Have you ever waited for things to fail? Ministry is humming and life can’t get better and yet you just are afraid that things are going to fall apart. If so, meet Abram. He just won a major battle to save Lot and now he is afraid of what may happen. Below is a summary of a devotion from 32 days with Abraham by Mark Etter. You can have the full devotion by clicking here. You can have a sample of three full devotions from the book and one of the Bible studies by clicking here. The whole book is available on Amazon.com as a softcover book or for kindle.
Focus Passage: Gen. 15:1-6
We used to call it “waiting for the other shoe to drop”. Things were going so well that we were just waiting for something bad to happen. Many of the biblical characters like David in the Psalms or Jeremiah in his prophecy shared honestly with God how they felt. Abram had those feelings. His heart was torn with fear and so God came to comfort him. The armies that he defeated were big, but God is bigger. “Don’t be afraid, Abram. I am your shield” (v.1) was God’s comfort. The world around you is big and dangerous, Abram, but you can trust your God to protect you.
As Lot went back to Sodom, it became apparent that Lot would never be the heir that God had promised. Abram confesses to the Lord his second fear “I remain childless” (v.2). Abram was getting old and the child had not yet come. How would the promises be fulfilled? How would his descendants inherit this land or make him a blessing to the whole world if there was not even a single son? In an act of love, God does not rebuke His servant. He simply reminds Abram that the promise is still intact
What is the key to defeating Satan when he wants failure to follow success? “Abram believed the Lord and he credited it to him as righteousness.”(v.6) Open yourself up to the Lord as Abram did and believe the promises that God has made to you in His word. We are not saved by making promises to God, but by believing the promises that He has made to us.
How would life change if your fears changed to faith? You would spend less time worrying after a great success about what could go wrong. The joy of the Lord is stronger than the worries of the evil one. Like Abram, our weapon against worry is to listen to God. Read your Bible and let your loving God speak to your fears. Pray about them like Nehemiah, David or others have done so that your Lord can comfort you and push Satan’s worries away. It is natural to fear. It is harder to have faith.
· What are you worrying about right now? What help could seek from God for those worries?