Devotions

I have a special word for all who face impossibilities: “The Lord thy God in the midst of thee is mighty; he will save, he will rejoice over thee with joy; he will rest in his love, he will joy over thee with singing” (Zephaniah 3:17).

Here is a glorious revelation of the steadfastness of God’s love for His people. Scripture tells us He rests and rejoices in His love for us!

The Hebrew word for “rest” here means God hasn’t a single question concerning His love for us. In other words, He has fixed, or settled, His love for us, and He will never take it away. In fact, we’re told God is so satisfied in His love for us that He sings about it.

Can you imagine this? There is a manifestation in heaven of God’s delight over you. John Owen interprets the passage this way: “God leaps, as overcome with joy.”

Moreover, Paul tells us, everything that is out of divine order—all that is of unbelief and confusion—is changed by the appearance of God’s love. “After that the kindness and love of God our Savior toward man appeared” (Titus 3:4).

In the preceding verse, Paul says, “We ourselves also were sometimes foolish, disobedient, deceived” (3:3). In other words, “Everything was out of order. Our faith was not an overcoming one. But the kindness and love of God appeared, which the Father shed on us abundantly through Christ.”

When Paul says the love of God “appeared,” he uses a word from a Greek root meaning “superimposed.” In short, the Lord looked down on us poor, struggling souls, full of fear and questioning, and He superimposed this revelation: “My love will deliver you. Rest and delight in My love for you.”

I thank God for the day His love “appeared” to me. There is no faith that can stand against impossibilities unless everything—every problem, every affliction—is committed into the loving care of our Father. When my situations are at their worst, I must rest in simple faith.

I tell you, we are in the midst of war! You are facing evil powers, fighting for your faith against the father of all lies. He is the one who has planted all those little thoughts: “Where is your God? Things are going from bad to worse. Your pain, your suffering, your needs keep mounting. God has promised to make a way of escape for you. So, where is the way? Where is your God now, when you need Him most?”

You are now being shaken and sifted. And in the midst of it all, your faith seems to have failed. Beloved, I have good news for you: God is not mad at you.

You may ask: “Doesn’t Jesus suffer when we mistrust Him? Doesn’t the Lord grieve when we waver and question His Word and His faithfulness?” Yes, yes, He absolutely does. But those who have failed in faith can still keep their eyes on Jesus.

How patient is our Lord, how merciful. He hears all our murmuring and questioning, He sees so many doubtful thoughts in our minds, and yet He looks upon us with forgiveness and compassion.

After Peter denied the Lord he was restored and lived out a great life of faith. Remember, Jesus had given him this word of encouragement at Passover: “When thou art converted, strengthen thy brethren” (Luke 22:32). This is the Lord’s word for you and for me, as well. He tells us just as He told Peter, “Keep your eyes on Me. You are going to come through this. And you’re going to help your brothers and sisters in My house.”

Later, in the book of Acts (see Acts 12:1-10), we find Peter locked up in an inner prison. An angel comes to him, shakes off his chains, and tells him to get up and leave. At that point, Peter never looks at the impossibilities around him: the iron gates he had to go through, the many guards and soldiers he had to pass by at his own peril. Instead, Peter rises in faith at the angel’s instruction, and when he comes to the iron gates, they open of their own accord.

So it will be for you, dear saint, if you are willing to get up and move on in faith.

Abraham did not stagger in his faith. Rather, he was “fully persuaded that, what [God] had promised, He was able also to perform” (Romans 4:21). He recognized that God is able to work with nothing. Indeed, our Lord creates out of a void. Consider the Genesis account: Out of nothing, God created the world. With just a single word, He creates. And He can create miracles for us—out of nothing.

When all else fails—when your every plan and scheme has been exhausted—that is the time for you to cast everything onto God. It is time for you to give up all confidence in finding deliverance anywhere else. Then, once you are ready to believe, you are to see God not as a potter who needs clay, but as a Creator who works from nothing. And out of nothing that is of this world or its materials, God will work in ways you never could have conceived.

How serious is the Lord about our believing Him in the face of impossibilities?

We find the answer to this question in the story of Zacharias, the father of John the Baptist. Zacharias was visited by an angel who told him that his wife, Elisabeth, would give birth to a special child. But Zacharias—who was advanced in years, like Abraham—refused to believe it. God’s promise alone was not enough for him.

