When All Else Fails…

Close your eyes and think about something or someone that makes you feel safe … that makes you feel like you’re okay and you always will be.

Now imagine that whatever or whoever it is fails you.

Your perfect boyfriend or girlfriend hurting you, your spouse dying, your house burning down, your job outsourced, your money drying up from unforeseen medical bills – it’s all possible in this harsh world. Anything on earth you put your hope in can fail you.

We know this if we’re honest with ourselves. We remember the last time we felt like everything was going to be okay because of the new job, and we remember what it felt like when that job made us feel small and inadequate.

We remember the relationship that made us feel like we could never be unhappy again, and we remember the agony we felt when that relationship ended.

Being honest about our misplaced hopes from the past can tempt us to think it’s foolish to hope at all. Why go through experiencing peace just to lose it again? Why inflict on ourselves the anxiety, fear and despair we feel when it all falls apart?

Still, something in us urges us to hope. Some spirit tells us there is something – someone – who will come through for us in each and every circumstance.

The Bible teaches us there is someone that fits this description: the real God, whose faithfulness is the only thing in the universe on which we can safely rely.

But what does that mean? How can we put our hope in someone who is invisible?

The person of Jesus Christ is the answer. The real God came to us as a flesh-and-blood human being. He walked among us. People touched Him and were healed. He taught that no one, not even the religious leaders of His day, could save us from our sinful, fallen world. All would let us down. Our sins were killing us.

But, He said, “I am the Way, the Truth, and the Life.” To follow Him was to know God.

The religious leaders didn’t believe Him. They had Him killed, but not even death could stop Jesus. He rose from the dead to show us there was no power greater than He. While all else will fail us, He will not.

Take a moment to listen to Chip explain what it means to follow Jesus. He is the faithfulness of God in the flesh. To know Him is to have a friend with supernatural power who will never, ever let you down.

To find out more about the faithfulness of God, check out the series The Real God.