Faith in Good and Bad Times

This week at our staff meeting, Christ Church Business Manager, Jennifer Stewart, shared this devotion. It spoke deeply to us. I hope it will speak to you too.

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Some of you know that the past two years have been challenging for my family. It started with my dad being diagnosed with dementia, then my mother was diagnosed with cancer, and my husband lost his job and was unemployed for seven months. My mom had surgery at Duke to remove part of her lung, and then to top it off, she had to have surgery on her foot which kept her off her feet for six weeks. We made the decision to place my dad into memory care. Within two weeks he was diagnosed with Lewy Body, an aggressive form of dementia, and passed away two weeks later. And now, we have been told mom’s cancer is back and she has made the decision to not have chemo or radiation.

I’m not sharing this so you’ll feel bad for us. But it’s during times like this that a lot of people might ask God, “why me?” I won’t say I didn’t ask that, but my mom said, “Why not us? Having faith doesn’t mean we are free of hardship and pain. Have faith that God is in control."

If there is a silver lining to these hard times, it is that they can drive you to your knees in prayer, which this has done. They make us more aware of our faith walk and dependency on God. Our faith has given us the peace we needed.

But what about when times are good? What is our faith walk like then? There is a tendency to stray in our faith walk and place less dependence on God during “good” times. I think it has taken the hard times for me to realize that is what I do. Did God allow all these good things in my life to test my faith? Will I be faithful in the good times and bad times? I am certainly going to try.

So, this takes me back to the past two years. They have been hard and continue to be hard at times, but they would have been harder without our faith. Maybe God is using these events for a bigger reason for me. My mom certainly thinks so. I don’t know, but God isn’t asking me to figure this all out. He is asking me to trust that he already has.

Faith doesn’t always take us out of the problem, faith takes us through the problem. Faith doesn’t always take away the pain, faith gives us the ability to handle the pain. Faith doesn’t always take us out of the storm, faith calms us in the midst of the storm. 

Amen.