We Choose Our Response: Faith or Doubt – Sunday Thought For The Day

The wife of close friends is bedridden.  Our friend’s mother-in-law cares for his wife during the day.  The wife had not been feeling well for a day or so; she had spiked a temperature and some other signs that signaled the onset of sepsis.  One of her hospital visiting home nurses had been contacted the night before and was at the house early the next morning.  There was discussion per how long to wait before calling an ambulance and getting her to the hospital to run tests.  It was decided that an ambulance would be called.

During the period of time the treatment discussions were taking place, our friend’s mother-in-law, who was an important part of the discussions, began to experience symptoms consistent with a heart attack.  Our friend was telephoned at his office and told he needed to rush home.  An ambulance was on the way to the house, not for his wife, but now, for his mother-in-law and only possibly for his wife.

My friend called me en route to his house.  We discussed the situation, we prayed and we thanked God, because it was clear that He was handling everything.  There was no need to panic and become stressed and fearful or to become overwhelmed by the situation.  By the time our friend arrived home the prognosis was that his mother-in-law wasn’t having a heart attack, but was on the verge of having a stroke.  But, I’m getting ahead of myself.

As I said, our friend and I prayed, gave thanks and rejoiced that this wasn’t the disaster it appeared; this was one more undeniable example of God having everything ordered.

You see, had our friend’s wife not become ill, her visiting home nurse wouldn’t have been contacted, she wouldn’t have been at the house when his mother-in-law literally collapsed.  The ambulance, which had been called earlier wouldn’t have been called and his completely bedridden wife would have been alone with her mother collapsed on the floor in need of assistance she couldn’t provide.

Everything appeared to the natural eye(s) as cause for concern; but to the spiritual eye(s) everything that was transpiring was undeniable evidence of God handling everything before it happened.  In brief, it wasn’t that the situation wasn’t going to happen, it’s that God had it resolved before it did.

Our friend’s mother-in-law, didn’t have a heart attack or a stroke.  She had a sudden unset of a variant form of vertigo.  Treated with medication and giving more attention to taking care of herself is the remedy to full recovery.  The wife ultimately did go to the hospital the next day and she is recovering from what turned out to be pneumonia, despite  the worst case scenarios of her doctors.

The moral is: when we say we believe God takes care of us, we truthfully need to practice what we claim.  God’s promises are precious and true.  His promises are sure and unbreakable.  His promises to never leave us or forsake us, are exactly what He means and they are promises He will never break or abandon.

When we panic, wring our hands and become overwhelmed as situations unfold, we’re telling God we don’t trust Him, and contrary to our words, we don’t believe Him.

Just as the Apostles trusted God and praised Him in the midst of many seemingly adverse situations, they testified that God never once failed them.  God’s plans and His ways are higher than ours.  We must learn to trust Him and let Him be God.  It’s when we fully surrender to God that we see and experience His dramatic works and provisions for us.

READ:

Hebrews 11:1-3; 6 (KJV)
11 Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.

2 For by it the elders obtained a good report.

3 Through faith we understand that the worlds were framed by the word of God, so that things which are seen were not made of things which do appear.

6 But without faith it is impossible to please him: for he that cometh to God must believe that he is, and that he is a rewarder of them that diligently seek him.