Against All Hope

Against hope Abraham believed in hope with the result that he became the father of many nations according to the pronouncement, “so will your descendants be.” Without being weak in faith, he considered his own body as dead (because he was about one hundred years old) and the deadness of Sarah’s womb. — Rom 4:18-19

 

We shall never forget a remark that George Mueller once made to a gentleman who had asked him the best way to have strong faith.

 

“The only way,” replied the patriarch of faith, “to learn strong faith is to endure great trials. I have learned my faith by standing firm amid severe testings.” This is very true. The time to trust is when all else fails.

 

Dear one, you scarcely realize the value of your present opportunity; if you are passing through great afflictions you are in the very soul of the strongest faith, and if you will only let go, He will teach you in these hours the mightiest hold upon His throne which you can ever know.

 

“Be not afraid, only believe.” And if you are afraid, just look up and say, “What time I am afraid I will trust in thee,” and you will yet thank God for the school of sorrow which was to you the school of faith.
--A. B. Simpson

 

“Great faith must have great trials.”

 

“God’s greatest gifts come through travail. Whether we look into the spiritual or temporal sphere, can we discover anything, any great reform, any beneficent discovery, any soul-awakening revival, which did not come through the toils and tears, the vigils and blood-shedding of men and women whose sufferings were the pangs of its birth? If the temple of God is raised, David must bear sore afflictions; if the Gospel of the grace of God is to be disentangled from Jewish tradition, Paul’s life must be one long agony.”

 

“Take heart, O weary, burdened one, bowed down 

Beneath thy cross;

Remember that thy greatest gain may come 

Through greatest loss.

Thy life is nobler for a sacrifice, 

And more divine.

Acres of bloom are crushed to make a drop 

Of perfume fine.

 

“Because of storms that lash the ocean waves, 

The waters there

Keep purer than if the heavens o’erhead 

Were always fair.

The brightest banner of the skies floats not 

At noonday warm;

The rainbow traileth after thunder-clouds, 

And after storm.”

~L. B. Cowman~