O my soul,
When do you expect change will come?
After so many years spent hoping and trusting, holding on to your promise from the Lord and yet still waiting, are you tempted to give up?
Or do you still somehow expect that the Lord will act with great power to fulfil that promise? And when exactly do you expect that?
There is only one answer which honours the Lord and that is today. You must continue to expect it and you must expect it today! It is imperative that you do so. Your very faith depends upon it. Your life and health and strength depend upon it. How else could you live a life that honours him, other than in complete trust and dependence upon him, and other than in expectation of the imminent outworking of his great power in your life?
Let us hold fast the confession of our hope without wavering, for he who promised is faithful.
― Hebrews 10:23
He who promised is indeed faithful. His very name is Faithful and True (Rev 19:11).
But why is it quite so important to hold fast to this hope, this expectation of imminent fulfilment, without wavering?
We are in the midst of a spiritual battle and the fighting is fierce. To expect anything other than imminent fulfilment would open the door to doubt ⸺that doubt which is so ready to creep in and steal away hope and joy and expectation. That doubt which would cause all to unravel and expose the tattered remains of a faith which once was. That doubt which must be resisted with all strength. Be steadfast, O my soul! Cry out to the Faithful One, Lord I believe! Help my unbelief!
So Ahab sent to all the people of Israel and gathered the prophets together at Mount Carmel. And Elijah came near to all the people and said, “How long will you go limping between two different opinions? If the LORD is God, follow him; but if Baal, then follow him.” And the people did not answer him a word.
And they took the bull that was given them, and they prepared it and called upon the name of Baal from morning until noon, saying, “O Baal, answer us!” But there was no voice, and no one answered. And they limped around the altar that they had made. And at noon Elijah mocked them, saying, “Cry aloud, for he is a god. Either he is musing, or he is relieving himself, or he is on a journey, or perhaps he is asleep and must be awakened.”
― 1 Kings 18:20-21, 26-27
O my soul, are you tempted to such thoughts while you wait on the living God, the God of your life? Repudiate them!
And at the time of the offering of the oblation, Elijah the prophet came near and said, “O LORD, God of Abraham, Isaac, and Israel, let it be known this day that you are God in Israel, and that I am your servant, and that I have done all these things at your word. Answer me, O LORD, answer me, that this people may know that you, O LORD, are God, and that you have turned their hearts back.” Then the fire of the LORD fell and consumed the burnt offering and the wood and the stones and the dust, and licked up the water that was in the trench. And when all the people saw it, they fell on their faces and said, “The LORD, he is God; the LORD, he is God.”
― 1 Kings 18:36-39
The Lord, he is God! Praise him, O my soul!
The Lord’s answer to our most earnest praying, the outworking of his mighty strength in our lives to fulfil all that he has promised, is that all may know that the Lord, he is God! And his grace and kindness is that you, O my soul, may know it. Expect it today!
But there’s more.
Our experience of the Lord’s great power being outworked in our lives is limited only by our faith to believe it, our faith to receive it. This is why it is quite so important that we do not hold back in expectation.
And as Jesus passed on from there, two blind men followed him, crying aloud, “Have mercy on us, Son of David.” When he entered the house, the blind men came to him, and Jesus said to them, “Do you believe that I am able to do this?” They said to him, “Yes, Lord.” Then he touched their eyes, saying, “According to your faith be it done to you.” And their eyes were opened.
― Matthew 9:27-30
O my soul, do you believe that he is able to do this? According to your faith be it done to you. Do not hold back in expectation!
And there’s yet more.
“For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life. For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through him. Whoever believes in him is not condemned, but whoever does not believe is condemned already, because he has not believed in the name of the only Son of God.”
― John 3:16-18
What do you dare to believe, O my soul, of the only Son of God. Do not hold back in expectation!
This is the day that the LORD has made; let us rejoice and be glad in it.
― Psalm 118:24
This is the day, O my soul! Expect great things in it! 🙏