Life Lessons: One of Ten – God is Faithful.

February 5, 2025

Welcome to my revised 2025 blog schedule. I’ve been blogging weekly for about 5 ½ years and for 2025 I decided to post monthly. As you can tell from the blog title, this year I chose to write ten articles around life lessons.

I got the idea when I received a blog post from an organization I follow where Thom S. Rainer posted “40 Things I’ve Learned in 40 Years of Ministry.”[1] Rainer posted the list without expanding on any of the things learned. Still, I thought, “Wow, 40 learned things are a lot! I wonder what my list of life lessons would look like?”

First, as I began drafting my list, I concluded I would limit my list to ten things. I wanted my list to be lessons of substance. Plus, there weren’t many more than ten and it just didn’t make sense to have a list of 12 or 13 things.

Next, as I mulled over my items, I thought I would make a list of only those things that I experienced enough to warrant calling them a life lesson.

Then, I had to put them in some order. I didn’t use a formal process of elimination, but I did consider them all as I decided one had to be first.

I knew that learning and putting into practice a life based on God’s faithfulness had to be number one.

So, let’s get into this life lesson that, to me, is so important it had to be number one on my list of all-time life lessons.

Life Lessons: One of Ten – God is Faithful. #hope #joy #writingcommunity Share on X

How do I measure whether God is faithful in my life? Is it based on answered prayers? Is it based on promises from the Bible? How do I know that those promises have been fulfilled in my life? You may be surprised when you read how I came to this life lesson.

I thought back over my life and considered all the many things that have happened to me. I’ve experienced new life through children and grandchildren and death through the loss of my parents, grandparents, other family, and close friends. I’ve experienced the joy of marriage and the sorrow of divorce. When I was younger, I experienced success to a degree in sports through tennis. At the same time, I was either cut from or brought up the rear in more sports than I’d like to talk about.

I thought about prayers. I’ve had prayers answered the way I wanted, and I’ve had prayers answered not the way I wanted. I’ve sometimes felt the Lord lead me in a direction that ultimately resulted in what I viewed as a positive thing for me and my relationship with Him. At other times, I’ve felt Him leading in a direction that did not result in what I thought was a successful venture.

So why then, do I believe my number one life lesson is God is faithful?

It’s because God’s faithfulness and my trusting in that faithfulness is what provides me with all I need to live this life here on earth, while preparing for an eternal life with Him.

I can’t rely on judging my life based on life or death, joy or sorrow, success or failure, prayers answered the way I want or not the way I want, God’s leading resulting in what I view as the right path or God’s leading resulting in not what I consider the right path.

You see, I’m not God.

All those experiences I’ve mentioned, and how I view them, can be influenced one way or another by me based on my emotions, understanding, desires, preferences, or experiences. That’s not trustworthy.

I can rely on God’s faithfulness because He is God.

“For the Lord is good; his steadfast love endures forever, and his faithfulness to all generations.” (Psalm 100:5, ESV)

Dr. Charles Stanley said in one of his sermons that we can rely on God’s faithfulness because of five of God’s attributes. I’ll summarize them this way.

• God is all knowing.
• God is all powerful.
• God is always within reach.
• God is always truthful.
• God never changes.

I wouldn’t want to live a life any other way than knowing I serve a good, good God whose love endures forever, and whose faithfulness is provided to all generations.

I can count on Him to be aware of everything happening to me, close enough at all times to reach me when I need Him and love me with truth that only He knows.

You can have a life in a right relationship with a faithful God, too, by accepting His Son as your Lord and Savior. It’s as simple as choosing to believe Jesus died for your sins and was resurrected to live forever so that on your behalf you will be found blameless before God. And then, putting your belief into action, turn from a life of sin to a life trusting in Him.

Thank you for reading and while I’m sure my remaining nine life lessons will not be as weighty as this one, I pray each will encourage you in your daily walk.

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[1] https://churchanswers.com/blog/40-things-ive-learned-in-40-years-of-ministry/