Blue Elevator Blog

Faith in the Gap

And without faith it is impossible to please God, because anyone who comes to him must believe that he exists and that he rewards those who earnestly seek him.  Hebrews 11:6

Faith

We need to have faith to pray.  We need to have faith to wait.  And, we need to have faith that God will answer.  In this cycle, there are gaps: gaps of time between our circumstance and our celebration, gaps of time between our desire and our deliverance, and gaps of time between our ask and our answer.  We need to have faith in the gaps.

The Bible is full of gaps – not in terms of its validity or sufficiency, but in terms of experience.  Let’s take a look at some examples:

1. Abraham was given a promise (Genesis 12).  There was a 25 year gap from God’s promise until Abraham’s wife, Sarah, became pregnant. Sarah became pregnant and bore a son to Abraham in his old age, at the very time God had promised him.  Genesis 21:2
2. God gave Joseph a dream when he was about 17 years of age.  He was then sold into slavery.  It is believed he spent 11 years in Potiphar’s house and 2 years in prison.  There was a 13 year gap from his dream until he was promoted to Pharaoh’s palace at age 30 (Genesis 37-41).

So, What Gives?

Does God hear us when we pray?  Yes!  Consider this example:

Daniel prayed to The LORD for an answer.  When God’s messenger came to Daniel, he said … “Do not be afraid, Daniel. Since the first day that you set your mind to gain understanding and to humble yourself before your God, your words were heard, and I have come in response to them.”  Daniel 10:12

Daniel’s prayer was heard (“Since the first day …”).  God will hear your prayer.  He won’t miss it.  But, I will submit to you that our constant and continual prayers are measures of faith.  And, the longer we pray for something, the more our faith can grow.  That is, if we don’t lose heart.

Enough Faith to Move Mountains

I used to think that “faith enough to move mountains” (see Mathew 17) was a measure of the depth of my faith.  In other words, the deeper I believed it, the more compelled God would be to answer.  If my prayer wasn’t answered (e.g., immediately and exactly the way I wanted), then I surmised that I must not have had enough faith.

A Breadth of Faith

But, perhaps a depth of faith can be borne out of a breadth of faith.

Let me explain: as we have seen, there can be a gap of time between our ask and our answer.  And, it is precisely in this gap where we can please God by exercising faith: faith to pray, faith to continually pray, and faith to wait on The Lord and believe He will answer us.  By continuing to petition Him, I believe this pleases God and we can eagerly await His answer and His reward.

Consider Luke 18:1-8

18 Then Jesus told his disciples a parable to show them that they should always pray and not give up. ² He said: “In a certain town there was a judge who neither feared God nor cared what people thought. ³ And there was a widow in that town who kept coming to him with the plea, ‘Grant me justice against my adversary.’

⁴ For some time he refused. But finally he said to himself, ‘Even though I don’t fear God or care what people think, ⁵ yet because this widow keeps bothering me, I will see that she gets justice, so that she won’t eventually come and attack me!'”

⁶ And the Lord said, “Listen to what the unjust judge says. ⁷ And will not God bring about justice for his chosen ones, who cry out to him day and night? Will he keep putting them off? ⁸ I tell you, he will see that they get justice, and quickly. However, when the Son of Man comes, will he find faith on the earth?”

Conclusion

In the short span of eight verses, Jesus challenges us to “… pray and not give up.”  He concludes by asking … “when the Son of Man comes, will he find faith on the earth?”  To me, this passage seems to imply that to “pray and not give up” and to “cry out to him day and night” seems to be equated to faith.

Let me encourage you to continue to pray and to not give up.  Here’s to having faith in the gap!