Faithfulness

Faithfulness is not a common word these days. When I started to research and look into this, a chart popped up that really caught my eye. It showed the usage of the word faithfulness over time. It displayed that in the early 1800s it was a common word, but has steadily declined since the 1900s with a small uptick around the 1980s. Largely, this word is not used much, so much so that many people are not familiar with the definition. Being faithful means being loyal, constant, devoted, dedicated, trustworthy, dependable. I think we all can agree that being faithful is a positive trait that we all should work towards. The question we are asking is: are you being faithful to God?

I believe it is hard to be a faithful follower of Christ in America because the gospel has been weakened down which means this topic is not discussed often. Overall, I believe our general sense of comfort in America has ruined us. We have so much at our fingertips that we have grown weak and lazy. We have every excuse in the book lined up to help keep us comfortable  and only a major move of God in our lives is going to get us to budge. As christians, we should not be pursuing comfort. But comfort is such a common idol in America that it has become the norm, it has become accepted, and excuses are made for it often. If you are struggling believing this, just go through the gospels and read Jesus words. They should pierce your heart on this topic.  I know they do mine.

Ok, but what does this have to do with faithfulness? I believe our laziness and comfort have taken the faithfulness out of us. God needs people fully surrendered to Him so He can work through us and do awesome things on the earth. He likes to partner with us and involve His people in things, why do you think we are called to intimacy with Him? But if we are all comfortable and not willing to get our hands dirty, then He cannot use us. We are not loyal, we are not steadfast, we are not giving firm support and allegiance to God. We are only available when it is convenient and fits in our box of how we expect God to act. Which basically means not available at all.

I fully believe this time for the American church is over though. The time when we can simply go to church once a month and then remain too busy to walk a life set apart the rest of the time. The time when we can use excuses to sit on the sidelines. That time is up. It is time for us to rise up. It is time for us to pick up our bibles, to fill ourselves with Gods truth, to act on our faith, to show the world that Jesus is truly life changing and to do what we are called to do - to love and spread the gospel. 

We understand and expect Gods faithfulness in our lives. And we should be doing what we can on our part to be faithful back to Him. So what does this look like for us wives and moms? I believe the best place to start is thankfulness. 

Have you noticed the weird stigma in motherhood? It is like it is expected for us to be struggling and complaining. When we see friends it is expected for us to have complaints about our husband and kids and then all the moms say oh yeah, me too, can you believe my husband did this?! And it seems like you get mocked if you don't have enough to complain about! Have you ever experienced this? The whole I cant wait till its 4 pm so I can have wine, but what the heck  i will go ahead and have some for lunch because how am i expected to survive without wine, motto? Yeah, that is prevalent in motherhood in America and us as believers need to purposefully set ourselves apart from that. We need to show the world that is not how motherhood should be.

If that is how we treat our families, then we are not being faithful with what God has entrusted to us. Have you ever thought of it like that? God has entrusted your husband and kids to you. When He planned us all, He intricately planned your family and said yes, she is the best wife for him and she will be a great mom for these kids. Is that not wild?! I think it is important to remind ourselves of this often, because this different viewpoint helps us understand how thankful we should be! And I really do believe the way of the family tends to follow the mom. So if we are joyful, thankful and enjoying life then our family is likely to follow. If we are upset, bitter and complaining, our family is likely to follow. 

The next thing we need to be doing to be faithful to God is following His lead. We need to prioritize our relationship with Him, tune our ears to His voice, so we can follow Him. If He is asking us to do something and we are not doing it, that is disobedience. If we are hesitating that is disobedience as well. No condemnation here, but if this is common in our relationship with Him we need to repent and start saying yes! We need to move on from being afraid of following God, He is a good Father! Why are we so afraid? Will He push us outside our comfort zone? Yes, but while He is holding our hand! He never leaves our side. He never asks us to do something we are not ready for. He never leaves us unprepared for an assignment. And I am a firm believer that walking in His plans, saying yes, and being where He wants you to be is the safest place you can be!

One of our fundamental beliefs as christians is the goodness of God, and we need to remember this. If we believe that God is so good and loving to send His son, Jesus, to die for us, then why do we turn around and get scared to go all in saying yes to Him? He is a good Father! He is love. He didn’t just create love, He is love! So let’s get it out of our minds that following Him 100 percent is scary. Let’s just say yes and never look back. If we have hesitancy in our hearts then we cannot be the faithful followers that He needs. I encourage you to sit with Jesus about this. Talk to Him about your hesitancy, and work through it with Him. Let Him take a hold of your hand and walk you through the process of letting go and saying yes. 

Ladies, God is good. God is love. And He needs faithful people who are intimate with Him and fully surrendered for Him to work through on the earth. You don’t need any special abilities. You simply need an open heart and be willing to learn. So, can He trust you? Can He come to you with assignments? Maybe, just maybe, you were born for such a time as this!