Faith in the Storm
4 min read
17 About this time Hazael king of Aram went up and attacked Gath and captured it. Then he turned to attack Jerusalem. 18 But Joash king of Judah took all the sacred objects dedicated by his predecessors—Jehoshaphat, Jehoram and Ahaziah, the kings of Judah—and the gifts he himself had dedicated and all the gold found in the treasuries of the temple of the LORD and of the royal palace, and he sent them to Hazael king of Aram, who then withdrew from Jerusalem.
— 2 Kings 12:17-18
Despite Joash’s upbringing under Jehoiada, he ultimately failed as a king. Joash would come to murder Zechariah, Jehoiada’s son. Joash basically lost his faith in God, and so 2 Chronicles 24 tells us that Aram plundered Judah with a much smaller army.
After all that God had done for him, how could he have abandoned the faith so easily? As believers, I think we pretty much know the answer to that question.
Even as followers of Jesus Christ, life is not easy. And the Bible shows us again and again that God allows us to go through trials and difficulties to test our faith and grow our faith. If we do not embrace this reality with all our heart, then we will always be tempted to abandon our faith and trust in our own power.
But then, that would be the biggest mistake of our lives.
God does love us—more than we love ourselves. God knows that we live in a broken world because of sin, and so we will face trials and tribulations. And He does not shield us from trials and tribulations so much as teach us how to persevere and find strength and even joy in Christ through those trials and tribulations.
If all we are expecting is that God will bless us and shield us from troubles, we will lose faith.
But if we persevere in the troubles through faith, we will find ourselves growing in our relationship with Christ.
Father, I do pray that You would protect me, my family, and my Canvas family from troubles. But when troubles do come, may we not lose faith. As we persevere, Lord, grow us in love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, gentleness, faithfulness, and self-control. In Jesus’s name. Amen.