Will We?

June 26

“By faith Abraham obeyed when he was called to go out to the place which he would receive as an inheritance. And he went out, not knowing where he was going,” Hebrews 11:8.

Abraham was not so much a courageous man but an obedient man. Yes, it takes courage to leave all you know and venture forth into the unknown, but more than courage, it takes a true surrender to the will of the God you love. Just as Abraham has evidenced the surrender of His will to the will of the Holy One, so must we.

Another Biblical figure who allowed his will, his life to be swallowed into the will of God was Job. Job was the great grandson of Nahor, Abraham's brother. His maternal grandfather was Nahor's son, Uz the Elder. Like Abraham, Job was a man of great wealth and respect in his community.

Where Abraham was required by God to leave all the trappings of his prosperity behind and go forth into a new life away from his family, his great-grandnephew, Job, was required to witness the loss of all he possessed—including his children. As Abraham followed the Lord in faith to the destination he did not know, so Job followed the Lord in faith into a realm of sorrow and loss that he had never before experienced.

Neither man understood the reason for his transition from the familiar to the unknown, but both of them knew and trusted the God who sent them forth. The Lord expects no less from His people today.

The young couple had an employment opportunity before them. The wife was quite resistant to the notion of her husband being involved in the work because it entailed extensive travel into a country that is quite hostile to people of faith in Christ. When they attended church that weekend, there was a message in tongues and the interpretation was, “You can go anywhere in the world and I will be with you and I will return you home safely.” They went.

When the God of Heaven and Earth speaks into your life, whatever He calls you to do, whatever He calls you to leave behind, you must go forth. To do otherwise is to rob yourself of the joy of doing His will, to rob yourself of the satisfaction of obeying Him.

On a high level of devotion to Jesus, we find Meriam Ibrahim, the young woman who has been chained with her children in a Sudanese dungeon because she refuses to recant her faith in Jesus Christ. With the scrutiny of the world and great pressure upon them, the Sudanese have reversed her death sentence and set her free—only to detain her again as she was attempting to board a plane out of Sudan.

This courageous daughter of the Living God is possessed of a faith few of us have ever been or will ever be called upon to evidence, but if we were, would we go forth even into the pit of hell in faith and in love for the One who died to redeem us as she has done?

We who sit in the comfort of our air-conditioned churches, who think we have made great sacrifices when we have deposited our offering into the collection basket cannot begin to fathom the ordeal our brothers in faith endure daily because of their devotion to Christ in places like Sudan and Nigeria and Rwanda.

We have not seen our neighbors hacked to death by demons in human bodies who hate us just because we love Jesus. But daily they go forth into the hostile world around them, shielded only by their confidence that the One who has called them will keep them.

They say like Job, “Though He slay me, yet will I trust Him,” Job 13:15. They venture into each new day as “living epistles, read of all men,” II Corinthians 3:2, that boldly proclaim their faith in Jesus before the eyes of evil.

Will we pray for these our brothers who are on the front lines of the battle between good and evil? Will we pray for them as they go forth into the fray that demands that they fight the evil one in the power of their faith in Christ? Will we go forth if our Savior calls us from our church pew to the advance contingent of His Army? Will we?