Do you have people in your life who seem to see the best in every situation? If you don’t, you need them!
My daddy is one of the most optimistic people I know. Every time I call, I sense the smile in his voice as I ask how his day is going. Daddy answers, “Every day is a good day! Some are just a little bit better than others!” No matter what has tried his soul, whether serious sickness or even the death of his precious wife, Daddy somehow recognizes things could be worse. For real!
This high-octane optimism drives the pessimist nuts! It even rubs the realist the wrong way at times. But when you’re fighting your way out of a difficult situation, you need someone who believes it can get better despite what you see.
Some folks would deem Abraham, the father of our faith, an optimist. What else could account for his ability to believe for the best when not even a smidgen of that reality had come into view?
God promised a decrepit old man he would become a father to multitudes, when he and his barren wife (INFERTILE!) had never been able to conceive even one child in their youth!
Think about it. God promised them that they would soon be changing baby diapers in a season when they actually wore diapers. (Depends® sounds kinder, doesn’t it?)
Abraham’s wife, Sarah, found it impossible to conceive a child long before menopause. Now age 90 with a hundred-year-old husband . . . the thought was laughable! In fact, that’s precisely what Sarah did when she caught wind of this nonsense. She laughed! (Cackled, really.)
Yet despite endless waiting, despite obstacles that heightened the impossibility of this absurdity…Abraham believed!
The Scriptures say, “AGAINST ALL ODDS, when it looked hopeless, Abraham believed the Promise and expected God to fulfill it. He took God at His Word. He never stopped believing God’s Promise, for he was made strong in his Faith. And because he was mighty in Faith and convinced that God had all the Power needed to fulfill His Promises, Abraham glorified God and became the father of many nations.” (Romans 4:18; 20-21 tPt)
Folks, steadfast belief in spite of every impossibility is so much more than optimism; it’s unadulterated Faith! Even optimism has an expiration date. The most positive-thinking person will hit a limit and falter. But when we feed our Faith in the God who cannot lie, we can keep believing no matter how many times we get knocked down.
Are you getting this?! There was zero reason to believe God could do this through them. None! Yet Abraham was “…FULLY CONVINCED that what God had promised, He was also able to do!” (4:21 NET)
This is the best definition of Faith out there! Did God say it? Can God pull off what He said? Faith remains FULLY CONVINCED!
Friends and family surrounding Abraham surely reminded him of all the reasons he should move on and forget this pipe dream, probably rehearsed with meticulous detail why this absurdity could never happen. Yet, Abraham chose to rehearse the Promise of God more emphatically than all the skepticism surrounding him.
Friends, we must do this, too! Some people will feel obligated to remind you of all the reasons “it” can never work. Many of them love you deeply. But they can’t see what you see. They can’t hear what you hear. Their reference point resides in the natural; but your reference point dwells in the supernatural!
What impossibility faces you today? What does God’s Word say about it? In spite of what stands in your way, stand on that Word and rehearse it over and again until you are “…FULLY CONVINCED that what God has promised, He is also able to do!”
