FaiTH & FEELings - THE BATTLE ⚔️🛡

 Lately I am going through a season where God is teaching me to walk in faith. He spoke certain promises over me and is placing me in a season, so I learn how to walk by faith alone, even when I don’t see more than 2 feet ahead and even when I only see partially. My mind is so impatient that I want to see the end before I start on a path. I walk in disbelief even when I know that God has promised me victory.

I often allow my feelings to dictate my stance with God rather than what His Word already declares about me and what He has spoken over my life. God calls me to live instead by faith. This means my actions should not be based on my feelings but on what God has called me to do. I don’t believe something because of how it makes me feel but because the Scripture says so. I wondered why it is difficult for me to walk in faith without constantly feeling fear and doubt. Then I realize it is my past disappointments that make me doubt the promises of God. Disappointments that soon turned to irritation which morphed into resentment. I didn't FEEL it was fair. Why didn't God answer my prayers? Why had He placed a dream in my heart only to allow it to crumble? Why did He let this happen? Why me?

I allowed my Feelings to overtake my FAITH.

All I could think about was how this disappointment made me feel, instead of what God may be working through me that my faith could not see. I felt things weren't fair, without remembering God's ways are best. I felt a longing for immediate results, instead of trusting God's timing is perfect.

God reminded me to trust Him, not a desire or a dream. Not the world's view. Not my abilities. Not my timeframe. Not my ideas. Trust Him alone.

Regardless of the outcome, I need to believe that I will not be put to shame, because God is my God. If His plans coincide with my dreams, I know He will keep His eternal promises.

If I put my hope in my own desires and abilities, I set myself up for failure. My hope for joy and fulfillment comes from Christ alone. Hope is found in Him, not people, career, children, church, financial success or dreams that come true. Disappointments will happen. With God, however, we can turn those disappointments into God's appointments to trust Him. But if God promised you something, He is able to bring it to fruition in His time. No matter how impossible the current circumstances look like. Isaiah 55:11 says ‘So is the word that goes out from my mouth. It will not return to me empty but will accomplish what I desire and achieve the purpose for which I sent it’. 

It is also important to realize that just because God is silent, He is not distant. Communion with God is more than just the words He speaks to us. God can move in the silence too. For, if words can communicate meaning, so can the lack of them. It is in these times of silence that we need to rely on faith, not feelings believing that the never changing God hasn’t abandoned us. There seems to be profound power in periods of silence throughout the Bible. It takes 38 chapters in Job before God speaks, the Psalmists often cry out that God is silent and let’s not forget the silence of Easter Saturday where Jesus lay dead for a whole day. For periods of silence can prompt us into rest, reflection and can sometimes allow us to grieve and lament. I haven’t figured out exactly why we experience these seasons, but I suppose a large part of it has got to do with the fact that we aren’t home yet. We are still wandering in a foreign land waiting to return home.

Knowing that I have nothing to fear in this time, and that my relationship with God is more than these feelings of connectedness, gives me strength to persevere, a willingness to be obedient and patience to endure it until I hear His gentle and tender whisper once again. The first step is to exercise faith over feelings.

Written by: Anu Varghese