The Radiant Face of Faith

                                  
“Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall trouble or hardship or persecution or famine or nakedness or danger or sword?” Romans 8:35

“Trust in the Lord with all your heart. And lean not on your own understanding.”Proverbs 3:5

“My God, I have never thanked Thee for my thorn. I have thanked Thee for my roses, but not once for my thorn. Teach me the value of my thorn,” prayed the blind Scottish preacher George Matheson.

“If I had not lost my sight, I could never have written all the hymns God gave me” said Fanny Crosby, who wrote some of the best loved hymns of all time, including ‘Blessed Assurance’, ‘Blessed Redeemer’ and ‘To God Be the Glory!’

From the depth of a Nazi concentration camp, Corrie Ten Boom wrote, “No matter how deep our darkness is. He is deeper still.”

Who would have ever imagined for a poor cobbler like William Carey, with no formal education in theology, to take the gospel to India and get the Bible translated into forty different Indian languages?
Being poorly funded and unable to speak the native language, Carey and his family ended up living in a house amidst matted jungle swarmed with snakes and tigers. Disease in the new land caused his kids Ann, Lucy and Peter (all under age five) to die, and their loss plunged his wife into depression and to insanity.

Years later, when fire devoured his years of translation work in the printing press, Carey responded with tears brimming his eyes, “ How unsearchable are the ways of the Lord!...The Lord has laid me low that I may look more simply to Him.”

In such scenario, I would have pulled out my hair to baldness and drowned myself in the well of self-pity. But, Carey, amazed by God’s unique ways, wrote to his son William, “All our hopes must depend on the power and faithfulness of God. All His promises were made with a full intention that they should be fulfilled , and it’s our duty to live by faith, and to walk by faith.”

More than anything, what awed me the most was what Carey told the Scottish missionary Alexander Duff, on his death bed, when Duff went to visit him., “ Mr. Duff, you have been speaking about Dr.Carey….Dr.Carey …Dr.Carey. When I’m gone, say nothing about Dr. Carey—speak about Dr. Carey’s Savior.”

Today, in our success and recognition craving culture, I wonder how many of us would honestly radiate such humility and unshakable faith. Don’t we all want to stand in ovation before these giants of faith?

What was their secret? What made them so strong that neither hunger nor hardship nor blindness could separate them from God?

If we could read through their lives, we’d find a common link running underneath. They all had a kingdom perspective. Their eyes were focused on God, and not on their circumstances. They were aware of problems and roadblocks in their path, because Christ had already warned them about it.

“In this world, you will have trouble. But, take heart! I have overcome the world.” John 16: 33b
They sought God for who He is, and not for what they could get from Him. They must have valued their quiet and quality time with God, more than the quantity time they spent in the name of service. Because they delighted in the Lord, whatever they did became a worship unto God.

Experiences have taught me to focus on the One, who answers prayers, rather than on the answers alone. It doesn’t matter whether my requests are granted, delayed or denied, my prime purpose of praying should be to know the heart of God and to dwell in His presence in utter adoration.

In Oswald Chambers’ words, “We are not here to prove that God answers prayer, but to be living trophies of God’s grace.”***