The Quest For Truth

Faith is a state of rest. So many people struggle to have faith but faith does not come that way. We have to rest in God to exercise faith. Jesus was sleeping at the back of the boat when His disciples woke Him up because of the tempest. Faith can sleep in the midst of the disturbances and trouble in our life. It is aware of every problem but it is not disturbed by them. Rather it rests in the awareness of God’s presence and His ever very present help.

It is because of him that you are in Christ Jesus, who has become for us wisdom from God—that is, our righteousness, holiness and redemption.

1 Corinthians 1:30

The above verse says that Christ has been made unto us holiness. We all know as Christians that we ought to be holy but seldom do we find the way. The proper way to receive holiness is by faith in the finished work of Christ. Christ has done everything for us on the cross. His death has achieved what we could not achieve through human effort. All our struggles and strivings to be holy are in vain if we do not have faith. In order to be holy we have to first believe that Christ has made us holy through the cross. Our conduct may say something different but we have to remember that our conduct can be changed. As a man thinketh in his heart so is he. We have to get our thoughts on the truth. And the truth is that God has made us holy in Christ. We can be holy only when we believe that we are already holy in Christ. It is not because of anything that we have in us but because of the free grace available in Christ. By grace we have already been made holy. We have to believe the word of God and not look at our experiences. Our experiences will change as we apply faith and believe that God has already made us holy in  Christ. This is faith producing works.

Philippians 4:6-7

“Do not fret or have any anxiety about anything, but in every circumstance and in everything, by prayer and petition (^[a]definite requests), with thanksgiving, continue to make your wants known to God.

⁷And God’s peace [shall be yours, that ^[b]tranquil state of a soul assured of its salvation through Christ, and so fearing nothing from God and being content with its earthly lot of whatever sort that is, that peace] which transcends all understanding shall ^[c]garrison and mount guard over your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus.”

Worry is an entertaining habit for some people. But if we are like that we should know that we are sinning in the sight of God. We have to learn to live lives without any care. When we get to the state where we are not disturbed about anything, we will find great peace and joy in the Lord. We have to surrender everyday our cares and worries to the Lord. We have to cast our burden on the Lord and believe that He will take care of everything. Faith is something that God really delights in and He will bless you richly when you learn to trust Him for everything in life.

Proverbs 19:11 says, “Good sense makes a man restrain his anger, and it is his glory to overlook a transgression or an offense.” Many a time when we are angry we feel that we are right and that there is no other way we could have reacted. But this is a lie from the Devil. Anger really destroys our lives and hardens our conscience. When the feeling of anger comes we have to rest in God and allow that feeling to go away. Anger and wrath produces enmity and unforgiveness. It is best to overlook a transgression than to destory our soul.

In 1 Timothy 6:6-8, the apostle Paul says that he has learned to be content in all circumstances. What this really means is that contentment is a state of the heart and not of the lack or abundance of things on the outside. When we rest in God we find peace and contentment that makes our lives completely satisfied where we are. We don’t want or long anything for ourselves but look for the welfare of others. Our focus is now shifted from ourselves to others. That is contentment – not wanting anything for ourselves but all for the other person.

As a Christian we are not to be fearful of anything. Everything has to vanish before faith in God. Shall tribulation or persecution or famine or nakedness or peril or sword separate us from the love of God. No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through Christ. We must not be afraid to face and endure anything for Christ. We never worry because we know that through everything we are going to come out victorious and as overcomers. All things are subject to Christ whether they be principalities or powers. Christ has overcome and we share in His victory. Jesus said to his disciples, “Be of good cheer, I have overcome the world.” And the One who overcame the world lives in us. We can believe that God will give us grace to go through anything. Nothing can crush us. Nothing can defeat us as long as we have faith in God. Christ endured the cross experiencing the pain of death because He had entrusted His spirit to His Father. He knew that all things were possible with God even the resurrection from the dead into a glorious future. All things work for the glory of God when we put our trust in Him and entrust our lives to Him. We should not be fearful and anxious about anything. There are no coincidences in the life of a Christian. There is nothing called luck. Everthing is ordained by our Father. We have to trust Him always even through the hard times and rest in the eternal arms of God our Father.

