The Truth About Our Faithfulness
Very recently, a friend of mine poured into me and encouraged me to accept a job promotion, basing her argument on my faithfulness to the Lord. She practically listed out my whole faith resume over these last few years as evidence of me remaining faithful to God and this promotion was therefore my reward from Him. Honestly, up until this point, I never considered my faithfulness to God, as I tend to zoom in on my inconsistencies and where I fall short, so hearing her recite them with the perspective of these encounters showing my faithfulness to Him was humbling and, may I add, hard to digest. This conversation was just a prelude to the real lesson that would come days later from the Lord Himself.
As I was thanking God for His goodness towards me and these opportunities for me to lean more on Him, without putting other people, things and ideologies before Him as idols, I was moved by His love and intention towards me. I recalled my “faith resume” but was baffled at all the times I fell short, so I asked Him, “Lord, what does it look like to remain faithful to you? If you know we will never get it perfect, what does it look like to remain faithful to you?” In the silence of my car, He spoke:
“ Your faithfulness to Me looks like when times get hard and you grow tired, weak, and weary, yet you not letting the enemy steal your faith, not letting him steal your joy. It is not you never messing up and getting it right every time but rather you not allowing yourself to stay down and aligning yourself with the enemy. This is what your faithfulness to me looks like. This is the faithfulness I look for. This is the faithfulness I reward.”
I thought of all the biblical references where we are called to remain faithful and how I attributed this to mean that we are to remain perfect in our obedience to God. This is not to demand an unrealistic idea of perfect works, but to point us towards a righteous faith, where we do not lose our faith and belief in the resurrecting power and sanctifying work of Jesus. We are to daily repent and keep moving forward in obeying His commands so that we may experience the fullness of His work within us, with faith. This is what our faithfulness to Him looks like. It was not that we should not lament and leap for joy when times get hard and our bodies wear out, even Jesus experienced psychological and physical anguish as He prepared to be betrayed and crucified (Matthew 26:39; Luke 22:44). On the contrary, we can acknowledge our despair, casting our cares unto God (1 Peter 5:7), yet still take a posture of surrender and a heart of praise for the goodness of the Lord by recalling His faithfulness resume, even through the tears. This is what faithfulness to The Lord looks like:
Even when we times get hard, our present looks bleak and our future, hopeless, we still choose to follow and love God with all our heart, soul, mind and strength (Mark 12:30).
