So, how does faith grow?
Unfortunately, it doesn’t happen in a vacuum. After all, how strong would our faith be, if we didn’t exercise it?
Yeah. Wimpy is what I was thinking too.
In order for faith to grow, it has to be used, stretched, tried, exercised, worked, and tested. Only then can it be strengthened.
When I was in high school, I was a decent little athlete. Okay, not really, but I tried. I played basketball, volleyball, baseball (yes, on the boys team. I was the only girl on the team at the time (in the 80s) and we didn’t have softball.) I even tried my hand at track.
But I HATED practice.
Oh, goodness how I hated practice. Especially basketball practice. I despised it. Running up and down the court for no other reason other than to get in shape. Ugh. I despise running to this day. But I did it because I loved to play.
Our coach was relentless. Day after agonizing day, our girls’ team had to run ‘lines’ with the boys. Lines… the drill where you run to the free-throw line and back, then the half-court line and back and then the other free-throw line and back and finally from line to line.
And we were timed. If we didn’t do the whole thing in 32 seconds, we had to run the sprint again… often to the point of losing our lunch. Then we only got to wait the 28 seconds that the boys had to run their line before we had to get back up to the line to do it all over again.
We had to do six of them.
Ugh. I am tired just thinking about it.
But you know what? After three or four days we didn’t miss our times anymore.
A week later we had legs and lungs of steel.
By our first game, running up and down the court for an hour wasn’t such an ordeal.
All because we ran those stupid lines.
I am not sure where Coach Ellis picked up his conditioning regimen, but I have to wonder if they were God-inspired.
Listen to this…
The temptations in your life are no different from what others experience. And God is faithful. He will not allow the temptation to be more than you can stand. When you are tempted, he will show you a way out so that you can endure. – 1 Corinthians 10:13 NLT
When Paul used the word temptation, he was using the word peirasmos which is Greek for “a putting to proof” (Strongs Concordance).
I call it experience.
So by exercising, our muscles and lungs were strengthened. And by our experience our faith is proven.
And those experiences aren’t any different than anyone else faces.
We all have trials… financial troubles, illness, heartache.
Our kids all act up. Our cars break down.
Cats chew laptop cords… dogs pee on our good slacks.
Everyone has the same stuff… big and small. But not everyone leans on God.
His help is available 24/7, which means…
‘Either our trials will be proportioned to our strength, or strength will be supplied in proportion to our temptations.” – Matthew Henry’s Commentary (pg 2262)
I like that.
Either God won’t let the tough stuff be more than I can handle, or he will give me the strength to get through it.
I am finding that out first-hand right now. I told you a few weeks ago that my husband has brain cancer (Glioblastoma), my mother was diagnosed with Alzheimer’s late last year, and my dad was in the final stages of his battle with liver cancer.
He was.
My dad was called home two weeks ago.
You know what? God is faithful.
I will not be naive enough to say it was not more than I can handle… It was, but I will confidently say that in losing my Dad, God held me up, and He continues to hold me up. He has supplied strength (beyond my understanding) so that I can put one foot in front of the other through this trial and see His hand all along the way.
And He will do the same for you.
“There is no valley so dark but he can find a way through it, no affliction so grievous but he can prevent, or remove, or enable us to support it, and in the end overrule it to our advantage. – Matthew Henry’s Commentary (pg 2262)
God may allow our trials to exhaust us. He may let it get overwhelming. But He won’t let it break us… only we can allow that.
We all have a choice. We can allow these trials to break us, or we can choose to cling to the One who made us and trust Him.
Trusting him allows our faith to grow. It isn’t fun. It isn’t pretty, it is often messy and painful and it certainly isn’t what any of us would choose.
But it can be life-changing.
The kind of change that you look back on and realize the pain was worth it, because you wouldn’t be where you are right now if you hadn’t faced it head on.
We have a choice, my friend. We can either buckle under the trial or we can choose to grow our faith by holding the hand of the One who loves us even more than our daddies do.
I hope you’ll grow.
He will not crush the weakest reed or put out a flickering candle.
He will bring justice to all who have been wronged. – Isaiah 42:3 NLT