It is a great moment when a soul surrenders to Christ. But the road does not suddenly become all sweet and nice. The fact is God begins to work in us now if we don’t resist Him. Yes, we can resist Him even after we give ourselves to Him. Because our free will is always there. God does not bring us into bondage. After we see how Christ suffered for us, we are now called into the fellowship of His sufferings. Christ suffered pain, rejection, humiliation, sorrow, and separation. We are called to suffer and experience His sufferings. It may not be appealing but this is the way we become like Him. The disciples counted it worthy to suffer for Him. Now our lives are not our own. We should not resist the dealings of God in our lives. Nothing happens to a Christian except what God allows. All things including persecutions and trials are for our good. We have to co-operate with Him to accomplish His will in our lives. The scars of Christ have to be planted in our lives. The Apostle Paul said, “From now on let no one trouble me, for I bear in my body the marks of the Lord Jesus.” These were not just physical marks but the marks of the sufferings that Christ suffered. We can know him only by sharing in His sufferings. It is not imagining how He suffered for us but in reality experiencing how Christ suffered for us. Christ died on a cross and He gives us all a cross to pick up and follow Him. It is a path of pain but the joy of knowing this Person far exceeds all the pain that we might suffer. Therefore the Apostle James says, “Count it all joy…” When hardships and trials come our way we count it all joy. It may not be joyful when we are going through it but we know God will fashion us in the image of His Son as we come out of it by His grace.

When some people asked Jesus what they must do, the only reply they got was, “Believe in Me.” We are not only justified by faith but we are also sanctified by faith. Paul wrote to the Galatians, “Having begun in the Spirit are you now being perfected by the flesh” Gal. 3:3. The path to sanctification is believing that ‘Christ has been made unto us sanctification.’ Christ is our sanctification. We have to only believe that and rest from all our labors. Good works are produced by faith. James says, “Faith without works is dead.” Sincere faith produces godly works. The works that you are trying on your own strength will be possible only when faith is applied first. We do nothing to attain holiness. God does everything. Our part is to believe that. He has said, ‘I will give them a new heart and a new Spirit’ We hinder God when we try to do things with our own strength. Initially it may seem that you have to be passive. But when you receive from God in that way, He breathes his life and his holiness in us which stimulates us to good works. The working comes only after believing. We have to let go off our hands from ourselves. That is the only thing that God requires of you.

God is so much greater than our mistakes. He is a God of infinite love. His love makes him patient towards us. God is longsuffering and full of mercy. While we were yet sinners Christ died for us. And the blood of Christ still washes us from all our sins. It is not that God gives up on us. Most of the time it is us who give up on God. We cannot imagine a God who would love us so much despite everything. But God works slowly on us and in us Every prayer that we breathe takes us closer to Him. Every day we are drawing closer and closer to Love. The writer of Hebrews tells us to run the race with patience. Setbacks and failures should not let us down. God is always there to reach out His hand and pick us up again. If we could only believe in Him and His love. God is a God of Restoration because He is a God of Love.

When we talk about suffering, the words of Paul the Apostle comes to mind where he wrote, “The sufferings of our present time are not worth compared to the glory that shall be revealed in us.” Jesus endured the cross because of the joy that was set before Him. There is a reason behind the things we go through and though we may not always understand everything at that moment, the workings of God in our life are made clear as we come out of it. “All things work together for good.” That is what the saints have been believing all throughout the centuries. The Apostles called themselves, ‘bond servants of Christ.’ They were willing to endure everything for the Master’s sake. Their life was no longer theirs. It belonged to Another. Christ gave His life and everthing for us, we ought to give and endure everything for Him. If we see our sufferings in the context of our present earthly life, they may seem to be absolutely unjust and unfair. But in the context of eternity, we know that everything including suffering is for the glory of God and for our highest good. When he was struck and smitten, Job fell on his knees and blessed God. Jesus said, “In the world you will have tribulations but be of good cheer I have overcome the world.” And we know that ‘many are the afflictions of the righteous.’ But in the light of eternity we can rejoice for we have been counted worthy to suffer for His name’s sake.