Day Thirty-five

“And without faith it is impossible to please God.” (Heb. 11:6)

Scripture Reading: Hebrews 11:1–6

Have you ever wondered why you seem to get one faith walk—times when you must walk by faith rather than by sight—behind you just in time to begin another? Because “without faith it is impossible to please God!”

Revelation 4:11 proclaims our Creator’s purpose, “Thou hast created all things, and for thy pleasure they are and were created” (kjv). We were created for our Creator’s pleasure, and the building of our faith gives Him pleasure.

If you are really candid, you may be thinking: Why should the point of life be God’s pleasure? What kind of egotistical deity is He? God’s motive is not selfish. Take another look at Hebrews 11:6. He wants to reward those who exercise faith—those who “earnestly seek Him” even when they cannot “see” Him. God’s pleasure is to bless and reward His children and to lift them to spiritual heights they’ve never imagined. He wants to prepare us for the place in which He is accumulating treasures in our behalf as we walk victoriously in faith.

Hebrews 11:1 tells us, “Now faith is being sure of what we hope for and certain of what we do not see.” Our greatest reality—in other words that which is most “real”—is that which cannot be seen with human eyes. Think about it. How do your circumstances or your present challenges “look” to you right now? Based only on the evidences surrounding your deepest concern, how might you assume things are going to work out?

Hebrews 11 reminds us that the most influential factors determining outcome in the life of believers are those we cannot see. Your greatest reality in your greatest difficulty is an invisible, all-powerful God. Learn to look at your faith walks from His point of view: He is directing or allowing circumstances for the sheer purpose of rewarding you. The test is whether or not you’ll seek His invisible face. The reward is beyond your comprehension. Why so many faith walks? Because He has so much to give! And, frankly, so little time. Your walk in the fleeting “here and now” has colossal influence over His reward in your “there and forever.”

To give to you is God’s greatest pleasure, but He does “not give to you as the world gives” (John 14:27). Every reward this world can offer is here on earth “where moth and rust destroy, and where thieves break in and steal” (Matt. 6:20). God, however, is interested in quality. Every reward He has for you carries an eternal lifetime guarantee. One day the visible will be invisible and the unseen seen—instantly.

Look around you for a moment. Everything you see will disintegrate. “Behold, I am coming soon! My reward is with me” (Rev. 22:12). That’s reality. This life is only a vapor.