Walk and Not Faint

Isaiah 40:27-31 ESV

“Why do you say, O Jacob,

    and speak, O Israel,

‘My way is hidden from the Lord,

    and my right is disregarded by my God’?

Have you not known? Have you not heard?

The Lord is the everlasting God,

    the Creator of the ends of the earth.

He does not faint or grow weary;

    his understanding is unsearchable.

He gives power to the faint,

    and to him who has no might he increases strength.

Even youths shall faint and be weary,

    and young men shall fall exhausted;

but they who wait for the Lord shall renew their strength;

    they shall mount up with wings like eagles;

they shall run and not be weary;

    they shall walk and not faint.”

Have you ever felt that way? There have been times in my life when I did feel that way, that God had forgotten about me. I know better now, but I didn’t know better then. But I wanted to have a better understanding of verse 27, so I looked it up, and I read this on the Benson Commentary:

“My way is hid — He takes no notice of my prayers, and tears, and sufferings, but suffers mine enemies to abuse me at their pleasure. This complaint is uttered in the name of the people, being prophetically supposed to be in captivity.”

Now the interesting thing about this is that it is true that the Lord does allow our enemies to abuse us at their pleasure. He does permit us to suffer. He does allow Satan and his cohorts to attack us, sometimes mercilessly, and to do all sorts of evil against us, and to get away with it, at least at present. Otherwise these things could not happen to us. For, remember how he gave Satan permission to afflict Job, a righteous man, but he set limits on Satan and on what he was allowed to do or not do.

And actually realizing this truth, and accepting it as truth, but then realizing that God is good, we can soon begin to understand that God allows these situations in our lives to make us strong in the Lord and in his strength, to mature us in our walks of faith, to humble us, and to make us more like Jesus. And if we are truly being called to suffer, it is going to hurt, and we probably are going to cry, and we will most likely cry out to God to rescue us. But when he does not immediately rescue us, we are not to assume that he has forgotten about us or that he is not listening to our cries for mercy.

But we need to then surrender our lives to the Lord and to his purposes for our lives, and submit to his sovereign will over our lives, and trust the Lord to work all of this out for good in our lives. But this is not saying that we cannot defend ourselves against false accusations against our character and against our walks of faith in Jesus Christ. Jesus defended himself against his accusers on a regular basis, as did Paul, as did Peter and John. Now we should not be mean and hateful, but we can stand up for ourselves if we know we are in the right, but not out of pride, but as led by the Spirit.

But the good thing to know here is that, if we are serving the Lord with our lives faithfully, and if our consciences are clear that we are not sinning against the Lord – not that we are claiming absolute perfection – then we can trust that the Lord is not only going to work it all out for our good, and perhaps for the good of others, too, but that he will give us the strength we need to endure and the wisdom to know what steps to take and what things to say. And if Satan tries to attack us in the process, we can trust the Lord that he will continue to lead us in what to do and in what to say and in how to respond to the enemies’ attacks against us.

And, honestly, we are still human beings, and we are not superman or superwoman. We have limited strength. And we do grow weak and tired. And we cry. And sometimes that is all we can do is just to cry it all out to God and to say, “HELP!” Even the young get weary and exhausted, so us old people definitely don’t have the physical or even emotional endurance we did when we were young, especially if we are taking beating after beating from the enemy. Even Job, a righteous man, struggled with his emotions when he was suffering physically and his friends were accusing him falsely.

So, sometimes we just need time and space where we can cry it all out to the Lord, and release those emotions, and then let God heal us and bring comfort to our minds and hearts. And then he will renew our strength. And oh, I have seen the Lord do this in my life over and over again. Once I am able to cry it out, then he comforts me, and then he guides me in the way in which he wants me to go, and he gives me the strength I need to endure and to keep going in his strength. And he will do the same for you if your trust is in him, and if you are resting in him, and if you are letting him lead.

Suffering, trials, persecutions: [Matt 5:10-12; Matt 10:16-25; Matt 24:9-14; Lu 6:22-23; Lu 21:12-19; Jn 15:1-21; Jn 16:33; Jn 17:14; Ac 14:22; Rom 5:3-5; Phil 3:7-11; 1 Pet 1:6-7; 1 Pet 4:12-17; 2 Tim 3:12; 1 Thess 3:1-5; Jas 1:2-4; 2 Co 1:3-11; Heb 12:3-12; 1 Jn 3:13; Rev 6:9-11; Rev 7:9-17; Rev 11:1-3; Rev 12:17; Rev 13:1-18; Rev 14:1-13]

For Our Nation  

An Original Work / September 11, 2012

Bombs are bursting. Night is falling.

Jesus Christ is gently calling

You to follow Him in all ways.

Trust Him with your life today.

Make Him your Lord and your Savior.

Turn from your sin. Follow Jesus.

He will forgive you of your sin;

Cleanse your heart, made new within.

Men betraying: Our trust fraying.

On our knees to God we’re praying,

Seeking God to give us answers

That are only found in Him.

God is sovereign over all things.

Nothing from His mind escaping.

He has all things under His command,

And will work all for good.

Jesus Christ is gently calling

You to follow Him in all ways.

Men deceiving: We’re believing

In our Lord, and interceding

For our nation and its people

To obey their God today.

He is our hope for our future.

For our wounds He offers suture.

He is all we need for this life.

Trust Him with your life today.

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