Faith: When I Disagree

A few different thoughts have been going through my head lately. Here are a couple. If anything strikes your fancy and you'd like to hear more, send a comment or let me know.

1) Faith isn't faith if I agree with God. Instead, my faith is tested when I disagree or don't understand and I obey anyway: i.e. Abraham offering Isaac on the altar.

2) My response to Jesus reveals much. While the unclean spirits told Jesus to leave them alone and depart, the crowds sought him even in desolate places.

3) I have been much more aware lately of how much worry is created by fear of being inconvenienced. In the end, I will lose nothing more than comfort, but that seems to be the end goal--and I find it sad that my desire is so fleeting and empty compared to what God has in store through difficulty, inefficiency, and inconvenience.

Here is a list of bullet points re: faith, (I am lacking creativity, time, and prose this morning):

• Abraham rose early the next morning, (He didn't wait. He didn't barter. He got up and went.) Genesis 22:3
• He split wood, took 2 servants and his son and went to the place God told Him (note: He didn't choose a "better" place or one that suited his idea of a good idea. He went exactly where God told Him to go.) Genesis 22:3
• Abraham told the young men, "we will worship and return to you" (He did not think less of God; He trusted God to spare his son because God has promised and delivered Isaac once--he was the promised son. Abraham believed the impossible--"that God is able to raise people even from the dead," Hebrews 12:19.) Genesis 22:5
• Abraham put God's plan into action (He did not waver or change God's revealed plan; he obeyed completely) Genesis 22:6
• Even in the midst of conflicting emotions and circumstances, Abraham believed God would provide ("Where is the lamb?" "God will provide for Himself...my son.") Genesis 22:7-8
• Abraham acts in apparent conflict with the character of God to do the will of God: "Abraham bound his son Isaac and laid him on the altar...stretched out his hand and took the knife to slay his son" Genesis 22:9-10.
• Abraham expected God's intervention. When God called, "Abraham, Abraham!" he said, "Here I am." Genesis 22:11.  (How very different than Adam and Even's response to God's call, "Where are you?" Genesis 3:9)
• Abraham looked for and applied God's solution. (When God intervened, Abraham looked, went up and took the ram, offering it in place of his son. God's solution required action, effort, and sweat-equity, but provision was generously, miraculously supplied) Genesis 22:13.
• Abraham's response was not one of resentment, but worship. (He had seen God in a new, amazing, personal way and he now called God by a a new name, "Jehovah Jireh," the Lord will provide.) Genesis 22:13-14
• Abraham, and all the nations, were blessed as a result of his faith and God's provision. Genesis 22:16-18