Stepping Out in Faith
Bill Rudge
The Pattern
The pattern I see in Scripture is what I have repeatedly witnessed in my life and ministry. The Lord leads me to do something, or I spend time seeking Him until His leading is clear. Then I step out in faith and obedience, and most of the time just about everything imaginable goes wrong. The task seems impossible and defeat seems imminent. Then the Lord intervenes in His time and in His way. He is faithful to bring ultimate victory. He has done this countless times.
“Hard Pressed on Every Side, but Not Crushed”
The Apostle Paul was beaten, stoned, imprisoned and shipwrecked. He experienced hunger, thirst and cold; his life often in danger of death (2 Corinthians 11:23-33), but the results were victorious and his life was not taken until God’s purpose was fulfilled.
2 Corinthians 4:8-10:
We are hard pressed on every side, but not crushed; perplexed, but not in despair; persecuted, but not abandoned; struck down, but not destroyed. We always carry around in our body the death of Jesus, so that the life of Jesus may also be revealed in our body.
Psalm 44 is intriguing. It begins with the psalmist recounting God’s faithfulness and the victories He provided in the past:
We have heard with our ears, O God; our fathers have told us what You did in their days, in days long ago. With Your hand You drove out the nations and planted our fathers; You crushed the peoples and made our fathers flourish. It was not by their sword that they won the land, nor did their arm bring them victory; it was Your right hand, Your arm, and the light of Your face, for You loved them. You are my King and my God, who decrees victories for Jacob. Through You we push back our enemies; through Your name we trample our foes. I do not trust in my bow, my sword does not bring me victory; but You give us victory over our enemies, You put our adversaries to shame. In God we make our boast all day long, and we will praise Your name forever (Psalm 44:1-8).
Then at verse 9 it completely changes. The psalmist is bewildered, because even though the people of God have not forsaken the Lord, it appears that God has abandoned them. Let’s read the rest of this Psalm:
But now You have rejected and humbled us; You no longer go out with our armies. You made us retreat before the enemy, and our adversaries have plundered us. You gave us up to be devoured like sheep and have scattered us among the nations. You sold Your people for a pittance, gaining nothing from their sale.
You have made us a reproach to our neighbors, the scorn and derision of those around us. You have made us a byword among the nations; the peoples shake their heads at us. My disgrace is before me all day long, and my face is covered with shame at the taunts of those who reproach and revile me, because of the enemy, who is bent on revenge.
All this happened to us, though we had not forgotten You or been false to Your covenant. Our hearts had not turned back; our feet had not strayed from Your path. But You crushed us and made us a haunt for jackals and covered us over with deep darkness.
If we had forgotten the name of our God or spread out our hands to a foreign god, would not God have discovered it, since He knows the secrets of the heart? Yet for Your sake we face death all day long; we are considered as sheep to be slaughtered.
Awake, O Lord! Why do You sleep? Rouse Yourself! Do not reject us forever. Why do You hide Your face and forget our misery and oppression? We are brought down to the dust; our bodies cling to the ground. Rise up and help us; redeem us because of Your unfailing love (Psalm 44:9-26).
Not Our Ways
Has God forgotten us? Of course not. He has a broader perspective and purpose than our immediate circumstance and limited view.
The Apostle Paul, contemplating the suffering and adversity of the early Church, asks some relevant questions in Romans 8:31, 35:
If God is for us, who can be against us? Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall trouble or hardship or persecution or famine or nakedness or danger or sword?
In the context of the suffering believer, Paul continues in Romans 8:36 by quoting from Psalm 44:22:
As it is written: “For Your sake we face death all day long; we are considered as sheep to be slaughtered.”
Yet, Paul goes on to say in Romans 8:37-39:
No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through Him who loved us. For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord.
Whether we are blessed or whether we suffer and face adversity, our faith in Christ enables us to be more than conquerors. In spite of frustration and the threat of defeat, we can be assured that God is faithfully working behind the scenes to fulfill His purpose.
After our car was totaled in that four-vehicle pile-up in Oregon, the Lord gave me Psalm 34:19 NAS:
Many are the afflictions of the righteous; but the Lord delivers him out of them all.
As David, in his old age, affirmed his oath to Bathsheba that Solomon their son would become king, he testified of God’s faithfulness by confirming his promise with these words:
As surely as the LORD lives, who has delivered me out of every trouble (1 Kings 1:29).
And 2 Timothy 3:10-12 affirms:
You, however, know all about my teaching, my way of life, my purpose, faith, patience, love, endurance, persecutions, sufferings—what kinds of things happened to me in Antioch, Iconium and Lystra, the persecutions I endured. Yet the Lord rescued me from all of them. In fact, everyone who wants to live a godly life in Christ Jesus will be persecuted.
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