Challenging Times

On my desk I have a little plaque that says:”Before you go to bed, give your troubles to God”. Everyone who read it said that they liked it.

Faith comes natural to all people. Otherwise, we wouldn’t step onto a plane. How do we know that the pilot is properly trained to fly the plane? How do we know that all parts of the plane are in working order? As a passenger I must believe that he knows what he is doing.

The question is where we invest our natural faith. Do we have faith in other people? Do we have faith in our own abilities? Or do we have faith in G-d?

Some people think the Bible is just a fairytale story. In Israel I am wondering how unbelievers explain the existence of all those biblical towns that have been there for thousands of years.

Today we seem to live in an age of anxiety, as the scenario the Bible predicted for the end times is being fulfilled before our eyes. Our faith is challenged, because the world doesn’t seem to make sense the way we thought it did. Our hearts become fearful. We look at things that happen around us with our natural eyes - the human viewpoint. Despair is rising within us.

Everyone has troubles. We face problems, affliction, suffering, and hardship. We need strength, endurance, and patience.

This is why we need to know how to trust in G-d's promises.

Only when we see the things that happen around us through our spiritual eyes - from His divine viewpoint - can we experience inner peace and freedom from worry and anxiety.

How can we know his promises? Well, they are found in the Bible. – The more we study the scriptures, the more we increase our knowledge base about G-d and that causes our faith to grow. Since God is unchangeable, He will continue to be mindful of us in the future as He has been in the past. - God never takes back or changes His promises. It's in the Bible, (Psalm 89:34), "I will not break my covenant or change what my lips have spoken."

When reading our newspapers and watching television here in Israel it is easy to lose faith and see the miracle of modern Israel about to melt away. But the newspapers and television cannot and will not portray the reality of Jewish faith.

It was impossible to even dream that a Jewish State could be reborn in 1948. It was a logical certainty that the June war of 1967 would see the Jewish State destroyed. Today it looks even worse; rockets are pointed at Israel from every surrounding state.

But G-d promised: “I will restore the fortunes of my people Israel; they will rebuild and inhabit the ruined cities; they will plant vineyards and drink their vine, cultivate gardens and eat their fruit. I will plant them on their own soil, no more to be uprooted from their land, which I gave them.” (Amos 9:15)

The living G-d of Creation gave us a precious tool to enable us to live a good, happy and fulfilling life on this earth. Faith in G-d is our most powerful weapon.