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IS
OUR FAITH/BELIEF IN GOD’S POWER REAL IN OUR LIVES?
By
Marilyn La Strape
We can know that God’s power
is real and active in our lives as we experience His continued
care, guidance, provision, and protection.
When
we persevere in obedience to His will and way, we are kept by
the power of God through faith (I Peter 1:5), and that power is
perpetual to all of us who are called according to His purpose.
God’s word is replete with examples of His power
working in the lives of mankind.
I will share four of these accounts that have truly been
faith builders for me and I hope will have the same life
sustaining power for you.
The faith of Abraham in the
power of God was strikingly evident from the time God gave
Abraham His first command in Genesis 12. God
began to demonstrate His power to Abraham when He told him to
get out of his country, from his kindred and from his house to
go to a land that He would show him.
One of the most well known accounts of God’s power
occurs when Abraham and Sarah have a son when he is 100 and she
is 90! When God
told them that this would happen, both Abraham and Sarah laughed
(Gen. 17:17; 18:12), but God asked them:
“Is anything too hard for the Lord?
At the appointed time I will return to you, according to
the time of life, and Sarah shall have a son.” (Gen. 18:14)
Paul references this encounter that God had with Abraham
in Romans 4:20: “He did not waver at the promise of God through unbelief,
but was strengthened in faith, giving glory to God.”
Even though Abraham had laughed in his heart, he still
believed that God would do exactly as He had promised, that
through his seed all the nations of the earth would be blessed.
When God delivered the
Israelites out of Egyptian bondage, the power of God was
demonstrated in the ten plagues that defy human explanation or
full comprehension!
Pharaoh got a ten-lesson correspondence course in the
power of God and he failed the course miserably.
His failure to believe in the power of God could not have
ended more tragically. You
would think after witnessing power like that, there would be
unwavering faith in our God by His people, right?
Think again, they were just like so many of us, wavering
and in unbelief. When
the Israelites came to the Red Sea, with Pharaoh and his army
marching after them, they turned their fear and anger on Moses
and asked him weren’t there enough graves in Egypt, why had he
taken them into the wilderness to die?
In Exodus 14:13 it says, “And Moses said to the people,
'Do not be afraid'." Stand
still and see the salvation of the Lord, which He will
accomplish for you today. For
the Egyptians whom you see today, you shall see again no more
forever.” How soon they forgot that mind tilting proof of God’s
unlimited power, but before we become too judgmental, what about
our faith/belief in the power of God?
In II Kings 3, we have the
account of three of the kings of Judah going up to fight against
the king of Moab, but they had not made proper provisions for
this battle.
When they had marched on that roundabout route for seven
days; and there was no water for the army, nor for the animals
that followed them, they began to blame God!!
Is that typical of us??
The king of Judah, King Jehoshaphat did have enough faith
to ask if there was a prophet of the Lord among them, and they
inquired of the prophet Elisha.
For the sake of Jehoshaphat, Elisha told them to make the
valley full of ditches and the valley would be filled with
water. These three kings had to believe in the power of God through
the prophet Elisha to obey the command.
Elisha went on to tell them, “And this is but a trivial
thing in the sight of the Lord; He will also deliver the
Moabites into your hand. (IIKi3:18) Can we truly appreciate what
is being said here? It makes no difference what size the problem looks like to us
– to God with His power, it is trivial.
In II Chronicles 20, we read
again about King Jehoshaphat when the people came and told him
that the people of Moab, Ammon, and Mount Seir were coming to
battle against Judah.
King Jehoshaphat was afraid and he sought the Lord and
proclaimed a fast throughout all Judah.
Jehospahpat is one of the few good kings who ruled over
God’s people and he knew exactly what had to be done in this
situation. He is an
outstanding example that reminds us of who God is and who is in
control. He prayed
and in his prayer, he seems to be asking a rhetorical question,
but at the same time this question is a faith builder in the
power of God! In
IIChron 20:6 he says, “Oh Lord God of our fathers, are You not
God in heaven and do You not rule over all the kingdoms of the
nations, and in Your hand is there not power and might, so that
no one is able to withstand You?”
Can’t you hear the pleading of reassurance that he
needs from God to make sure that all will be well?
He goes on to say that God had not allowed Israel to
invade the people of Ammon, Moab, and Mount Seir when they came
out of Egypt, and now here they were rewarding the Israelites by
coming to throw them out of their possession!
In verse 12, he makes this statement that is staunch in
his belief in the power of God:
“O our God, will You not judge them?
For we have no power against this great multitude that is
coming against us; nor do we know what to do, but our eyes are
upon you.” Isn’t
that rich?
Is Jehoshaphat ready for whatever is about to
take place or what?! He
is moved from worry to worship when God sends Jahaziel and tells
him to tell Jehoshaphat that they would not need to fight in
this battle, to position themselves, stand still and see the
salvation of the Lord. In
verse 20, Jehoshaphat told the people “Hear me, O Judah and
you inhabitants of Jerusalem:
Believe in the Lord your God, and you shall be
established; believe His prophets, and you shall prosper.”
When the people of God begin to sing and to praise, the
Lord set ambushes against the people of Ammon, Moab and Mount
Seir, and they were defeated.
When Judah came to look, there was nothing but dead
bodies fallen on the earth – no one had escaped.
When Jehoshaphat and his people came to take away their
spoil, it was more than they could carry; it took them three
days to gather it! The
power of God is so evident once again in verse 30:
“Then the realm of Jehoshaphat was quiet, for his God
gave him rest all around.”
We need to take comfort in the fact that when the power
of God is working through our obedient faith, there is only
success in our future!
In my estimation, the greatest
manifestation of God’s awesome power was exemplified when He
raised Christ from the dead.
All four of the gospel writers tell of this marvelous
event and when we embrace the truth of that revelation, we will
be steadfast and unmovable always abounding in the work of the
Lord. Our hope of
one-day being able to see Him as He is became a reality for us
as faithful believers when God raised Christ from the dead! It
was an unprecedented and unparalleled event because Christ is
the only one who was ever raised from the dead never
to die again! As
our faith in the power of God continues to grow and mature we
can say with Jeremiah: “Ah,
Lord God! Behold,
You have made the heavens and the earth by Your great power and
outstretched arm. There
is nothing too hard for You.”
(Jer. 32:17)
This
article is copyrighted by the author. All Rights Reserved. No
part of this article may be reprinted without permission of the
author. ©Copyright 2002
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