Dennis Edwards
“That He would grant you, according to the riches of His
glory, to be strengthened with might by His Spirit in the inner man; that
Christ may dwell in your hearts by faith; that ye, being rooted and grounded in
love, may be able to comprehend with all saints what is the breadth, and
length, and depth, and height; and to know the love of Christ, which passeth
knowledge, that ye might be filled with all the fulness of God.”
Apostle Paul is emploring the early believers to understand
the reality of the all compassing love of God. We, as people of faith, know
that God loves us. Knowing that God loves us, causes us to see things differently than those who have no faith. When we pass through life’s difficulties,
we also have a special power, a special ability, that those without faith do
not have. We have the Holy Spirit as a Comforter. The Holy Spirit helps us see
the events of our lives through the eyes of faith and trust. As people of
faith, we know that everything that happens in our lives is in God’s loving hands
and He will use it for good.
“Let not your heart be toubled: ye believe in God, believe
also in me. In my Father’s house are many mansions: if it were not so, I would
have told you. I go to prepare a place for you. And if I go and prepare a place
for you, I will come again, and receive you unto myself; that where I am, there
ye may be also.”
In the Gospel of John chapters 13 to 17, we see Jesus
ministering to his disciples just before He is to be arrested, tried, and
finally crucified. Jesus tells His disciples to not be troubled. Why? Because
they have a place in Heaven. Heaven is real place! He is giving them the
heavenly vision. Death is not the end. We are pilgrims on a journey. We are students
in school learning how to love God, and how to love others as ourselves. Our
mission in life is to learn how to love, to forgive, to encourage. Therefore,
we have a different way of seeing things.
We are also laying up treasures in Heaven.
We do not need everything here and now. We do not have a bucket list we must
accomplish or experience before we die. We do not have that necessity to
experience everything right now, like those who believe life is over when you
die. We believe real life just begins when we die. We are living – now, for
that other life - later. We are just passing through this life, learning to
love and teaching our children how to love: to love God and to love our
neighbor as ourselves. Therefore, we are not troubled as others are, because we
have faith in that which is not seen in the physical, but with the eyes of the
spirit.
“If ye love me, keep
my commandments. And I will pray the Father, and he shall give you another
Comforter, that he may abide with you for ever; even the Spirit of truth, whom
the world cannot receive, because it seeth him not, neither knoweth him: but ye
know him; for he dwelleth with you, and shall be in you.”
Jesus tells us to love God and keep His commandments.
Apostle Paul tells us God’s commandments are not grievious, not difficult to
perform. We are to love God and love others and do unto them as we would have
them do unto us in any given situation. If we keep Jesus’ commandments, He will
ask His Father to send us the Comforter, the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit will
illuminate our hearts and minds, so that we see things with the eyes of faith
& trust.
The Holy Spirit will, also, help to lead us to the truth in
any given situation. But it is up to us to be looking and searching for the truth.
Jesus said, “Seek and ye shall find.”
He said we should hunger and thirst after righteousness, after goodness, after
truth.
Truth is something we need to seek for. Since our minds are transformed by the
illuminating power of the Holy Spirit, we don’t see things like the world sees
them. We see them more like God sees them. But remember, we see through a glass,
darkly, not face to face.
In other words, even though we have God’s mind, we still have a long way to go
in our understanding.
When we memorize Scriptures and meditate on God’s word, and
put God’s word into practice, we are putting on the mind of Christ. We are
thinking and acting like Jesus would have. We are having our wordly perspective
transformed into a Godly one, into a Romans 8:28 perspective: a perspective that
tells us that all things will work together for good, because we love God.
We, also, have the heavenly perspective. The perspective
that Jesus has indeed prepared for us a heavenly abode. We do not look for any
continuing city here on earth, but one in Heaven. The present world is not our
home, we just are passing through. We have our eyes fixed on Jesus, the author
and finisher of our faith. All the great men and women of faith, found in Hebrews
chapter 11 in our New Testament, were able to face persecution and death,
because they looked for that heavenly city, New Jerusalem. They kept their eyes
on Jesus. Faith in God helps us to live our lives knowing our recompence is not
here on earth, but with God in the Eternal Now.
“But the Comforter, which is the Holy Ghost, whom the Father
will send in my name, he shall teach you all things, and bring all things to
your remembrance, whatsoever I have said unto you. Peace I leave with you, my
peace I give unto you: not as the world giveth, give I unto you. Let not your
heart be troubled, neither let it be afraid.”
Jesus is speaking about sending the Comforter to His
disciples. The Holy Spirit will lead us in our learning. Jesus, also, told us we
should not be afraid. Why? Because, God is going to send us the Holy Spirit,
which will supernaturally give us the peace of God that we need. God’s peace
will supernaturally comfort us in any and in every difficult situation. Apostle
Paul calls it “the peace that passeth all understanding,” which “shall keep
your hearts and minds through Christ Jesus.”
The peace Jesus gives is not the momentary peace the world gives. It is a peace
that lasts, a peace that endures, a supernatural peace that helps us through the
difficult moments we face in life. In the Old Testament God says, “I will keep
him in perfect peace, whose mind is stayed on Me, because he trusts in Me.”
Our peace of mind comes from our trust and faith in God and it is beyond our understanding
or explaining.
When we know that God is in control of our lives, we can trust
in Him. We are not going to react like Job’s wife who said, “Curse God and die.”
