Forged By Faith

Psalm 116:2 NIV For within life we’re bound to find that to go alone is equally implausible as it is impossible. Because we’re here as if radiant reflections meant to live reflecting the radiance of an image entirely not our own but rather one barrowed from He who is the source of all of this that we’ve so selfishly come to assume a matter meant for our own making. Yes, such is life as it seems, just a song we sing that’s but a chorus of chaos all coming down upon us from the bridges we so boastfully bet upon building by ourselves leaving us all higher and higher and yet all the more alone all the while. All while God sits up in Heaven looking down probably both laughing and lamenting the many things we’re trying and the many more we’re only forgetting. Simply because an infrequently found fact of life is that we’re not as well-equipped to undertake every effort, to endure every struggle, to understand every confusion, to decline every delusion, to pursue every priority or even to know...

Psalm 18:6 NIV Perhaps it's only the heaviest of a life's crossroads that might finally inspire the courage to find out where the cross goes. For there’s a demanded degree of distress designed inside this decree to die that new life might be lived from within the ashes from which we came and through which we’ve run within this life we’ve run aground atop our every assumption having only assumed we’ve too much to lose to leave a life behind for even that which is to be proven better forever. Indeed, it seems that forever is felt too far away, so distant that it’s none but a pretense not at all worth the pain of prayer as spoken only in humility. Because there’s simply no other way that a people such as we could be so bold as to come before the King we killed, the God we denied, the hope we’ve not had and the peace unproven in this place. Yes, we’re altogether too much this place to withstand the standing before the face of grace. And thus defines the humility needed for even a p...

Proverbs 28:9 NIV Here's another assurance that we have in our faith: God hears our prayers. We're told that very thing in 1 Peter 3:12, 1 John 5:14, Proverbs 15:29, John 9:31, and the list goes on. There are verifications all throughout Scripture that tell us that God hears our prayers. But there remains a large portion of our world that doesn't believe so. I contend that they don't believe in prayer because they also don't believe in the God to which we pray. And yet they shout and ridicule and blaspheme and throw stones at the idea of prayer when the world around them isn't changed. I guess since they haven't read the passages that testify to the fact that God hears our prayers, then they obviously don't know the other half of those verses I listed above that point to a possible reason that they’re ideas of what prayer should be aren’t fulfilled. 1 Peter 3:12 for instance: "For the eyes of the Lord are on the righteous and his ears are attentive ...

Romans 12:12 NIV This is one of those verses that we can carry with us every single day that we're here. Short, simple, and full of some of the best wisdom there is. And I think it's just about perfect for the start of this new year that we're now a few days into. We don't know what lies ahead. We can't imagine the challenges that are coming our way. We may not ever have the comfort of foresight but that just gives us more opportunities to learn to trust in the truths found in God's word. We all started off this year with hope. Hope that the days ahead are better than the days behind. Hope that we're closer to the end of the worldwide challenges we've been facing the past couple of years. Hope that our friends and family have a good year full of health and happiness. Hope that we have plenty of opportunities to grow in faith and strengthen our walk with Christ. Hope is just one of those things that is always there to keep us going and lift our spirits wh...