Zacharias answered the angel, “[How] shall I know this? For I am an old man, and my wife well stricken in years” (Luke 1:18). Simply put, Zacharias considered the impossibilities. He was saying, “This isn’t possible. You’ve got to prove to me how it will happen.” It didn’t sound reasonable.

Zacharias’ doubts displeased the Lord. The angel told him, “Behold, thou shalt be dumb, and not able to speak, until the day that these things shall be performed, because thou believest not my words, which shall be fulfilled in their season” (1:20).

The message is clear: God expects us to believe Him when He speaks. Likewise, Peter writes: “Let them that suffer according to the will of God commit the keeping of their souls to him in well-doing, as unto a faithful Creator” (1 Peter 4:19, my italics).

“Being not weak in faith, [Abraham] considered not his own body now dead, when he was about an hundred years old, neither yet the deadness of Sarah’s womb” (Romans 4:19).

The essence of true faith is found in this single verse. God had just promised Abraham that he would have a son, one who would become the seed of many nations. Remarkably, Abraham didn’t flinch at this promise, even though he was well past the age of siring children. Instead, when Abraham received this word from the Lord, we’re told he “considered not his own body now dead [nor] . . . the deadness of Sarah’s womb.”

To the natural mind, it was impossible for this promise to be fulfilled. But Abraham didn’t dwell on any such impossibility. According to Paul, the patriarch gave no thought to how God would keep His promise. He didn’t reason with God, “But, Lord, I have no seed to plant. And Sarah has no life in her womb to conceive. My wife is past the ability to bear children. So, how will You do it, Lord?” Instead of entertaining such questions, Abraham simply “considered not.”

The fact is, when God is at work producing a faith that is tried and better than gold, He first puts a sentence of death on all human resources. He closes the door to all human reasoning, bypassing every means of a rational deliverance.

The faith that pleases God is born in a place of deadness. I’m speaking here of the deadness of all human possibilities. It is a place where man-made plans flourish at first but then die. It is a place where human hopes bring temporary relief but soon crash, adding to a sense of helplessness. Have you been at this place of deadness? Has it seemed that you have no options left? You can’t call someone to advise you. The heavens are like brass when you pray, your requests falling to the ground.

I declare to you, this is God at work. His Spirit is working to get you to stop considering the impossibilities—to stop looking to human ways and means—to stop trying to think your way out of your situation. The Holy Ghost is urging you, “Quit hunting for help from some man. And quit focusing on how hopeless you think your situation is. Those are hindrances to your faith.”

The way Paul writes to the Corinthian church, it’s easy to assume that it was rife with gross sins. The truth is, however, they were greatly gifted by the Holy Spirit. Indeed, it’s because of the Corinthians that we know about the gifts of the Spirit; Paul’s letter to them shows how powerfully those gifts were operating in them. But even though the Corinthians had a great knowledge of the things of God, they lacked the love that Jesus commands of us. Paul hit them hard on this point:

“If I speak in the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I am a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. And if I have prophetic powers, and understand all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have all faith, so as to remove mountains, but have not love, I am nothing. If I give away all I have, and if I deliver up my body to be burned, but have not love, I gain nothing” (1 Corinthians 13:1-3).

Note Paul’s operative word here: nothing. That’s what the love of the Corinthian church was worth. He was telling them they could never accomplish God’s purposes. Christ’s love—the lay-down-your-life-on-a-cross kind of love—is a tall order, one that’s impossible except through the Spirit.

Now, this may sound to you like a surprising interpretation of 1 Corinthians 13. Most of us know this chapter as the Bible’s “love chapter.” Even non-Christians are familiar with it because it is read at so many weddings. In that context, 1 Corinthians 13 isn’t much more than a greeting card sentiment. In truth, this chapter is a counterpoint to all the carnal sins Paul listed in 2 Corinthians 12. That list includes quarreling, jealousy, anger, hostility, slander, gossip, conceit, and disorder. Note the contrast:

“Love is patient and kind; love does not envy or boast; it is not arrogant or rude. It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful; it does not rejoice at wrongdoing, but rejoices with the truth. Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things” (1 Corinthians 13:4-7). When we compare this list with the other, we begin to see 1 Corinthians 13 as a spiritual solution to a problem of sin—indeed, the only solution.