A way to keep from having to re-prove the things of God over and over.
Have you ever felt like you were regressing in your beliefs? For
example, have you had occasional thoughts of, "Maybe there is no God"?
You may be just fine in your relationship with HIm for a long time and then,
all of a sudden, because of something that happens you begin to wonder if
you've been tricked, duped, and fooled and that there really is no God.
That
thought may persist for a while until He proves Himself to you and then all
is good again, for a time. Then that thought pops up again later.
It used to happen to me over and over.
Each
time that would happen I would begin to ask God to reveal Himself to me.
I would look for signs that He was real. I would keep searching until
I was satisfied. I got the proof I needed. I did that over and
over!
My
brain doesn't hang on to a lot of things. It hangs on to conclusions
and ideas and drops the facts. I had a hard time in history class in
school. I knew the concepts but they expected me to remember the dates
and names of people and places. It was that same way with my belief in
God being real. I would no longer remember the facts that helped me to
draw the conclusion that God was real.
It
got to a point where I couldn't advance in my spiritual walk because I was
being held back by doubts. I couldn't wholeheartedly witness to a
person when I didn't believe 100% that God was real. I couldn't move
forward to hearing His voice speak to me if I thought there was a chance He
didn't exist.
It
finally occurred to me that I needed to put an end to my doubting. I
could have kept a list of the ways I knew God to be real, but I would
have had to read them again and again because I would have needed to be
ready whenever God brought someone to me that needed me to tell them about
Him. I would have had to keep them with me all the time.
That didn't seem like a good solution.
I
knew it was my brain that had the problem. I also knew that satan
needed to find ways to keep Christians from being effective. He would
certainly try to put thoughts doubting God into my mind. I needed to
do something to fill in the holes that he was using to enter into my brain.
"Above
all, taking the shield of faith, wherewith ye shall be able to quench all
the fiery darts of the wicked."
Ephesians 6:16
So,
I needed to figure out a way to convince my brain that it didn't need to
keep coming up with new facts that proved God existed. Like the
above scripture says I needed the shield of faith to quench those fiery
darts.
What
is faith? A few of the definitions from the dictionary are:
Confident belief in the truth, value, or trustworthiness of a person, idea,
or thing.
Belief that does not rest on logical proof or material evidence.
A
definition from the Bible is:
"Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things
not seen."
Hebrews 1:1
I
realized that what I had to do was to fix it once and for all so I wouldn't
go backwards past a certain milestone. I did a final examination
looking for proof that God was real. I gathered the evidence and,
while it was still fresh in my mind, I made a decision. I examined the
evidence I had gathered and decided that it was very good and rock solid
evidence. Then I made a kind of mental
memorial altar. I took the facts I had gathered and they were the stones.
I piled them on top of each other like in the Old Testament when they would make a pile of
stones where something memorable happened. They would name the place after
what happened. Then, each time they came back by that pile of stones they would
remember what had happened there. (I put examples of those scriptures
at the end of this article.)
So, I did that in my mind. I focused on the fact that I had determined it to be
truth that God is real. I guess I named that altar "God is Real!" Then I never re-visited that
question. When a doubt would poke at my mind I knew it was the enemy trying
to give me grief. I would push it away without even having to think about
it. I knew that I knew that I knew God was real. I chose to
never prove that fact again.
Was it easy at first? No. My logical mind wanted to prove it all
over again just to be sure. I had to mentally view that memorial altar
in my mind and just remember the conclusion I had drawn rather than trying
in vain to remember how I came to that conclusion.
That
was my shield of faith. I didn't have to examine the shield any more
to see if it was good enough. I just had to hold it up so I could move
on. I've done that same thing again with other spiritual issues.
I found that, as I was able to get past proving those things over and over,
I could move on to the next step.
There have been many times when that process has come in very handy.
Off and on I go through desert seasons when I feel like I can't hear God's
voice and when I feel like He isn't guiding me. I never go farther
back than the previous mental memorial altar. I just lean against it
in blind faith knowing that it is there and that it is there with purpose
and for a good reason.
MEMORIAL ALTARS
IN THE BIBLE
"And Joshua said unto them, Pass over before the ark of the LORD your God
into the midst of Jordan, and take ye up every man of you a stone upon his
shoulder, according unto the number of the tribes of the children of Israel:
that this may be a sign among you, that when your children ask their fathers
in time to come, saying, What mean ye by these stones?
Then ye shall answer them, That the waters of Jordan were cut off before the
ark of the covenant of the LORD; when it passed over Jordan, the waters of
Jordan were cut off: and these stones shall be for a memorial unto the
children of Israel for ever.
And the children of Israel did so as Joshua commanded, and took up twelve
stones out of the midst of Jordan, as the LORD spake unto Joshua, according
to the number of the tribes of the children of Israel, and carried them over
with them unto the place where they lodged, and laid them down there.
And Joshua set up twelve stones in the midst of Jordan, in the place where
the feet of the priests which bare the ark of the covenant stood: and they
are there unto this day."
Joshua 4:5-9
"So Jacob came to Luz, which is in the land of Canaan, that is, Bethel, he
and all the people that were with him. And he built there an
altar, and called the place El-beth-el*: because there God appeared unto
him, when he fled from the face of his brother."
Genesis 35:6-7
"And
Moses built an altar, and called the name of it Jehovah-nissi**: for he
said, Because the LORD hath sworn that the LORD will have war with Amalek
from generation to generation."
Exodus 17:15-16
*God of Bethel (Bethel means House of God)
**God My Banner