It is nice hearing promises from God, but when we wait around for it to happen, it gets harder to believe and more unimaginable to retrieve in the long-run. What are we to do to in the meantime? Do we still trust the promise-maker?
Sarah and Abraham were a cute couple, faithful to the Lord. God, pleased with them, promised to bless them with the biggest promise practically ever made to mankind (especially at that time). It was not until recently that I realized that Sarah conceived Isaac through faith. She was an old, barren, woman, who laughed at God when He told her she would carry a child. It made me wonder how this unimaginable fiction of a plot twisted into her reality of childbirth. Her situation was literally a story of fiction turned into reality. Sure, all sorts of “impossible” stuff takes place in the bible. So how does this apply to our faith life today?
Some things remain fiction. Fiction could be translated as anything we believe to be nothing-but-a-story and never a possibility of truth; in other words, it is simply a lie. On the contrary, we are to consider how a storyline turns into a matter of truth – this requires the belief that it has the potential to become a reality. Hence, it alludes that there is a quality of truth within it. Just imagine you were Sarah, God just told you about an unexpected blessing. It is hard to believe considering the circumstances you are currently experiencing. However, after laughing it off, doubting, denying, and going through all her emotions, she finally conceived through the faith she attained. Hebrews 11:11 states “And by faith even Sarah, who was past childbearing age, was enabled to bear children because she considered him faithful who had made the promise.” I mean, how beautiful is that!? She did not believe in the statement due to its absurdity – but rather in the One who said it.
Growing up, I believed in a lot of lies. The problem is, when we believe in the lies as opposed to the things that God speaks over us, we are giving more power to the speaker of lies than the speaker of truth. Sometimes the speaker of lies comes from the people around us and other times the thoughts are placed in our minds by the enemy. Either way, it affects our self-esteem. However, when the truth enters our minds and hearts, it sets us free and breaks us from the negative thought cycle. Though it is natural to go down this road, as children of God, we are to resist the devil and his ideologies in every way. Only then, by pursuing the truth, acknowledging the faithfulness of the Father (who is a giver of only good gifts), and believing that He has the best in store for us, can we receive the promise.
As we sing that He is a "miracle-worker, promise-keeper, our light in the darkness," we are acknowledging the character of faithfulness in our Heavenly Father even when our circumstances have yet to reflect it. We often quote Hebrews 11:1 as we explain how faith works. “Now faith is confidence in what we hope for and assurance about what we do not see.” This means that faith only comes into effect when we believe in something that has not actually taken place. In order for something to exist out of nothingness is a miracle! This may actually look like you living a double-life (seeing one thing but believing in the truth instead) until your idea turns into a reality. Time is not a factor here, just the will of God and our refining in the process. God is more interested in the condition of our hearts through this season than the progress of our execution.