“But I will never stop loving him nor fail to keep My promise to him. No, I will not break My covenant; I will not take back a single word I said. I have sworn an oath to David, and in My holiness I cannot lie: His dynasty will go on forever; his kingdom will endure as the sun. It will be as eternal as the moon, My faithful witness in the sky!” (Psalm 89:33-37 NLT)
Do you ever get discouraged? Feel like quitting? Wonder if it’s all worth the effort? When you read through the Psalms, especially the words of David, you get a sense at times David feels like he’s fighting a losing battle, but in the words above, given through Ethan the Ezrahite, the Lord promises and confirms that the words He spoke to David would prevail and come to fruition.
Perhaps another way to think of it would be, have you stopped believing? No, I’m not suggesting you’ve given up your belief in Jesus, but has your discouragement prevented you from continuing to ask Him the hard questions? Will I ever be healed? Will my loved one(s) ever be saved? Will my grown children ever come back to You? Will my co-workers or classmates ever stop hassling me? Will my young children ever get out of diapers?
The list is long of questions that can lead us to discouraging answers, but I’m learning that questions aren’t always the issue. Why not? Because our source of hope is in Jesus and He should be the basis of all the questions that really matter. For example, “Has He ever failed?” And, yes, that’s a very biased question leading to a sometimes ambiguous answer. But why? Because we too often evaluate “failure” based on OUR experience of something, not on how God responds.
For example, when our child is sick or our job is on the line, or our own health is failing, or a thousand other scenarios where we’re begging God to do one thing and He does (allows) something different. Did HE fail? Or did our expectations of Him fail? And please understand, I’m not trying to let the Lord off the proverbial “hook”, I’m trying to help us see that He’s perfect in every way and incapable of failure of any kind. He cannot NOT do the right thing in the right way at the right time – EVER!
It would be a violation of His holiness and perfection, not to mention His omnipotence and omniscience. Here’s the bottom line: God cannot and will not violate His own character. What we want in any given circumstance may seem the right thing, but the Lord sees the beginning from the end and knows the outcome of every choice and decision. What it boils down to is a matter of trust. Who will we trust?
Yes, of course, pray and ask for outcomes that would be pleasing to us. If I have a loved one who is sick, of course I will pray for their healing with great expectation. But if the Lord chooses to take them home to Him, I’m certainly fine with that as well. “But what if they die and they don’t know Him?” That’s very likely, at least in my mind, the most painful and difficult scenario I can imagine, and there’s no way to sugarcoat the outcome.
Every morning I name dozens of my lost relatives by name, pleading with the Lord and with them, to come to Jesus, knowing that it’s not God’s will for any of them to perish. I’m reminded of 2 Peter 3:9 where Peter writes: “The Lord isn’t really being slow about His promise, as some people think. No, He is being patient for your sake. He does not want anyone to be destroyed, but wants everyone to repent.”
Here’s the painful truth: people go to hell against God’s will! We can pray and beg and beg and pray, but some will never open their heart to the Lord. Does that mean we should stop asking the Lord for their salvation and them to repent? Not until hell freezes over!
Food for thought.
Blessings, Ed 😊
