Is your future scaring you? You don't know how you are going to get through it, but yet you thought God was telling you to go this way?
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Imagine this situation:
You were working as a slave under an oppressive regime when you heard talk of a stranger. A man who had lived in the royal house of the regime 40 years ago, had returned from exile, saying he had a message from 'God' to help you all escape.
He called group meetings to tell you about this 'God' - 'Jehovah' or 'Yahweh'- meaning 'I AM' . He told you that this God existed from before time was. That He is the God of your ancestors, and had seen your plight, heard your cries, seen your suffering.
At first, this stranger and his message seemed to cause nothing but trouble and you struggled to believe him or his 'message from God'. In response to his dealings with the regime they made your workload even harder. And then terrible things started happening.
Mysteriously you noticed that these terrible things seemed to affect the regime rather than your own settlement, but you could smell the awful stench when their rivers were turned to blood and all the fish died, and then again after they had piled in heaps all the frogs that had suddenly appeared.
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You had noticed the sky above your oppressors dark and thick with swarms of flies, and then heard all their cows had mysteriously died. After more rumours of terrible illnesses affecting your slave masters and their families, it all came to a head.
The stranger and his brother had passed a message through your 'clan' on a memorable day that you were to prepare for escape that night but first there were strict instructions of what you must do to protect your families from the last plague that God was going to send.
It all seemed strange, and terrible, although you were starting to get excited that you were really going to escape - and go to the land of your ancestors.
After a dramatic exit from this land where you had been held captive for so many years, and continued breath taking experiences where God had saved you from the pursuing enemies and provided you with food and water when none was to be had, you were now wondering if you had been totally deceived.
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A scouting party had returned and were reporting that the land of your ancestors was full of great cities, giants and strong enemies. However would you survive? This wasn't going to be an easy journey 'home'! You were going to have to fight for your freedom, your ancestral lands, and the survival of your families.
People started talking about what you should all do. There was a lot of unrest and unease. Some were saying they would rather had died as a slave or from hunger and thirst in the wilderness than from being killed.
You all decided you had had enough of this stranger and his God and decided to appoint a new leader, a captain, to take you back to the cruel regime you had been set free from - after all you had seen all the army drowned, and the regime weakened so what was there to be afraid of now? You were longing for familiar surroundings, your homes and your usual foods.
Photo by Ruben Hanssen on Unsplash..........
As we imagine what it was like to be part of the Israelite exodus from slavery in Egypt under the leadership of Moses, and then their rebellion against God and deciding to turn back to Egypt, are we any different today as we dread what lies before us and perhaps think how we can avoid it or turn back from it?
These people were faced with the daunting prospect of the battles and hardship in front of them, after years of slavery and oppression. It would seem that many of them were not familiar with the faith of their ancestors and had had to be taught about God. Despite all the wonders, miracles and power of God that they had now seen it was all fairly new to them. Their faith and belief in God was faltering.
We may like to think that we would have been like two of the spies who tried to encourage the people not to be afraid, but rather to trust in their great God who would help them. These two spies were looking back at what God had already shown he could do on their behalf. And now they were looking to God in faith, trusting that He would continue to help them now. That He would be true to his promises.
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Christians, either longer or shorter in the way of following God, have too the evidences of his powers and greatness in the Bible and in what He has done in our lives - but does our belief still falter and perhaps even want to give it all up? Turn back to life as it was before we followed Jesus? Do we get tired and frustrated with the difficulty of the way and complain, can't we just have a bit of an easier time?!
Perhaps not outwardly, but inwardly we may start to rebel. We might think life was much easier before we became a Christian. We start to lose faith in God.
We sometimes seem to be very selective at what we remember from our past and may conveniently forget negative aspects just remembering the good things. The Israelites were being beaten, their babies murdered, forced to work in glaring hot sun without the supplies they needed and oppressed - they were slaves. And they wanted to return to it! Why?
Because they were more scared at what lay before them than by the persecution and terror they were familiar with.
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They were doubting God. Doubting that He exists, that He was really going to help them, that He really knew about them, that He would really work out their problem for them, that He was greater than their enemies, that He really knew what was the best way for them.
Maybe we are tempted to return to how things were before we started following Jesus. What would that mean?
No loving Heavenly Father to turn to every second of the day when we feel our need of help, counsel, wisdom, love and everything we can name. No precious Saviour to adore, worship, praise, lean on, come to in all our needs for help and forgiveness from our sins, for acceptance by God, no Holy Spirit to teach us of God, to give words to what we can't express in our prayers and needs, to comfort us.
We would be totally ALONE. Our future would be one of total alienation from God and all that is good for ever and ever and ever.
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Dear Christian, whatever is in front of you now is under God's control. Whether it seems as big as the giants which the Israelites were faced with, or as impossible as the great walled cities which would need to be overcome and destroyed, listen to these words from Isaiah 48:17,18:
'Thus saith the LORD, thy Redeemer, the Holy One of Israel; I am the LORD thy God which teacheth thee to profit, which leadeth thee by the way that thou shouldest go. O that thou hadst hearkened to my commandments! then had thy peace been as a river, and thy righteouness as the waves of the sea'.
What unnecessary fretting we cause ourselves by looking at our circumstances, by imagining the problems we are going to have, by looking at our own inadequacies, instead of looking to our God and believing that He is leading us in our journey to Him in heaven.
What peace we miss out on!
Faith is a gift from God. As JH Gosden* so beautifully expresses it, faith is like 'hands' given by God to lay hold on Him. And these hands - faith - work by love and is accompanied by hope and repentance. It fights against our unbelief, which is the sin of our heart, exacerbated by the whispering taunts of the devil and voices of people and the circumstances around us.
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Let us pray to God to increase our faith and subdue our unbelief. To strengthen our 'hands' and our 'hold' on Him, so that instead of being like those who rebelled and wanted a different leader to take them back to slavery and trouble, we might be like those who 'press towards the mark' (Philippians 3:14) clinging to our dear Lord and Saviour, clinging to the Rock which never moves.
And, dear friend, if you have 'taken up your cross' to follow Jesus, remember - it wasn't you that made you willing to start following Him - it wasn't you that chose Him and made this decision. It all comes from the work of God within you.
From before time began God knew about you, loved you and chose you to be one of His children. He will never leave you, let you down, or forget about you. He is bringing you through life to be with Him in eternal happiness. He will not let you go.
*JH Gosden. What Gospel Standard Baptists Believe. Article 13.
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