Today we shall focus on Faithfulness.
But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control. Against such things there is no law. (Galatians 5:22-23)
When a person gets married, both make a pledge to remain faithful to each other until they die. Now compare this happy couple to Christ and ourselves. Christ is our bridegroom, (Matthew 9:14-16) and when we give our lives to Him, we are in a sense, 'marrying' Him (thus we are His bride). When we pledge our lives to Him, telling Him we will follow Him all the days of our lives, this vow shows our faithfulness to Him.
I will betroth you in faithfulness, and you will acknowledge the LORD. (Hosea 2:20)
As a bridegroom rejoices over his bride, so will your God rejoice over you. (Isaiah 62:5b)
One of Jesus's followers asked to go and "bury his father" before he was to go and follow Christ. Jesus replied, "Follow me, and let the dead bury their own dead". (Matthew 8:21-22 or Luke 9:58-60) Therefore, is Jesus number one in our lives? How are we to remain faithful to Him if we don't even have Him first in our lives?
Think for a moment on how many times you may have stumbled down the straight and narrow road, and God grabbed you by the hand to steady you? How many times when you repented, He took you joyfully back into His arms? If this awesome God decided to do that for us so many different times when we are so undeserving as it is, don't you see how much never-ending faithfulness He has in us?
He sends from heaven and saves me, rebuking those who hotly pursue me; Selah. God sends His love and His faithfulness. (Psalms 57:3>
For great is his love toward us, and the faithfulness of the LORD endures forever. Praise the LORD. (Psalms 117:2)
Think of it this way. How many people do you know who would take you back and help you out with a loving and caring attitude, every time you needed help?
Now in Hebrews we learn that Faith is "the evidence of things unseen". Now faith is being sure of what we hope for and certain of what we do not see.(Hebrews 11:1) Faith a lot of the time can be thought of as closely linked with Trust. For example, we can't physically see God, even though there is evidence He's all around us. If we saw Him with our own eyes, why would we need faith? (Have you ever seen the wind? We've seen the effects of the wind, but never the wind itself.) When you put faith in someone, you trust them to do something. You may not physically see them do it. So because of God's promise (the Bible contains 66 love letters (books) to us; check them out,) we know that we can put our trust, or have "faith" in Him to do His will, to cloak us in His love, to pick us up when we fall down.
We live by faith, not by sight. (2 Corinthians 5:7)
Therefore, as God is faithful to us, so must we reflect Him. This as a fruit is an important one - if we are not faithful in our relationship with Jesus, that would be like the bride being unfaithful to her new husband. So don't be tempted by things that may give you short-term pleasure, but will leave you dry and unsatisfied. Instead put your faith in Jesus ,and He will give you LIFE.
Thankful for His faithful promise,
Whitney
