To Think About
by Norman Grubb

Shout! For the Lord has given for the Lord has given you the city!"–Joshua 6:16.

Faith is always an involvement, not a sitting on the fence. Faith is always a conquest of uncertainty. But the point is that we come to a conclusion, and do not leave things in the air. Faith can only be as strong as its object: if the chair we seat ourselves on is strong, the faith is strong; if the chair wobbles, the faith wobbles. But to come to a conclusion that such-and-such is the will of God involves our reputation, and that is where we stop short. That is why we do not easily believe; it is the committal of ourselves to something,, and a taking of the consequences. That is why the prayer of request is easy. We then only ask, "If it be Thy will." If it does not happen, well, it was not His will; we are not involved. But if I have said something is His will, and then it fails to materialize, I appear to be the fool or false prophet.

When the decision is settled in my mind, then the final step of faith, of my human involvement, is taken. Faith declares a thing done before it is done. It "calls the things that be not as though they were." This is the crossing of the Rubicon. Prayer puts its toes in the water; faith dives in. The Bible is filled with such incidents in the lives of all the men of faith, as well as in the Savior’s life.
"Shout, for the Lord hath given you the city," said Joshua to his army before Jericho.

–From The Spontaneous You