How many times have you felt like, or already have, lost hope for a cause God called you to serve?
Many of us said a prayer expressing our faith when we gave Christ a position of Lordship over our lives by trusting Jesus for the forgiveness of our sins. I did, and I continue to depend on Him every day. The Bible says, “faith comes from hearing the message, and the message is heard through the word about Christ” New Living Translation.
So now what? Now, we are supposed to take a life-long walk of faith, hope, and love in Christ Jesus. However, there are times when we feel fainthearted and temporarily forget some of the promises God has declared to us. In these moments, we need to hear again that same voice that we trusted at the beginning of our journey with God. That begs the question…
How do we hear from God?
I’m glad you asked.
For me, the first step starts with the Bible. That doesn’t mean I open my New International Version every time I make a decision. It’s been years since I started my journey with God, and as I’ve pored over His written word, it’s affected my mindset. So, in many of the simple decisions, I make I’m able to ask my Biblically saturated heart, “do I have peace about this option I’m considering?” If I have peace, I make a quick decision so that I’ll have more time for meditating on the weightier issues troubling my mind.
For example, it has been about two years since I wrote blogs consistently. I made excuses not to write because I had a full master’s degree schedule and was planning for my wedding and a move across the ocean to China.
After three months of quarantine in my small new apartment, I felt called to write again. I had a decision to make and needed to hear from God.
I did not want to write.
I was not consistent before.
I let down my faithful subscribers.
I feared to let God down again, too.
When I prayed about it, though, my heart was at peace, but my mind doubted whether I would be successful this time around.
So I needed to take step two.
The second step to hearing God’s voice is for the more difficult questions. Here I fast and pray about the issue. Why fast? In Luke 5:35, Jesus said that Christians would fast after he ascended to Heaven. Fasting uses our feelings of hunger to remind us to seek God in prayer. It also helps us to pray more passionately.
While fasting, I also recommend something so important, I have made it the third step (even though it’s wise to do this during your fast). Meditate on additional scriptures. God kindly led me to relevant verses in my daily devotions. 1 Corinthians 10:15-16 talks about Paul’s desire to see the Corinthians grow in faith so that his ministry could expand to areas where the gospel had not reached. As an imitator of Paul, I desire to see my ministry expand as well. In these verses, I could hear God’s voice confirming my desire was from Him.
So now that we have discussed how to hear from God, let’s ask again…
How many times have you felt like, or already have, lost hope for a cause God called you to serve?
Before you reflect on that question again, let me define hope:
Hope is the right response to the promises of God. Abraham is a great example. He believed God would keep His promise of blessing him with a son. Even though he was very old, he had confidence God would fulfill his promises. “Against all hope, Abraham in hope believed” (Romans 8:14) NIV.
What about us?
In our journey, we should believe as Abraham believed. The Bible says, “For no matter how many promises God has made, they are “Yes” in Christ. And so, through him, the “Amen” is spoken by us to the glory of God” (2 Corinthians 1:20) NIV.
Also, “Being confident of this, that he who began a good work in you will carry it on to completion until the day of Christ Jesus” (Philippians 1:6) NIV. Understanding who we live for and for what purpose, vital. We should; “Let perseverance finish its work so that you may be mature and complete, not lacking anything” (James 1:4) NIV.
Sometimes we feel crushed down for not doing our best to cultivate the gifts God has given us. In those times, we should remember the only thing that provides us with good standing with God is having hope in Whom we’ve believed.
The Holy Spirit helps us run our race faithfully. I asked Him to help me bear fruit as I try to write and blog again.
“Abraham, in hope, believed.” Therefore, it is not how much we are discouraged, but how much we believe that counts.
Against all hope, hope.