All who live by faith are challenged to live as Abraham did, daily venturing into the unknown with trust in God’s guidance and sustenance. – Unknown
I read this quote above while searching for some spark or God’s presence initiator in an area in my life where I recently felt lost, or God had abandoned me in. However, God showed
me, even in the bad, He can still make it for my good in the end (Romans 8:28). Such as my dating life. Yes, romance, one of the most commonly talked about topics since the beginning of time – something that we all think about from time to time.
For some context, I had not been in a relationship for what felt like an eternity, and I have not been on a date for even longer say, since Martin Luther King Jr. had given his “I Have a Dream Speech,” so it was safe to say I was a bit rusty and out of practice in the dating and romance department. But just like the Bible features so many people who felt so disqualified, unworthy, and unlikely when it came to doing a task God called them to do, it also features a variety of those same individuals during instances of God bringing them to their expected end; however, they needed to use something called faith (Hebrews 11:1)
When the word faith comes to mind, what does that make you think of? Do you feel like you have great amounts of faith, or is it a work in progress or an area of improvement for you
while on your Christian journey? I like maybe some of you have, have always struggled with using and truly understanding what is faith in something other than one’s self, relating to God specifically. If you’re anything like me, our first instinct when issues arise on our paths is not to just run and pray to God to save me. I sadly tended to run to other things for instantaneous or physical remedies, which in the end always resulted in me feeling burned out, empty, and reaching out for the very thing I should of started with in the beginning, which was ultimately God.
Just like the age-old tale, boy meets girl, boy likes girl, and boy takes girl out for a date. So recently, here I was walking into the unknown and unfamiliar territory, which was romance and dating due to me being out of the dating field for so long, and feeling unequipped to succeed. Just like many throughout the Bible, I knew I needed someone(God) greater than myself because of my human limits and limited knowledge of the unknown. From start to finish, I sought and prayed to God about every step I attempted to make because I didn’t want to be out of His will for my life. Just like so many of us, we just want to be right and not wrong in whatever that may be for us. In the end, things didn’t end where me and the woman had hoped, but I believe God showed us both what we needed to continue on in our individual journeys and our individual walks as Christians.
The greatest lesson God revealed to me through the failed date and talking stage is that when I feel unequipped, life is throwing everything but a break at me, and I don’t know which way to turn, “I must turn to Him.” During this period, God revealed to me the greatest revelation in recent memory of His and I relationship together. God told me that life and our life issues are like a roaring tornado, which is uncontrollable and dangerous, but in the center of that chaos is the safest and most peaceful. God said He was and has to be my Center. God has to be your Center. Throughout that process of attempting to keep God as my center, I felt negative feelings, I wanted to stop, and I thought God had led me astray when things didn’t end how I wanted them. I kept the faith and finished what God had called me to do, which was to wait and move as God had directed. Just like so many people that came before me and you in the bible. King David(1 Samuel 17:1-58). Abraham and Isaac(Genesis 22). And countless more.
The key thing that they and I did, and what we all have to do, is keep walking into the unknown in tandem with God, no matter how it looks or how you feel. That’s what true faith has to be. Are we willing to move when God says move?
