Bread For the Soul: Lesson 2, "God's Answer"
God’s Answer for Us in our Faith Struggles
Most children begin to develop an awareness of failings, and sin, when entering elementary school. Their self- understanding is greatly formed by the people around them at this time. When my son, Andrew, went to a local Christian camp at the age of 10, he had a very young counselor. Every night before lights out, campers had discussion time with their counselors about the day, what they learned and did. That day, they had been exposed to the idea of going to Hell due to the sin that lives in us. Andrew, quite understandably, and with a knowledge of his imperfect self, asked this burning question of his counselor: “If I forget to ask forgiveness of a sin, and then die, do I go to Hell?” Unfortunately, the counselor’s answer was “yes.” Four years after that theological wrecking ball of a discussion, I was still tucking Andrew in bed at night reassuring him that no loving God would send people to Hell because they couldn’t remember every sin and ask forgiveness. “God is on our side. He’s on our team!” I said over and over again.
For those of us who are so painfully aware of our shortcomings compared to the glory of God, we can’t help but worry about our eternal outcome. And the worst answer to our anxiety is another believer telling us in flippant and cavalier ways things such as “Once saved always saved, “ or “I’ve never worried a day in my life. I love Jesus all of the time.” Most of us either don’t subscribe to the first, or can’t measure up to the second. The result is living is the painful reality that we aren’t walking the path best laid for us by God the majority of the time, we are sinners, and too often we aren’t repentant as we ought to be.
Answer #1) God loves us and stops at nothing so that we can be with him forever. But our relationship with him requires a response to that love.
John Wesley preached about “assurance.” Assurance is the blessing that, while we can choose to walk away from God, God himself NEVER makes that choice. We are assured of God’s fidelity to us, in spite of our brokenness. For the questioners and worriers, we can identify with Wesley, who had great theological knowledge, but paltry application of that knowledge to his own life. This is why his “heartwarming experience” should be a great comfort to so many of us “over-thinkers.”
“I Felt My Heart Strangely Warmed”
In the evening I went very unwillingly to a society in Aldersgate Street, where one was reading Luther’s preface to the Epistle to the Romans. About a quarter before nine, while he was describing the change which God works in the heart through faith in Christ, I felt my heart strangely warmed. I felt I did trust in Christ, Christ alone, for salvation; and an assurance was given me that He had taken away my sins, even mine, and saved me from the law of sin and death.
I began to pray with all my might for those who had in a more especial manner despitefully used me and persecuted me. I then testified openly to all there what I now first felt in my heart. But it was not long before the enemy suggested, “This cannot be faith; for where is thy joy?” Then was I taught that peace and victory over sin are essential to faith in the Captain of our salvation; but that, as to the transports of joy that usually attend the beginning of it, especially in those who have mourned deeply, God sometimes giveth, sometimes withholdeth, them according to the counsels of His own will.
After my return home, I was much buffeted with temptations, but I cried out, and they fled away. They returned again and again. I as often lifted up my eyes, and He “sent me help from his holy place.” And herein I found the difference between this and my former state chiefly consisted. I was striving, yea, fighting with all my might under the law, as well as under grace. But then I was sometimes, if not often, conquered; now, I was always conqueror.
Thursday, 25. —The moment I awakened, “Jesus, Master,” was in my heart and in my mouth; and I found all my strength lay in keeping my eye fixed upon Him and my soul waiting on Him continually. Being again at St. Paul’s in the afternoon, I could taste the good word of God in the anthem which began, “My song shall be always of the loving-kindness of the Lord: with my mouth will I ever be showing forth thy truth from one generation to another.” Yet the enemy injected a fear, “If thou dost believe, why is there not a more sensible change? I answered (yet not I), “That I know not. But, this I know, I have ‘now peace with God.’ And I sin not today, and Jesus my Master has forbidden me to take thought for the morrow.”
Wednesday, June 7. —I determined, if God should permit, to retire for a short time into Germany. I had fully proposed, before I left Georgia, so to do if it should please God to bring me back to Europe. And I now clearly saw the time was come. My weak mind could not bear to be thus sawn asunder. And I hoped the conversing with those holy men who were themselves living witnesses of the full power of faith, and yet able to bear with those that are weak, would be a means, under God, of so establishing my soul that I might go on from faith to faith, and from “strength to strength.”
[The next three months Wesley spent in Germany visiting the Moravians.]
John Wesley epitomizes the advice of Paul in
In Philippians 2:12-13, Paul writes, “Therefore, my dear friends, as you have always obeyed – not only in my presence, but now much more in my absence – continue to work out your salvation with fear and trembling, for it is God who works in you to will and to act according to his purpose.”
This text is often misused to instill fear into people, warning them that it means that they can lose salvation. What does it mean to work out our salvation with fear and trembling? Paul can hardly be encouraging believers to live in a continuous condition of nervousness and anxiety. That would contradict his many other exhortations to peace of mind, courage, and confidence in the God who authors our salvation. The Greek word translated "fear" in this context can equally mean "reverence" or "respect." Paul uses the same phrase in (2 Corinthians 7:15) where he refers to Titus as being encouraged by the Corinthians’ reception of him “with fear and trembling,” that is, with great humility and respect for his position as a minister of the gospel of Jesus Christ. Paul himself came to the Corinthian church in “weakness and fear, and with much trembling” (1 Corinthians 2:3), mindful of the great and awesome nature of the work in which he was engaged.
The sense in which we are to work out our salvation in fear and trembling is twofold. First, the Greek verb rendered “work out” means "to continually work to bring something to completion or fruition." We do this by actively pursuing obedience in the process of sanctification, which Paul explains further in the next chapter of Philippians. He describes himself as “straining” and “pressing on” toward the goal of Christlikeness (Philippians 3:13-14). The “trembling” he experiences is the attitude Christians are to have in pursuing this goal—a healthy fear of offending God through disobedience and an awe and respect for His majesty and holiness.
Answer #2
We will never have all the answers to our questions, but we always have THE ANSWER!
So often, I run across believers who have “prayed and received their answer.” Or they have experienced the “answer to their prayers,” meaning they received exactly what they asked for. I would personally loved to claim that, but my personal experience does not bear that out. God has never appeared to me with detailed instructions about where to go and what to do. Often, I have prayed for certain outcomes, and my prayer was not answered in the way I longed for.
Even now, my 42-year-old cousin with twin 4 year olds and a 7 year old is dying of cancer. That is not my answer to prayer.
Notice, however, that Jesus did not promise to help people exactly in they way they asked. Although he performed many miracles, all that he did and said was for the purpose of pointing the way to God, demonstrating God’s love, teaching followers about the character of God, demonstrating that God is close and active in each person’s life.
John 5:6 - Read about the cripple at the pool of Bethsaida…
What was Christ’s chief aim in that story?
Luke 8:43-50 -The woman with the issue of blood and Jaures’ daughter…
Why did Jesus respond to the woman first, rather than to the important religious official?
John 11:1 -The rising of Lazarus…
Why did Jesus wait until four days after Lazarus died?
Jesus in the Garden of Gethsemane…
Why did he not save himself? What do you think about his petition to God, “Let this cup pass from me?”
Understanding how God works in the world, God’s will for our lives, and our roll as believers is not simplistic. Neither is God simplistic. As he tells a complaining Job, “Were you there when I made everything? Can you possible comprehend me?” Faith is an act of coming close to God, letting God into our lives. Faith is not an exercise in achieving answers to all of the big questions in our lives, and most especially, it is not a means to “getting what we want.”
As the Book of Common Prayer asks, “What is the chief end of man?” And the people answer, “To glorify God and enjoy Him forever.”
