I’ve gone to a lot of youth group nights over the years. Not many of them stick out because they all sort of run together. One night in particular, though, stands out from the rest.
One night in my early years doing youth ministry, one of our leaders, Marc, was teaching. As part of his message, Marc sang “Faithfully” by Journey. No one is going to confuse Marc with Freddie Mercury, but Marc definitely committed to the song. And even after all of these years, I remember that God wants us to be faithful to him because Marc did some awesome karaoke.
Obviously I knew that God wanted us to be faithful before I heard Marc do his best Steve Perry impersonation, and I’ve learned that lesson many times since then. However, it’s a lesson that we can never learn enough. Because no matter how many times we hear that God wants us to be faithful to him, we still end up being unfaithful.
This week at camp we’ve been looking at the life of Peter and what it means to be faithful.
What does it mean to be faithful when God calls us?
What does it mean to be faithful when God gives us a hard truth?
What does it mean to be faithful in the midst of a storm?
What does it mean to be faithful in our normal, everyday lives?
What does it mean to be faithful when we’ve walked away from God?
Every day is an opportunity to be faithful to God, yet every day I seemingly miss that opportunity. Instead of being faithful to God, instead of pursuing him wholeheartedly, I get lazy or I give into temptation. Like Peter I have my moments of faithfulness, but those are shortly followed by moments of unfaithfulness.
Like journeying through a wall, though, being faithful isn’t just a matter of gritting my teeth and trying harder. Being faithful is about turning to the one to whom I’m trying to be faithful. God is the object of my faithfulness but also the one who enables me to be faithful. Apart from God I cannot be faithful to God. That seems a little counterintuitive but it is our reality. God wants us to be faithful to him and, if we turn to him, he will help us be faithful to him.
If we want to be faithful to God when he calls us, then we need to turn and listen to his voice.
If we want to be faithful to God when he gives us a hard truth, then we need to turn to him even when we don’t fully understand.
If we want to be faithful to God in the midst of the storm, then we need to turn to him and take his hand.
If we want to be faithful to God in our normal, everyday lives, then we need to turn to him in every morning and commit our days to him.
If we want to be faithful to God when we’ve walked away, then we need to stop, turn around and return to him.
God wants us to be faithful to him and he enables us to be faithful to him. That is an amazing truth because, without God, we wouldn’t have any hope. But with God, we can be as faithful, if not more, than the truck driver in the song “Faithfully.”
What helps you be faithful to God?
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