Lots of emphasis in the church is on God’s faithfulness to those who believe. Without God’s faithfulness and righteousness, humanity is a lost cause. Lately, I have been seeing that the Christian walk also requires our faithfulness in return to God.
My wife and I have been reading the book of Job in our devotions. Here is a guy who is probably the “rockstar” of faithfulness in the Bible. While he was one of the most blessed believers in God on the earth at that time, God allowed the evil one to test his faith in some very extreme ways. Satan took away all his wealth in this world, allowed his whole family to be killed, and afflicted Job with terrible physical ailments. In addition to all this, Satan sent Job’s closest three “friends” to encourage him by accusing him of all kinds of terrible sins he had not committed and told him to falsely admit to wrongdoings he had not committed in order to escape what they perceived as God’s wrath against Job. Through it all, while Job questioned why God was allowing all of this to happen to him, he never lost faith that God had a plan even though everyone around him was laughing at his ugly conditions and “terrible luck”. Job passed the test of his faithfulness and in time God rewarded Job with many times more than he had lost in possessions and quality of life for standing up to the evil of his friends and even his wife who encouraged him to forsake his faith in God.
Today in American Christianity we see much emphasis placed in many circles on God rewarding faith with miraculous healing and financial prosperity. We are told that we can’t outgive God and that we should expect a multiple return for any money or devotion we give to God and spiritual matters. It seems many of us think that God is some piggybank or Santa Claus in the sky ready to give us “candy” anytime we ask or want. The spirit of consumerism doesn’t seem lost on the Christian church of today.
The Apostle Paul called himself a “bondservant to Christ”. After persecuting the early Christians for a long time, Christ called him out on the road to Demascus and revealed Himself to Paul causing his conversion. We are led to believe Paul came from money, education, and political prominence of his day. After his call to faith and service, he spent the rest of his life in service to the Gospel of Christ, was often emprisoned, and was eventually killed by Emporer Nero for his faith and testimony. Not much worldly prosperity in that story, but by his faith all gentiles were included in the call of Jesus the Messiah to faith and forgiveness.
While I see passages of the Bible that could encourage us to think God will somehow reward us materially for our faith, I think we need to think contextually when we ask and expect God to do things for us. Some thoughts from scripture that advise me are:
1 Peter 4:19 “So then, those who suffer according to God’s will should commit themselves to their faithful Creator and continue to do good.”
James 1:12 “Blessed is the one who perseveres under trial because, having stood the test, that person will receive the crown of life that the Lord has promised to those who love him.”
Proverbs 28:20 “A faithful man will abound with blessings, But he who makes haste to be rich will not go unpunished.”
James 4:3 “You ask and do not receive, because you ask amiss, that you may spend it on your pleasures.”
Phillipians 4:19 “But my God shall supply all your need according to his riches in glory by Christ Jesus.”
What we see consistently through the Bible is that God is faithful to provide all our NEEDS, not necessarily all our desires, fame or fortune. Thinking that God owes US something is a slippery slope to carnality and doom.
It is clear from scripture that we are to share in His suffering and live lives of servitude and sacrifice for His sake. Most of the apostles and original disciples of Jesus were crucified, beheaded, and otherwise tortured or persecuted in their time. Why do we think today’s believers should get off the hook of persecution or suffering for the cause of Christ? It has been happening throughout the world forever and in recent times, and yet American’s seem to think it can’t happen in the USA. Think again.
Believing and being faithful to God is not about living lives of pleasure or convenience. It is about living for God’s purposes and building the future kingdom that Christ will rule. It’s not about fitting in or being prosperous in this world. It is about serving our brother, not self serving.
If we give in order to receive or pray and worship so that others might see us and think highly of us…we already have our reward. Job suffered greatly before being rewarded by God for his faithfulness. His famous quote in Job 13:15 is “Though He slay me, yet will I trust Him.” What he didn’t know during his trials was that it was Satan, not God, who was doing this to him. Sometimes we Christians forget we are living in a fallen world and WILL BE affected negatively by it at times. God has promised us a way of escape and strength to withstand all that the evil one throws at us. We need to trust the God of Job, Daniel, Peter, and Paul who were all given the strength to meet the challenges they faced in the Bible.
Grace and mercy came to us at a great cost for God…the sacrifice of His Son on the cross for our redemption and forgiveness of our sinful natures. We can never deserve the grace God has shown us nor His promise of an eternity spent with Him simply because we have believed. Yet all of this does not come without a price on our end. We are to lay down our lives in return and realize we were born for God’s purpose and are not our own.
God may allow us to be “rich Americans”, or it may be his will we are born in the slums of some overpopulated city of violence and poverty with little hope or education to get ahead and become wealthy. His purpose is to show his grace and power in our weak and perilous conditions as we learn that life is not about what we gain in this life. It is about the joys of serving God and overcoming the evils of this world while placing our hopes on the next kingdom where we will reign with Him forever and ever.
It’s all about imitating the faithfulness of Christ when he was on earth. He could have called 10,000 angels to deliver him from suffering and death on the cross. He could have had wealth and established His kingdom on THIS earth in time and space. But, that wasn’t the plan and His ways weren’t our ways. The Jews were looking for a powerful, rich Messiah to rescue them from captivity and bondage at that time. Instead, he came as a baby and a humble carpenter to show us how to live…and to die…humbly before His Father. Fortunately God raised Him from the dead so that one day we will be raised also.
May we all learn to be faithful to His calling on our lives as we offer ourselves as living sacrifices for our brother. May we not measure His faithfulness in material things or high positions in this world. Instead, may we focus on the love we are to have for one another as we remain faithful to whatever He has called us to do in this short life.
God is faithful not by doing what WE want Him to do, but in always doing what is right and just. He simply calls us to do the same…to show our faithfulness by obedience to what is right and just. There is no better way to live no matter how much pleasure or fortune our own ideas could bring. We don’t have faith for any reason apart from the reward of God’s love and calling on our lives.