… God’s Word exhorts and strengthens.
Early this year as I faced a personal crisis in self-confidence and faith in God, I was challenged by a pastor’s message during our weekend services at VCF Galleria to pray for something that seems impossible. From personal conviction that God is greater than I can ever imagine, I decided to do so.
A few months later, I am praying for three breakthroughs: in my career, in my family’s finances, and in someone’s salvation. Of these, two have started to come to pass, but one in particular seems really impossible, and I was losing heart.
Then, last Tuesday, my Bible reading took me to several verses and passages that recalled so many more in my mind. When I looked them up, surprisingly I had already underlined them in my Bible in my past years of reading it and meditating on the Word. God’s Word is always there; we just have to cling to it at all times to renew our hope and strength in Him. I just want to share these with you, dear reader. (All quotations are from the New International Version.)
Mark 11:22 “Have faith in God,” Jesus answered. “I tell you the truth, if anyone says to this mountain, ‘Go, throw yourself into the sea,’ and does not doubt in his heart but believes that what he says will happen, it will be done for him. Therefore I tell you, whatever you ask for in prayer, believe that you have received it, and it will be yours.”
Mark 12:29-31 “The most important one,” answered Jesus, “is this: ‘Hear o Israel, the Lord our God, the Lord is one. Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.’ The second is this: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’ There is no commandment greater than these.”
Luke 21:13 “But make up your mind not to worry beforehand how you will defend yourselves. For I will give you words and wisdom that none of your adversaries will be able to resist or contradict.”
John 15:26-27 “When the Counselor comes, whom I will send to you from the Father, the Spirit of truth who goes out from the Father, he will testify about me. And you also must testify, for you have been with me from the beginning.”
Isaiah 40:28-31 “Do you not know? Have you not heard? The LORD is the everlasting God, the Creator of the ends of the earth. He will not grow tired or weary, and his understanding no one can fathom. He gives strength to the weary, and increases the power of the weak. Even youths grow tired and weary, and young men stumble and fall; but those who hope in the LORD will renew their strength. They will soar on wings like eagles; they will run and not grow weary, they will walk and not be faint.”
Romans 8:24-27 “For in this hope we were saved. But hope that is seen is no hope at all. Who hopes for what he already has? But if we hope for what we do not yet have, we wait for it patiently. In the same way, the Spirit helps us in our weakness. We do not know what we ought to pray for, but the Spirit himself intercedes for us with groans that words cannot express. And he who searches our hearts knows the mind of the Spirit, because the Spirit intercedes for the saints in accordance with God’s will.”
May these verses bless you as they have blessed me. My God is alive and real. Ü
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