Toward the end of the summer of 2000 we got to visit some missionary friends in Jerusalem. We came home through Athens, Greece and had a little difficulty. A good friend had given us buddy passes for this trip so we were flying stand-by. When we arrived in Athens on Thursday, the airlines told us we would not be able to fly home through the weekend because all flights were full. What a dilemma! I was to start teaching school on Monday! Also, two motel rooms per night in Athens would cost a pretty penny (or a pretty drachma in that country)! Of course the kids were celebrating. They didn’t have the same concerns about school or drachmas that I did. So what do you do when you have no control of the situation? You do what we should always do… pray.
“Lord, here we are again in a different jam. You let us take this trip, will you get us home?” The next day, we went to the airport and had a great surprise as they called our names to get on the plane. God was revealing two things to my family: the sheer foolishness of having confidence in ourselves and the great wisdom of having confidence in Him. We arrived home on Saturday. I taught school Monday through Wednesday. I found out I had cancer on Thursday.
Do you know one of my first thoughts after the bad news came? “Lord, you brought us home from Greece last weekend. You can get us through this.” The faithfulness of God in a lesser trial became a blessing for the new storm. I am convinced of this: God wants us to have confidence in Him always… and the devil doesn’t.
The longer the trial or the more intense the struggle, the louder we hear our enemy whisper, “Look what your God lets happen to those who are His!” I resist by arguing, “But God has never let me down. He has rescued my family before.” “But those were little problems… you are dying! How can you trust Him any more?” How tempting it is to lose confidence when things are difficult. How critical it is that we heed the Spirit’s instruction: “Do not throw away your confidence; it will be richly rewarded.”
It is easy to have confidence that God is with you when everything is going well. But what if things start to fall apart? What if you lose your status in the community? What if you are criticized for doing what is right? What if disaster strikes your family? What if death enters the picture? What if everything in the human view says God has abandoned you? These are tests. Here is our answer: “Come to Me. I will never leave or forsake you.” Jesus experienced rejection, hardship, shame, and death… yet He never lost hope in His Father. Our Good Shepherd will teach us to have such confidence as we trust in Him.
“Therefore, brothers, since we have confidence to enter the Most Holy Place by the blood of Jesus, by a new and living way opened for us through the curtain, that is, his body, and since we have a great priest over the house of God, let us draw near to God with a sincere heart in full assurance of faith, having our hearts sprinkled to cleanse us from a guilty conscience and having our bodies washed with pure water. Let us hold unswervingly to the hope we profess, for he who promised is faithful.” Hebrews 10:19-23