The Importance of Faithfulness

‘I do not pray for success. I pray for faithfulness.” (Mother Theresa)

What does this mean?
It means following hard after God; having radical loyalty, and covenantal commitment to God, first, above all other relationships and commitments. It means remaining true to Gods word, our own word, and persevering in trials or storms.  Christian faithfulness is, at its heart, about our commitment to accept, believe in and commit to the God of the Bible as the one true God, and attempt to live out his commandments (the Jesus Lifestyle).
It means pursuing His plan and purpose with intentionality, and investing our time, talents and resources to that journey.  It means following his path with unshakable and unbreakable stick-to-it-iveness, even when it counter-cultural to do so.  
It means:
Being faithful to God’s calling
Being faithful to God’s message
Being faithful to God’s leading in your life
And trusting that God is faithful in all things

Christianity itself is based first on faith that God is, and then, that through Christ Jesus we can be forgiven, made righteous, and redeemed.  Faithfulness is essential to the Christian life, it is named as a fruit of the Spirt by Paul (Gal 5:22) and credited as righteousness to Abram (Gen15:6, Rom 4:22).  Jesus puts faithfulness alongside justice and mercy and ‘the more important matters of the law’ (Matthew 23:23)

The whole of the Bible calls us to a radical lifestyle and a radical faithfulness which is totally counter-cultural.  It changes our perspective of what success looks like, and shifts our vision and focus to one driven by Kingdom goals.  Under our own strength the inner transformation is not possible; the lifestyle and the standards are impossible; but ‘what is impossible for mankind, is made possible with God’ (Luke 18:27).  

So let’s be like Mother Theresa and ask God to grant us faithfulness; then radically pursue it! 

Blessings,

Jen