Thesis 65- We must believe He will never let us go.
Fear can be a potent motivator, or conversely, a great de-motivator. Many of us have a deep fear of change. However disappointed we may be in ourselves, in our circumstances, in our walk with the Lord, in our church, we can always imagine it getting worse. We end up paralyzed, set in our ways, stuck.
When I find myself challenged in terms of my biblical understanding of something I find it important to distinguish between changing my mind about what the Bible teaches and changing my mind about the Bible. We all ought to be open to the reality that we might misunderstand the Bible. We all ought to be confident, on the other hand, that the Bible is right in all that it teaches. A disagreement about the meaning of a text between two people who share a commitment to the authority of the text means no one is slipping away from the Bible.
In the same way, when we seek Reformation, in our own lives, in the lives of our family, in the church itself, we aren’t letting go of our lives, our families or the church itself. How much less are we letting go of the living God? “We’ve been doing this wrong” doesn’t mean, “so God has rejected us.” It may well mean, “And our loving Father is gently correcting us, because He loves us.”
When Luther stood on the Word of God, when he could do no other, he understood this point. He was defying the power and authority of the whole of the western church. He was securely resting in the power and authority of the God of heaven and earth, and His Word. He not only, however, was securely resting there, he knew he was securely resting there. The first Reformation came because of a courage resting on a faith in the absolute trustworthiness of God.
Like the rest of us, Luther was prone to feeling God’s distance, if not absence. It happens to all of us. That we feel His absence, however, is no evidence whatever that we are experiencing His absence. In fact, we have His Word that such can never be. He has told us He will never leave us nor forsake us (Hebrews 13: 5). He has promised that He is with us, even unto the end of the age (Matthew 28:20). He has assured us that nothing can take us from His hand (John 10:28).
It is not the bold who go forth and do great things for the kingdom, for they depend upon their own strength. Rather it is those who embrace the gospel truth we learned as little children, “We are weak but He is strong.” It is not just those who come as little children who see the kingdom, who enter the kingdom, but who make manifest the invisible kingdom to the watching world. We are used for Reformation as we remember that He has you and me brother, in His hands.