Devotionals

Trusting God's Promises in Difficult Times

By novia collis · September 8, 2019 · 6 min read

Walking with God does not always offer a smooth, obstacle-free path like a toll road. Sometimes the terrain is hard and winding, climbing mountains, descending valleys, even blocked by the sea. Facing this, we begin to feel weary and doubtful. Where does the road end? Is this journey worth taking? What if after all we have fought for, our lives do not match our expectations? Are all God's promises real?

All our turmoil is ultimately summed up in two important questions: How can we firmly hold on to God's promises in situations and conditions that seem far from His goodness and beautiful plan ?

God Is Not Negligent in Fulfilling His Promise

The Lord is not negligent in fulfilling His promise, though some consider it negligence ... - 2 Peter 3:9

God's promises in the Bible number in the thousands. Some sources say there are 3,573, 5,467, or even more than 7,000. Whatever the exact number, Peter says that God is never negligent in fulfilling all His promises.

For people, the word promise often feels empty. We may forget it or pass over it because we consider it trivial. It may be that we deliberately ignore it because we feel we do not have to keep that promise. Because of this, we doubt, will God fulfill what He promised?

Unlike us, God never breaks promise. The heavenly bodies He created always move according to their own order, right on time. The sun, for example, always rises every day. If the laws of nature are not negligent in keeping their promises, how much more their Creator! In the Bible, there is not a single promise of God that He has failed to fulfill. Even after thousands of years, God still remembers what Hepromised

, and the way He fulfills all of it is truly extraordinary. Believe that God is able and always fulfillsHis promises

, because that is His character. By faith

Sarah herself also received strength to have descendants, even though her age was past, because she considered Him who had made the promise faithful. - Hebrews 11:11

Walking by Faith

It is easy for us to believe God's promises when our hopes are quickly fulfilled or life is going well. But what should we do so that we can hold on to God's promises in difficult situations? But without faith

it is impossible to please God. For whoever comes to God must believe that He exists, and that He rewards those who diligently seek Him. - Hebrews 11:6 Our lives as Christians must be lives led byfaith . Even though we do not know what our future will look like, keep walkingwith God . Even if we are uncertain and anxious because life seems the same, without any meaningful change, keep moving forward withfaith . For faith

will lead us to see His work. (Abraham was called by God to leave his homeland, his relatives, and his father's house, at the age of 75. He went to a land he had never seen, never visited, and did not even know by name). Genesis 12:1-9 Yet Abraham chose to believe and keep walking by

faith. (God also promised to give Abraham descendants as countless as the sand by the sea and the stars in the sky)—Genesis 15:5 no matter that his wife Sarah had stopped menstruating and both of them were already very old. Once again, Abraham chose to.

believeHis

faith did not weaken, even though he knew that his body was as good as dead, since he was about a hundred years old, and that Sarah's womb was barren. - Romans 4:19

A quarter of a century later, God fulfilled His promise to Abraham. At last Abraham had descendants when he reached the age of 100!

If Abraham was willing to faithfully wait 25 years for the fulfillment of God's promise, what about you? Can you keep believing when your road climbs and twists uphill? Or are you currently hopeless and frustrated? Is your faith weakening, your confidence fading, your spirit gone? If this happens, remember: Twenty-five years is not time wasted when we walk byfaith . Even if its fulfillment takes a long time

, God's promise is worth waiting for.

Live As Though You Have Already Received What God Promised After going through the first test of faith (by waiting for descendants, God tested Abraham again. Not half-heartedly, he was asked to offer his only son Isaac). Genesis 22:1-2

Imagine it, the child he had waited for over decades had to be given back to God. Yet once again Abraham did not hesitate to do it, and God honored hisfaith

Then He said: "Do not lay a hand on the boy or do anything to him, for now I know that you fear God, since you have not withheld your only son from Me." - Genesis 22:12

When you have already received God's promise, but are asked to believe again for the same thing because He wants you to love Him even more deeply, how do you react? Will you become angry and refuse to surrender that thing? Abraham was not afraid of losing, angry, or tightly clutching what had once been promised to him. Then how did he respond to this test of faith

this time? For he reasoned, that God was able to raise people even from among the dead. And from there hefiguratively received him back

. - Hebrews 11:19 Abraham believed that God had the power to raise his son back from death. He felt.

as though he had received Isaac back We never know when God's promise

will be fulfilled. Whether tomorrow, the day after, next month, next year, or ten years from now, whatever happens, do not let go of your confidence. Like Abraham, keep believing and holding on to His promise. Live as though you have already received it! In faith all these people died as those who did not receive what had been promised, but only from afar saw it

and waved to it and confessed that they were strangers and pilgrims on this earth. - Hebrews 11:13 What if at the end of your life, you do not receive God's promise

and can only witness its fulfillment from heaven? Will you regret it? What matters most is not whether you can enjoy God's promise or not during this life, but the faith you have to believe His promise. Even if that promise is fulfilled only after you return to the Father's house, believe that your faith

is not in vain. - Let us keep holding on to God's promises!