Trusting God when it’s hard

“By faith the walls of Jericho fell down after being marched around by the Israelites for seven days. By faith Rahab the prostitute welcomed the spies in peace and didn’t perish with those who disobeyed.” (CSB – Read the chapter)

Have you ever been given a request or an instruction that simply didn’t make sense? Did you do it? If you did, why did you do it? There is probably one of a couple of reasons behind your acquiescence. One is simply that the person asking possessed a sufficient authority over you that you felt compelled to do it. The other reason is that even though you don’t understand it, you have enough trust in the person asking to do it anyway. Another way to put this second reason is that you have faith in the person. In the last bit of Hebrews 11 before the big finale (which we’ll talk about next week, Lord willing, and then on to chapter 12), the author mentions two of the stranger stories in the Old Testament. Let’s talk this morning about trusting God even when it doesn’t make sense.

Read the rest…

“And Job again took up his discourse, and said: ‘Oh, that I were as in the months of old, as in the days when God watched over me, when his lamp shone upon my head, and by his light I walked through darkness, as I was in my prime, when the friendship of God was upon my tent…'” (ESV – Read the chapter)

Job’s ordeal had been intense at this point. He had lost everything including his health. That’s not really specific enough. He had faced total financial ruin. All of his children had died in a tragic accident (an accident we, the readers, know was caused by Satan). His wife had functionally abandoned him out of her own grief. And he was experiencing horrendous physical suffering as well. To make matters even worse, three of his best friends had spent days with him arguing with greater and greater intensity and insistence that he was ultimately to blame for all of his troubles because of some sin that was going unconfessed in his life. The old adage, “when it rains it pours,” does not even begin to cover it here. Read the rest…

Tag: Trusting God when it’s hard

Morning Musing: Hebrews 11:30-31

Morning Musings: Job 29:1-4