To Have the Faith of Abraham

How do you have the faith of Abraham?

Wait…

Wait for it…

Around 2003 I began praying that the Lord would remove pride from me and replace it with pure, true faith.  It was shortly after that that I lost my job, was sidelined from ministry, and lots of incredible difficulty arose in almost every area of life.

When God told Abraham in Genesis 22:1-3 to take his promised child, Isaac, to the top of a mountain and sacrifice him, Abraham got up the next day and immediately left to obey the voice of the Lord.  They traveled for three days to the mountain that the Lord would designate.  When they got to the top of the mountain, Abraham bound his son, his only one, and prepared to kill him with his knife.  It’s at this point that the angel of the Lord stops Abraham and tells him not to harm Isaac, for “now I know that you fear God, since you have not withheld your son, your only son, from Me (v. 12).”

It took great faith to offer up the promise on the altar as a sacrifice to the Lord.  I believe Abraham was only able to display this great faith because he spent 25 years in waiting for the promise.  Abraham was promised a child through Sara 25 years prior to Isaac’s birth.  That’s 25 years of waiting, wondering, and watching the years go by.  Twenty-five years of thinking that maybe, just maybe something will take place.  Twenty-five years of seeing their own bodies aging and the hopes of having a natural child looking more, and more grim.

I believe that faith is built in waiting.  To say it another way, I believe that, most often, the gift of faith—and it is a gift—is activated when having to wait for the promises of the Lord.

For those of you who are in the middle of the waiting, hold fast to those promises. 

Don’t just hang on, but know that the waiting is for a purpose.  The Lord is not just making you wait to torture you—though it sometimes may feel like it.  He is making you wait in order to do something even greater!  He doesn’t want to just give you the promise–He could have done that anytime.  He could have done that without giving you a promise, or He could have given the promise just before fulfilling it.  No, He is making you wait in order to activate a greater level of faith within you.  Often, it is to prepare you to do greater things, pass greater tests, or show God’s glory in a much greater measure than you ever could have if you had not had to wait.

After over 20 years of waiting, I’m coming to grips with the fact that the Lord was answering my prayer.  I prayed that He would remove pride and replace it with faith, and that is exactly what He began to do over 20 years ago.  I’ve been waiting, hoping, praying, and travailing.  The Lord didn’t just want to give me promises—and there are quite a few—He wanted to make me into the man who could use those promises for His glory. Plus, He wanted to give me the great faith that I prayed for.

So, if you are in the midst of waiting, hang in there.  God’s not finished, and the waiting is on purpose—it’s for a purpose.  And, that purpose is one that could not have been forged within you without the trial of waiting. The Lord will fulfill His promises in His time, and in His way.  It will probably come differently than you expect, but it will be better than what you thought.

From one who has waited…and, in many ways, still is!