The Special of the Day… From the Orange Moon Cafe…
“That We May Believe”
“These things have I written unto you that believe on the name of the Son of God; that ye may know that ye have eternal life, and that ye may believe on the name of the Son of God” (I John 5:13).
Unto those “that believe,” the Apostle John wrote his epistle for purpose “that ye may believe.” The faith of the new birth must increasingly become the faith of our “walk in newness of life” (Romans 6:4). We do well to take pause and prayerfully ponder a question that bears the greatest impact on our existence…
“To what degree do we believe God and His Word?”
We do not direct the question inward, but rather outward, upward, and away. Only our Heavenly Father can answer the great question of how faithfully we trust Him. We await His answers that will come to us by His Spirit, His Word, fellow believers, and His illumination of our hearts and minds along the paths of Providence. “Thou wilt show me the path of life” (Psalm 16:11).
An even greater question actually prepares us to know where we are in our journey of faith. “How well do we know our Lord?” Indeed, faith is fruit rather than root. We trust others to the degree we know them. The challenges of faith do not primarily involve their measure, degree, or nature of difficulty. Scripture and history record that God can be trusted in fiery flames by those who well know Him:
“If it be so, our God whom we serve is able to deliver us from the burning fiery furnace, and He will deliver us out of thine hand, O king. But if not, be it known unto thee, O king, that we will not serve thy gods, nor worship the golden image which thou hast set up” (Daniel 3:17-18).
Three young men did not trust their Lord in the most dire circumstance as a mere matter of disciplined obedience. They believed Him because they knew Him. God had revealed Himself personally to Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego. They had responded in faith to find Him so trustworthy that they knew He could be trusted in fires that brought light and warmth, and in fires that threatened pain and death. His faithfulness and the knowledge thereof assured their hearts regarding His heart and its assurance that God can and must be believed, no matter what.
“God is our refuge and strength, a very present help in trouble. Therefore will not we fear, though the earth be removed, and though the mountains be carried into the midst of the sea, though the waters thereof roar and be troubled, though the mountains shake with the swelling thereof” (Psalm 46:1-3).
Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego knew something about our God that we must know, and having known it, we must know better and better. Namely, no one has ever trusted the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ and been disappointed for doing so. And no on ever will. Infinite faithfulness forever abides as the sublime character of His heart, and the governing determination of His every thought, word, action, and relationship to His creation. How well do we know the wonder of such glory? Not well enough. We “that believe” must become those who more and more “may believe.” The issue does not involve our determination to become better at trusting God, but rather more and more knowing who He is and understanding of His perfect faithfulness that motivates and empowers our believing. Trusting God flows from the wellspring of knowing Him, and of knowing Him better and better, more and more, and “increasing in the knoweldge of God” (Colossians 1:10). The Lord Jesus Christ defined eternal life in these terms and we close in their faith fostering and fueling light, “that we may believe…”
“And this is life eternal, that they might know Thee the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom Thou hast sent.”
(John 17:3)
Weekly Memory Verse
The secret things belong unto the LORD our God: but those things which are revealed belong unto us and to our children for ever, that we may do all the words of this law.
(Deuteronomy 29:29)
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