Being a Faithful Follower

     What does someone who is faithfully following God look like? Are they missionaries that leave their family and homes and go to a different country? Are they pastors and other church leaders? Or are they simply people who go to work every day and do their best to apply God’s will to their daily walk? Being a faithful follower simply means that you have asked for God to show you his will for your life and you are willing to follow it. That doesn’t mean it is going to be easy! In fact, I would bet that following God’s will for your life will leave you in many uncomfortable positions throughout your walk, but God promises to remain faithful to us if we are faithful to Him (see 2 Samuel 22:26).

     One of the most important aspects of being a faithful follower is prayer. Seeking God every morning will get your day off on the right foot and renew your spirit for whatever challenges the Lord may have in store for the next 24 hours. Romans 12:12 says, “Be joyful in hope, patient in affliction, faithful in prayer.” A faithful follower will faithfully pray and seek God’s will every day.

     Another important part of being a faithful follower is to be willing. If you are going to ask God to show you his will for your life, you had better be prepared for His answer. God doesn’t often call us to do things that will be comfortable and easy for us. Not that there won’t be times when you will feel like following God’s will is easy, because there may be. But most often, we are called to step out of our comfortable boxes and once we step out in faith, God will probably burn that old comfortable box you kept yourself in for you will no longer need it!

     Being a willing follower will not be easy. God never said it would be. In fact, He tells us plainly that following Him will be hard. In Matthew 7:14 Jesus says, “Small is the gate and narrow the road that leads to life, and only a few will find it.” Have you ever tried to thread a needle with a very small eye? It is extremely difficult and very frustrating! But some amazing person created this little thing called a needle threader to make this task a little easier. God is our needle, Jesus is the threader, and we are the string. Jesus died on the cross so that we would be able to find that narrow path that leads to the Father and in so doing, be able to be used by Him.

     Following God faithfully will probably be the most difficult, uncomfortable at times, choice you will make in your life. But it is the most important, rewarding one. If we remain faithful to God and his will for our life, He will remain faithful to us in everything. The things we will be asked to do and to endure will be difficult, but they are always for our good. For the Lord “is the rock, his works are perfect, all his ways are just. A faithful God who does no wrong, upright and just is He” (Deuteronomy 32:4).

Growing in Faith

     Hebrews 11:1 tells us that “faith is being sure of what we hope for and certain of what we do no see” (NIV). If you are growing in your faith, your personal relationship with God is becoming stronger and you are becoming more and more certain that God is at work. There will be a deep trust between you and your Creator and a powerful knowledge of His will for your life. There will also be a hunger for constant communication with Him. Now, the methods you use to develop this relationship will be as unique as you are, however, there are a few things that are necessary for any relationship to be successful. You need trust, knowledge of the other person involved and communication. Lots of communication.  

     Let’s start with trust. Trust is difficult in any relationship. You won’t feel like growing a relationship if you don’t think you can trust the other party involved. This holds true for our relationship with God as well. If you don’t think you can trust that God has your best interests at heart, you will have trouble with your faith. But the great thing is that God doesn’t expect us to trust blindly. He has given us plenty of examples through His word of His trustworthiness. He promised Abraham a son in his old age and He delivered. He promised to lead the Israelites out of Egypt and He did, with no shortage of miracles along the way. All we have to do is read through the Old Testament to see God over and over again proving His trustworthiness.

     And it doesn’t stop in the Old Testament. Think about this: Would you trust someone who was willing to give up His own son in order for you to have life? That’s what He did. He sent the ultimate proof that He is worthy of our trust by sending his son to die in our place. It is hard to grasp sometimes, but Jesus was a real, live, flesh and blood man that felt hunger, thirst, pain and all the other things we experience on a daily basis. Then He died a horrific, painful death just because He loved us and wants our trust. In John 14:1 Jesus tells us, “Do not let your hearts be troubled. Trust in God; also trust in me.” Take heart friends, He wouldn’t command us to trust Him if He wasn’t worthy of our trust.

     Knowledge of God’s will for your life can also help deepen your relationship with Him. How does God provide us with that knowledge? He gives us His word. Literally. The Bible is full of instruction on how God’s wants us to live our lives, and if we are the Christians we profess to be, we will seek this knowledge on a regular basis. In John Ortberg’s book titled “The Me I Want to Be” he reminds us that “only God knows your full potential, and he is guiding you toward that best version of yourself all the time.” God wants us to know what his will for our life is and He will guide us into that place if we are willing to go. All we have to do is spend time in His word, trust His guidance, and ask Him to keep us on track.

     That brings us to communication. Sometimes, communication can be the hardest part of a relationship. I think this is especially true in our relationship with God. He doesn’t respond in the typical way, does he? We have to learn to listen for God’s voice throughout our day. Sometimes He will respond directly to us through his word and we know it’s Him. Other times He will respond through someone else, through a situation we are dealing with or maybe even a book we are reading. Regardless of how He responds, if you are not actively listening and watching for His response, you will miss it. Growing this part of your relationship may seem the hardest. How do you find time in your busy day to talk to God? And how do know that you haven’t missed his answer? The demands of your job and home life may make you feel like you don’t have the proper time to spend communicating with God. While it is important to spend some quiet time alone with God everyday, that doesn’t mean that He won’t value the short, seemingly broken conversations you may have with Him during your busy day. A quote from Thomas Kelly’s book “A Testament of Devotion” sums up this concept beautifully:

“There is a way of ordering our mental life on more than one level at once. On one level we may be thinking, discussing, seeing, calculating, meeting all the demands of external affairs. But deep within, behind the scenes, at a profounder level, we may also be in prayer and adoration, song and worship and a gentle receptiveness to divine breathings.”

     Moses’ words to the Israelites serve as a reminder to us all, “Now choose life, so that you and your children may live and that you may love the Lord your God, listen to his voice and hold fast to him. For the Lord is your life…” (Deuteronomy 30:19-20). Make the Lord your life, and He will not fail to lead you if you hold to his teachings, trust him and listen to his voice.