By Melody Vanosdol
God is always faithful. I’m still working on it.
This morning in my juvenile detention class, I had a special speaker. He asked the kids to write about something they wished they could go back and change in their lives. (Even the most hard-core student wants to change the fact that he or she got caught.)
This gentleman has known me for quite some time. Knowing me well, he smiled at me and said, “I bet I know what you would change.”
I smiled back and made a declaration just loud enough for my whole classroom to hear. “There’s nothing about my life I would change. Nothing.”
He looked at me with surprise. All who were listening stopped and looked at me.
I turned to address the room, “Satan has tried many times to take me down. I won’t lie and say he hasn’t come close or brought me to my knees. But on my knees is where I am my most powerful. On my knees is where I stop depending on my power and start handing everything over to God. It’s where I lean on Him. It’s where my faith grows.”
They were listening intently. Some were nodding their heads. Some were smiling.
I went on to explain, “It is the hardest days and the hardest struggles that God will use to build you up and increase your faith if you lean into HIM. But Satan will use the same test and the same struggles to make you bitter if you don’t.”
I wrapped it up with one of my favorite declarations, “You would have better luck convincing me that I don’t exist than convincing me that God doesn’t exist.”
There are people who seem to hold up under any circumstance: widowhood, family troubles, job troubles—sometimes all at once. There are also people who get upset over anything and think that God or the world is against them if it rains. The one bearing up is the one leaning on God.
I chose to lean on God and cannot express how much I’ve been rewarded. I can bear up under any circumstance because I am not leaning on my own power. I am leaning on the absolute infinite power of my Lord.
Great tests become great testimonies.
Had I not gone through that abusive relationship, I would not have developed the same level of faith or closeness with the Lord.
I have a long list of things that I would never want to go through again, and I have been on my knees more than once asking, “Lord, what do you want me to learn from this? I don’t want to go through this lesson again.” But I wouldn’t change what I’ve been through.
God wants us to run to Him first. Run to Him with our love. Run to Him with our praise. Run to Him with our troubles. Run to Him with our fears. Run to Him with our heartache. Run to Him with everything. God longs to prove to us that we can trust Him. All He asks is that we put Him first.
God is always faithful. I’m still working on it.
“‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.’ This is the first and greatest commandment” (Matthew 22:37-38).
“In you, Lord, I have taken refuge; let me never be put to shame; deliver me in your righteousness. Turn your ear to me, come quickly to my rescue; be my rock of refuge, a strong fortress to save me. Since you are my rock and my fortress, for the sake of your name lead and guide me” (Psalm 31:1-3).
“Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. 29 Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls” (Matthew 11:28-29).
“Be strong and courageous. Do not fear or be in dread of them, for it is the LORD your God who goes with you. He will not leave you or forsake you.” Then Moses summoned Joshua and said to him in the sight of all Israel, “Be strong and courageous, for you shall go with this people into the land that the LORD has sworn to their fathers to give them, and you shall put them in possession of it. It is the LORD who goes before you. He will be with you; he will not leave you or forsake you. Do not fear or be dismayed” (Deuteronomy 31:6-8).
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