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07
Nov 2011

Walking In Faith On A Four-Lane Road

The most interesting faith moment came to me today while driving to pick up my daughter from school. You see, I was driving along on a four-lane section of a small town and when I glanced up there was a very large man walking straight down my lane towards me! I couldn’t believe my eyes for a moment. Cars were all around and here was a man taking what seemed like a stroll right down the inside lane. My lane! As I slowed down on my approach toward the man he didn’t even look over his shoulder when he casually moved into the center turning lane.

At first I was appalled by the audacity the man had as if he was more important and all these huge cars and trucks should just clear the way for him. You see, around the area that I live people constantly stand in the middle of the road or loiter on the sides of the roads. Usually it is on the side roads that they do this. The man walking straight for me while I was driving made me stop and think that it must take some kind of blind faith to just casually stroll down the road the way he was doing today. I could imagine that in his mind was the lack of thought that someone might hit him or that he could be hurt. When I remembered all of the others that stand in the road I suspected they also had some kind of blind faith in drivers that I just cannot comprehend.

And then it struck me…. Wow! What faith! If I could only have that type of faith when walking through life! Jesus is always with me, this I have no doubt, but to walk among the obstacles of life in the same manner that that man could walk among the cars and trucks today, now that would be truly awesome! To not look over my shoulder when I should enter the turning lane but just simply take that step forward on nothing but faith that God will protect me.

Now don’t get me wrong, I do think that the man today was acting foolishly and was in serious risk of getting hit, but just try to think of that kind of faith applied to our walk with Christ. We could all learn a valuable lesson in the act of a foolish mans stroll if we just think about it in terms of faith. Do you have that kind of faith? I pray that my faith will continue to grow so that I can walk with Christ through life just like the man walking down the four-lane was today. No thoughts of worry, no thoughts of fear, but just putting one foot in front of the other no matter what obstacles lie before me because I know Christ is with me and will see me through life’s traffic jams.

Thank you for allowing me to share this time with you. I pray that you have found some value in this post and will click on the links below to share this message.

In His Service,

The Faithful Geek

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28
Sep 2011

Reduce Stress Through Faithfulness

So many people run into challenges and problems in their lives that they become overwhelmed and downtrodden. A death of a loved one, a recent injury, loss of a job, or a multitude of even smaller problems all contribute to our stress level and our outlook on life. The magnitude of the situation usually does not matter. The loss of a pet can be just as devastating to some as the loss of a job or the loss of a husband or wife to others. We are also often influenced by the stress of others. By that I mean that we are empathetic to others problems and thereby take their stress upon ourselves in the form of worry.

Many times we end up reacting to stress by blaming others, ourselves or even God or the Devil. Pushing the blame off on someone or something else is often a producer of more stress instead of making us feel better. Sure, blaming someone make make us feel better temporarily, but once we realize that the blame is put out falsely then we often carry the burden of guilt of those false accusations.

So, how do we alleviate stress? There are many, tons even, of self-help gurus out there willing to tell you how to alleviate stress by taking long walks, reading a book, getting plenty of rest, the list goes on. And while these things can be helpful they don’t address a person’s inner core beliefs which affect how certain situations can bring on stress in the first place. You see, most of us are affected by challenges or problems by the way we view them. For instance, one person may look at the loss of a job as devastating and think there is no hope for their future which is a very stressful situation for them. On the other hand, a second person may look at losing a job as an opportunity to find a better job or change careers and this creates less stress for them than the first person.

This is where faithfulness comes in to play. Faithfulness or the degree of our faith can affect the way we perceive adverse situations. Different types of faithfulness have different types of effects on stress, however today I will be addressing Christian faith in the term faithfulness. In the Christian faith we believe not only that Christ died for our sins, and that we will have everlasting life through faith in Him, but we also believe that Christ is always with us. Knowing that Christ is with us everywhere we go, day in and day out, gives us the knowledge that we are not alone. We also know that Christ said that He will see us through the storms (problems), but please remember that He never said that he would prevent the storms.

Now if we understand that we are not alone, and that Christ will see us through the storm, then this in turn gives us hope that we will be alright. We can depend on Christ as our support group to help us deal with stress. We can talk to Him through prayer, we can even scream out our frustrations to Him. We can live with the knowledge that God will provide what we need. This is not to say that He will provide what we want. That is a big difference. In knowing that He will provide what we need it takes the edge off of the stress level we may be experiencing.

In order to reduce stress we must first and foremost listen to what God is trying to tell us. We must keep working to improve our current situation, but in a manner that we are being Christ-like. And we must have the type of faithfulness to know that no matter what we are experiencing that we will make it through. The sun will still rise in the morning. This type of faithfulness can reduce stress with the knowledge that Christ knows our pain, He knows what is best for us, and He is always there for us to turn to.

Reduce your stress through faithfulness today. Know that God loves you and even though you are experiencing what seems like too much to handle, you can handle it, you can make it through and there is always God’s silver-lining. Start counting all of the blessings you do have in your life and if you honestly count them, you will begin to see that God does take care of us.

I hope you enjoyed today’s post. Please share the knowledge by clicking on the links below. I pray that you (yes you!) experience a day of peace and blessings.

In His Service,

The Faithful Geek

 

Category: Day-To-Day, Faith, Life Lessons  Tags: , , , , , , , ,  One Comment