Genesis 47:1-10
If I only believed, how different my life would be! I have no doubt it happened, I believe
in the God who made it happen, but when the rubber hits the road, I seem to
rely on my thoughts, feelings, and actions, and not on the promises of
God. And you might say; surely you
believe the promises of God, have you not taught them, have you not seen the
effect of them in your own life and the lives of others. Truthfully I must answer, yes, I have
both taught them and have seen the fulfillment of God’s promises. But how does one like me refrain from relying
on my thoughts, feelings, and let the Holy Spirit of God control my actions?
Both Joseph and his father believed the promises of God, the
promises that He had given to Abraham; Paul, the apostle gives this insight in
the book of Romans 4:21-22, “fully convinced that
God was able to do what he had promised.
That is why his faith was “counted to him as righteousness.”
and Isaac also had the same belief, and now God has promised Jacob/Israel, that
he would go with him into Egypt.
It is very clear to all, that what is seen in these first ten verses is
the hand of God on His promised people.
It is because I believe what I have read in these ten verses
that I can see clearly I have a belief problem, for there are many promises to
us who are called by the name of Christ.
Both you and I have experienced the gift of grace through faith, we call
that promise “Salvation,” and it is found in many places in the Scriptures; one
of my favorites is in John 1:12, “Yet to all who
received him, to those who believed in his name, he gave the right to become
children of God.”
Pastor Bill Johnson writes: “Jesus could not heal the
sick. Neither could He deliver the
tormented from demons or raise the dead.
To believe otherwise is to ignore what Jesus said about Himself, and
more importantly, to miss the purpose of His self-imposed restriction to live
as a man.” Jesus said of Himself: “I tell you the truth, the Son can do nothing by himself; he
can do only what he sees his Father doing, because whatever the Father does the
Son also does (John 5:19-20).”
The following promise is from our Lord Jesus, in John
14:12-13, it confronts my faith.
Jesus tells you and I the following, “I tell
you the truth, anyone who has faith in me will do what I have been doing. He will do even greater things than
these, because I am going to the Father.”
In my mind, this promise is very clear, I must rely on the
Father, I must let the Holy Spirit do it all for me, and through me, and that
is my crisis of faith!
So this is my question: “How can a person become dependent
and obey and abide in Christ and the Holy Spirit so as to experience this power
our Lord has promised? Could the
answer be, do as Jesus did, stop looking to man or self, and look to the Father
and obey.
From the Back Porch,
Bob Rice
No comments:
Post a Comment