nazarene. He was a man of God, a prophet, dynamic in work and word, blessed by both God and all the people. Then our high priests and leaders betrayed Him, got Him sentenced to death and crucified Him. And we had our hopes up that He was the Christ. And now this is the third day since it happened. But now some of our women have completely confused us. Early this morning they were at the tomb and couldn’t find His body. They came back with the story that they had seen a vision of angels who said He was alive. Some of our friends went off to the tomb to check and found it empty just as the women had said, but they didn’t see Jesus,'” Luke 24:19-24 (The Message).

What sad words, ‘We had our hopes up…’

‘What a story! No wonder these poor disciples were confused! So many things had happened in such a short time that they could not make head or tail of them. If they had only taken note of Jesus’ repeated warning, they would have saved themselves from all this confusion.

How many times had Jesus told them that these things would happen? He had explained to them in detail that He would be arrested, tried and crucified, and that He would rise again on the third day. Had they listened, it would have been a time of celebration and expectation instead of confusion and grief.

Jesus continued to play His little game of “hide-and-seek” with them. He listened to their story, perhaps with a touch of amusement because He was about to give them the biggest surprise of their lives, but also with some frustration because of their unbelief.

The disciples had walked with Jesus long enough to know that He was always in charge of every situation and that He always had a solution. Had they watched and listened, they would have realised that He was not a victim of an assassination plot but a willing participant in something much bigger, orchestrated to fulfil a greater purpose.

Time and again He had made it clear that He was nobody’s pawn. He had often walked through a murderous mob unscathed. He had often declared, ‘It’s not yet my time.’ The tale of woe of these two that morning made it obvious to Jesus that nothing He had said made sense to them and they didn’t believe any of it. What a slap in the face for Him!

How like them we are! We have a whole Bible full of promises and reassurances but, when things don’t go our way, we fall apart like the disciples did, and spend our time and emotional energy recounting the problems instead of trusting the promises. Has God ever failed? If He fails you, it will be the first time in history, His first lie and the first crack in His flawless character!

On one occasion, Jesus and His disciples met a man born blind. The disciples’ reaction was, ‘Whose fault was it that he was born blind.’ Jesus’ response was typically ‘Jesus’. “‘You’re asking the wrong question. You’re looking for someone to blame. There is no such cause and effect here. Look instead for what God can do.'” John 9:3 (The Message).

That’s it! It does not matter what crisis we are in. Three facts are non-negotiable: God is there; God is good; God is in charge. No one can ‘do’ anything ‘to’ anyone without God’s knowledge and purpose. How much better to wait and trust rather than expend useless emotional pain in fear and unbelief.

A simple, ‘Let’s see what God can do,’ will wipe out doubt and replace it with anticipation of something bigger than we can imagine. After all, isn’t God about putting His glory on display through us? He used the most impossible circumstances to do it through Jesus, and He will do it through us if we believe.

Persistent Faith

Christian Life, , ,

PERSISTENT FAITH

“Jesus told them a story showing that it was necessary for them to pray constantly and never quit. He said, “There was once a judge in some city who never gave God a thought and cared nothing for people. A widow in that city kept after him. ‘My rights are being violated. Protect me.’ ….After this went on and on he said to himself,…’Because the widow won’t quit badgering me, I’d better do something and see that she gets justice — otherwise I am going to end up beaten black and blue by her pounding.’

“Then the Master said, ‘Do you hear what that judge, corrupt as he is, is saying? So what makes you think that God won’t step in and work justice for His chosen people, who continue to cry out for help? Won’t He stick up for them? I assure you, He will. He will not drag His feet. But how much of that kind of persistent faith will the Son of Man find on the earth when He comes?'” Luke 18:1-8 (The Message).

Another story that reveals the character of God by contrast! A godless judge is moved to action by a shamelessly persistent ‘nobody’ widow to get her off his back. It was not her need or his compassion that drove him to action but her nagging that got him going.

We must not think for a moment that God is like that. He is, first and foremost, a Father. Does a father hold out against his child until the child’s persistent nagging gets him down? Not if he is a loving and caring father but, however loving and caring an earthly father he may be, he can never match the love of God for His children.

So why does God sometimes seem deaf or unmoved by the cries of His children? If I had the answer, I would be the first person in Christendom to solve this mystery! I can only make a few suggestions from the evidence of Scripture as to why God’s answers don’t come when we expect them.

God is painting His picture on a very big canvas. We often tend to think that we are the only people in the universe. When our need arises, God must step in and do something when we call. But He is working out His purposes, not only in our lives but also across communities, nations and the world.

He heard the cries of His slave people in Egypt but He had to prepare a Moses and a national and international situation that would be the right time to deliver His people from slavery and take them into the Promised Land. With a new dynasty in Egypt, He changed their status from pampered and protected people to slaves so that they would groan under their oppression and long for freedom. Then God was ready to take them out.

God gave sons to aged and childless couples like Abraham and Sarah, Manoah and his wife and Zachariah and Elizabeth to fulfil His greater purposes for His nation and for the eventual coming of His Messiah. God weaves the answers to our prayers into a much bigger picture in some mysterious way that is beyond our comprehension.

Jesus spoke of ‘persistent faith’. These two words are almost interchangeable. Real faith is confidence in God that does not give up, even when things seem really bad. Once again, Abraham is a good example. What father would deliberately take his own son, that one who was born to him in his old age, and raise a knife to kill him on a sacrificial altar? Only a man, whose confidence in God was unshakeable, would do that because his faith was tried and tested.

A statement I heard in a teaching long ago has helped me to understand why God’s delays seem like unanswered prayer: “God will not answer your prayers until He has put all the structures in place to maintain that answer,”

Now that makes a whole lot of sense. If He were to jump to attention every time we call, He would leave a string of disasters behind because every answer to prayer needs a supporting structure so that God’s work in our lives is not wasted.

Imagine if God had given Abraham his son when he first began to pray, or if God had delivered Israel when they first began to cry out. Abraham would not have grown a faith so strong that he trusted God for his son’s life. There would not have been a Moses, raised in the palace and honed in the desert to lead His people out of slavery.

So what’s the point? God is saying, “Will you trust me, even though nothing seems to be happening? Although you can’t see it yet, I am working and, if you believe, you will see your place in my great big picture.”