What a great week we have had focusing on Faith! How faithful God is, how He wants to fill us with faith, having faith for others in their time of need, how to keep refilling our seed bag of faith; so many ways for us to consider how we need to walk in faith! Wrapping up today I want to drop a rock in the pond with this question, “Do you anticipate the reward of your faith?”

What does that question mean, and what exactly is the reward of our faith? The bottom line of our faith is that we are rewarded with eternity in God’s presence. For some this is something they would rather not think about because death or the return of Christ are the only passage ways to get there, and well, it feels rather morbid to say, “I am looking forward to death so I can spend eternity with God.” Can we change our words and thoughts regarding this?

I for one hope and want to live a long and healthy life enjoying the generations to come of my family. To see my children become parents and then grandparents, how awesome of a thought is that? But I also want to keep fresh in my heart that the promise of God is this, to spend eternity with Him. So how do I balance the two without sounding…..strange?

“So do not throw away your confidence; it will be richly rewarded. You need to persevere so that when you have done the will of God, you will receive what he has promised.  For,  “In just a little while,  he who is coming will come  and will not delay.”” Hebrews 10:35-37

I love this thought of not throwing away my confidence. When we stay engaged our confidence in our calling and purpose are forefront. It is about His will and purpose for my life, not mine. He knows the exact number of days that I will walk this earth, the moments of engagement with others that he has prepared in advance for me to do….and for you to do! Life is not about chance, it is about purpose. When we walk engaged in a faith walk, our eyes are opened to the opportunities and preplanned divine appointments that he has scheduled every day for us. So do not throw away your confidence!

Recently we had a precious friend who pastors in the mid-west whose life was tragically lost at the young age of 55, very young! It is so hard in those moments to not feel like that one got by God, but you and I both know that this is not true. Nothing catches God unaware, and we have to hold on to our confidence when things don’t add up for us. When life seems to be cut short, or it doesn’t go in a way that we think it should. The reward of our faith is not having it always go our way, it is yielding to God’s way and the promise of eternity.

Today you are called to go about your day with expectancy, to trust in the one who holds all things. Pray to have your eyes of faith open to everything that God has scheduled as a divine appointment for you! You can trust Him today and you can trust Him with eternity, because he has set eternity in your heart.

^“He has made everything beautiful in its time. He has also set eternity in the human heart; yet no one can fathom what God has done from beginning to end.” Ecclesiastes 3:11, NIV

Click here to download today’s worksheet: handout 10_04_2013

Love being in the Word with you,

Cheryl J