Faith is a huge topic to discuss and so I will merely share a small slice of my thoughts of late. Faith - it lays the foundation of our belief systems and is at the root of so many things in life.
We have faith in the pilot that they will fly us safely to our destination, we have faith that our loved ones will stand by us through good and bad, we even put faith in our kitchen appliances that they will work so we can make a tasty and hot dinner. We put faith in so many things that often we don't really think about it at all. We just confidently go about our day and simply believe that what we hope for is going to happen- even if we can't see the evidence of that quite yet.
But lately I've been thinking that it isn't until our faith has been tested in some way that it makes one stop and dwell over what exactly having faith means and this has led me to ask some questions; "How strong is my faith?" and more importantly "Am I putting my faith in the one who matters the most?"
The past 9-10 months have definitely been a walk of faith for me as my husband and I have journeyed on the exciting path of pregnancy. And while we have had, overall, a very good pregnancy there have been various bumps along the way which has tested my faith.
I experienced this very early on in my pregnancy when you can feel bombarded with everything you shouldn't be doing or eating or drinking and hearing people's horror stories of things going wrong.
And then you start your medical visits and all of the possible negatives are brought to life with everything that, although unlikely, could occur to you and your baby.
Needless to say there is a lot of fear lurking around the corner just waiting to pounce on you if you let it.
But I really do feel like God has used this time to give me a fresh revelation of the meaning of faith as I am quite literally striving to have the confident assurance that what we hope for (a healthy, happy baby) is going to happen, even when we can't see him or her yet.
I love the story of Abraham's faith found in Romans 4 verses 16-25.
To summarise:
When God promised Abraham he would become the father of many nations, he believed him. Even when he knew he was too old to be a father and his wife was not able to bear children, He never wavered in believing God's promise, in fact his Faith grew stronger- he was convinced God was able to do anything he promised.
And as we know, Abraham and Sarah had Isaac and Abraham's descendants did indeed become 'as numerous as the stars'. What a man of faith! I love this story as it demonstrates Abraham's unwavering faith he placed in the Lord.
The following scriptures have been so encouraging to me when my faith has been tested and hopefully may encourage someone who may be in the midst of having their faith tested.
2 Corinthians 12 verse 9 - "His Strength is made perfect in our weakness."
Hebrews 11- The entire chapter outlines various Old Testament examples of faithful followers but I particularly love verse 34- "Their weakness was turned to strength."
Romans 5: Faith brings Joy is the title of the chapter in many bibles and I love verse 2 - "Because of our faith, Christ has brought us into this place of undeserved privilege where we now stand and we confidently and joyfully look forward to sharing God's glory."
*A quick update - since writing this piece, we have welcomed our beautiful little boy, Isaac James, into the world.
Jo Fuller is an Early Childhood Teacher with degrees in Education and Journalism. Having just returned from living and travelling abroad for the past two years, she now resides in Brisbane with her husband.
Jo Fuller's archive of articles may be viewed at www.pressserviceinternational.org/jo-fuller.html