Job was being tested by God. Job had had his flocks stolen, his ten children
killed in a storm, and at last his health damaged. Job’s wife cried out to him,
“Curse God and die.” But Job responded, “Thou speakest as one of those foolish
women speaketh. What? Shall we receive good at the hand of God, and shall we
not receive evil?”
The Bible tells us, “In all this did not Job sin with his lips.” In other words,
he did not complain, but trusted. Later in the book, Job makes his famous
declaration of faith, “Though He kills me, yet will I trust in Him.”
Faith to the death is the kind of faith we are going to need. Faith that gives
us the power to face the difficulties of life with eyes of hope and trust. Different
from those with no faith, many of whom end up with bitterness, hatred and
cursing God; we shall say with Job, “Even if God kills me, I am going to trust
in Him.”
The Bible has many other examples of how a person’s faith in
God gives them resilience. The three young adults who were thrown in the firey
furnace by King Nebuchadnezar of Babylon are another example. They refused to
bow down before the golden image the king had set up. Everyone was obligated to
bow down before the image to show alligence to Nebuchadnezar. However, the
three young Isrealis refused. They would rather trust and obey God, than to
disobey Him. They said, “Our God is able to save us from the firey furnace, but
even if He does not, we still will not bow down to the golden image.”
They decide to obey God rather than men, and God delivered them. You can read
about it in Daniel chapter 3.
“These things I have spoken unto you, that in Me ye might
have peace. In the world ye shall have tribulation: but be of good cheer; I
have overcome the world.”
Apostle Paul says we are more than conquerors, or more than
overcomers, through Jesus, who loved us and died for us.
In the above verse from John, Jesus would soon be leading His disciples to the
Garden of Gethsemane. He knew He would be captured and condemned to die a few
hours later. He was preparing His disciples to face that difficult moment.
Later, after His resurrection, He told them to wait in
Jerusalem for the infilling of the Holy Ghost. He promised them that the Holy
Ghost would give them power to be witnesses of those things that had seen and
heard to all mankind. When they received the Holy Spirit these men of little
faith were transformed. Before the infilling of the Holy Spirit, these men of
little faith could not even stay awake with Jesus as He prayed in anguish of
soul in the Garden of Gethsemane prior to His arrest. They ran off at the moment
of danger. They did not even appear at His crucifixion, but hid out until after
His resurrection.
However, when the Holy Spirit came upon them, they were
transformed from cowards into courageous and bold witnesses of the truth. They
would no longer deny their faith, even if it meant death. They, too, would obey
God rather than men.
Cowards became more than conquerors, and spoke the truth of God without fear in
front of the whole world. With the transforming power of the Holy Ghost, we also
can be more than conquerors. If we spend time with God in His Word, in quiet
meditation, in prayer, and then in obedience; He will strengthen our souls. We
can become those that know their God and are strong, and do exploits.
Apostle Paul tells us, “Faith comes from hearing the word of
God.”
If we do not listen to God’s Word, but rather we spend our time listening to
the word’s of men; all we will have is fear rather than faith. If we fill our
heart and mind with the daily new’s report, which says another wave of trouble
is coming, then all we will end up with is fear: Fear, fear, and more fear!
Fear is the opposite of faith.
However, if we listen to God, if we read His Word, we will
see things differently. We will be able to face fear with faith. When fear
knocks on our heart’s door, we will send faith to rebuke it. We will be able to
see that fear is a liar. We do not need to walk in fear. We have the love of
God and love casts out fear. God has promised to be with us in every given
situation so that we fear no evil. Let us read and claim the promises in Psalm
23.
“The Lord is my shepherd; I shall not want. He maketh me to
lie down in green pastures: he leadeth me beside the still waters. He restoreth
my soul: he leadeth me in the paths of righteousness for his name’s sake. Yea,
though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil:
for thou art with me; thy rod and thy staff they comfort me. Thou preparest a
table before me in the presence of mine enemies: thou annoinest my head with
oil; my cup runneth over. Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me all the
days of my life: and I will dwell in the house of the Lord for ever.”
Psalm 23 is the psalm of the Good Shepherd. Jesus said He
was the Good Shepherd. He was referring to Psalm 23 – the Good Shepherd psalm. He
was assuring His disciples, past and present, that all our problems will work together for good,
that He would be with us through them all. The Good Shepherd will anoint our
heads with the oil of the Holy Spirit. Through the Holy Spirit our lives will
overflow with the gifts of the Spirit. We will, then, have boldness to speak of
God in front of anyone and everyone. Finally, one day we wll go to our heavenly
reward. Our faith and our confidence in God gives us the resilience we need to
pass whatever difficulty, whatever abuse, whatever persecution we will face,
even to the point of death. Faith in God makes the difference. Faith gives us
the resilience we need to be more than overcomers.
“I can do all things through Christ which strengtheneth me.”
We can do all things. We can pass through whatever
difficulty, whatever problem, whatever life throws at us, through Jesus; who
lives in us and gives us the strength, the love, the faith we need for any and
every given situation. Jesus promises to, “…comfort us in all our tribulation,
that we may be able to comfort them which are in any trouble, by the comfort
wherewith we ourselves are comforted of God.”
The comforting power of the Holy Ghost not only comforts us,
but empowers us to be comforters of others. The power of the Holy Ghost gives
us the resilience we need to be more than conquerors through Him that loves us.
We can be confident that God who has begun a good work in us will perform it
until the day of Jesus Christ’s return.
Faith in God is the key to a resilient spirit, to an overcoming spirit. Faith
in God is the key to victory!
