Before I start, if you have not done so already, I strongly advise you to read Faith in God before this part || version. I went into great details about what it means to have faith in God and why it is crucial to trust in Him. Furthermore, this follow up post, Faith in God || is mainly about analyzing two important biblical stories of men who exercised EXTREME faith in God.
Disclaimer – I am no expert of the Bible nor do I claim to be. I will try to interpret these biblical passages to the best of my abilities. My interpretations may differ from yours. Furthermore, I do consider myself well versed in the Bible so I will try to break down key components so these stories can be understood in its entirety. Let’s begin, shall we?
Abraham
One story in particular that I will discuss is Abram. Abram, whose name will later be changed to Abraham, is a special man in the Bible. Particularly Genesis. He is to be the Father of many nations. That was his promise from the Lord. The Lord came to Abraham and instructed him to get out of his country (Ur) and go to a land chosen by Him. Abraham obeyed the Lord and set out on his journey.
The Lord promised Abraham that his descendants will be as numerous as the stars. Too many to count. Spread out all across the globe. And this was during the time that Abraham was 75 years old and childless! You can imagine how overwhelming it was to have this revealed to Abraham by the Lord. It almost seemed impossible. But, Abraham believed. Now keep in mind this promise was made to Abraham when he was 75. Sarai (later changed to Sarah), his wife was 65.
Fast forward to Abraham being 85 and Sarai 75, they are still childless. As an offering to her husband and to uphold the promise of the Lord, Sarai will use a woman, who goes by the name Hagar, to give him a child – which Hagar did. However, Hagar’s child, Ishmael, was not the promise child nor was he the chosen heir the Lord intended for Abraham because the child had to come from Sarai his wife. This whole section (regarding Hagar) is not necessary to elaborate on and I will skip this portion for the sake of this blog post. It was only brought up to show the gap of 10 years when the Lord made His promise.
Fast forward….. At last! Sarah is with child at 90 years old. Abraham, a proud father at 100. The birth of Isaac! However, the test of faith has yet to come!
The Lord will try us in order to test our faith in Him. The Lord wanted to see if Abraham was committed to Him as people were committed to their pagans during that era. People during that era sacrificed children as an offering to their gods so the Lord wanted Abraham to “sacrifice” his son Isaac as a test.
Abraham came soooo close into slicing Isaac’s neck off upon an altar but the Lord intervened. Beforehand, Abraham’s faith in the Lord that He can raise his son from the dead, was stronger than his love for his son Isaac. Abraham passed the test! The Lord knew from there that Abraham’s fear and faith in Him was solid.
How many of us can say that we have faith in God like Abraham? How many of us would offer up our dear sons and daughters as a test of our obedience to the Lord? This profound faith in God is telling.
The Lord promises Abraham that he will be the Father of many nations and have descendants as many as the stars in the sky. Abraham could’ve easily dismissed God and questioned how can that be? He was an old man! Or what about offering up Isaac? (FYI – the Lord never intended to kill Isaac, it was just a test y’all). Abraham was so confident that he had nothing to fear because God could easily bring his son back to life. After all, He is the giver of life to begin with. And let us not get it twisted, Abraham LOVED Isaac and the thought of slaying a son he waited so long for, wasn’t easy for him. But, faith in God can and will overshadow any fear that we have.
Noah
The last biblical story of faith is of Noah and the Great Flood. At this time, Noah was 500 years old. During his time, humanity was blaspheming left and right. The thoughts of EVERY human being (700 million +) were corrupted/evil and their behaviors were detestable. Fallen angels were mating with “daughters of men,” which produced nephilims aka giants. People were extremely wicked and engaged in sinful activities. This was also the first time that the Lord ever regretted something that He created. Not because of His wrongdoing but because of how corrupted and evil humanity became during that time on their own.
It was time for the Lord to bring an end to all flesh on Earth because of their unrighteousness. As a result of human sin, the Earth would also be destroyed. Unfortunately, the Earth has to always bear and suffer the consequences of human sin. However, Noah was able to find grace with the Lord. Because Noah had saving faith, the Lord saved Noah and his family – which in total was 8 people.
Noah was required to build an Ark to save himself, his family and the land/air animals (1 male and 1 female of every species).
Gopher would be used to build this Ark. And it was only AFTER this Ark was built that the Lord informed Noah the purpose the Ark would serve. Imagine that? Imagine being told by God to build a HUGE Ark and not being told why. Noah exercised faith in this particular instance because he did not ask questions. He did what he was told, trusting in God throughout the process. The Lord was to bring a flood – everything that was in the world during that time will die.
Mind you, constructing this HUGE Ark would’ve taken an immeasurable amount of time so this was a LENGTHY task (100+ years). Upon completion, it rained for 40 days and 40 nights on Earth. At this time, Noah was 600 years old. (Side note – After the flood, no one on Earth will ever be able to live this long ever again – 120 is the cut off point. Of course, there are outliers who live beyond 120 but it is rare). After the flood, the Lord made a covenant with Noah – never to send a flood to wipe out mankind again. The covenant was in a form of a beautiful rainbow.
Furthermore, faith in the Lord drove these men to follow specific orders without knowing the outcome of such events. Any of us would’ve questioned and possibly refused to go through with any of this during that time. This kind of faith is what I pray to the good Lord to have everyday! The Lord always keeps His promises. To be able to go through with a plan without knowing how successful it will be in the end, is the faith I want to have in the Lord.
Although my faith in the Lord is great, the uncertainties of life will sometimes be stronger. But at the end of the day, I will always find my way back to Him because He is never too far! Faith in God || is a reminder that we WILL be tested at certain moments in our lifetime. We must be prepared and willing to see it through in order to strengthen our spiritual faith in Him. Faith in God || is based on stories of faith by people who were willing to trust in Him. Their patience were rewarded. IN FULL. Abraham’s promise was sealed after he proved His loyalty. Noah’s saving faith spared him and his family from the wrath of the Mighty God.
I hope I was able to explain these biblical stories in a way that was easy to follow and understand. Moreover, there are many more stories in the Bible with people like you and me who exercised or will exercise great faith in the Lord. Even those who didn’t have faith in the beginning but later they did. Those who were stubborn and denied Him, found Love and Humility in the Lord.
We go through Lessons in life that has MEANING to them. We may not know why things happen the way they did but our faith has to be solid because the woes in life WILL get us down. The woes of life WILL trample over the good times that we were blessed to have. But the main takeaway from this – believe and trust in the Lord because HE has the final say in ALL things.
Now for people thinking that the Lord is a tyrannical, mean and irrational God – I beg to differ. “If God was this all loving Spirit, why did He kill millions of people?” As mentioned before, His ways are higher than our ways. His thinking are higher than our thinking. We were not created during that time but I can only imagine how devastating that time was. How ugly, malevolent, beastly, and damnable the people living in that era were. If the Lord deemed it was necessary to rid this beautiful Earth of such souls, who am I to question the Giver of Life? The Lord has a reason for everything that He does. I have seen the evil in people in this lifetime and I know it was waaaay worse during Noah’s time.
I hope you all enjoyed reading Faith in God ||. In conclusion, thank you for checking out https://spiritualandlifediscussions.com/. If you have any questions about Abraham and/or Noah, feel free to comment or send me a message on IG.
To conclude, you may leave questions, comments and/or suggestions if you so choose. God bless!
