“Faith is the substance of things hoped for,
the evidence of things not seen.”
Hebrews 11:1
One semester down, and one to go until I complete my freshman year of college. I expected second semester to be an easier transition than the first one. My luggage was still in my dorm room, which meant no heavy lifting, I would be running on a new class schedule so I wasn’t obligated to refresh my memory on any material, and I felt like a master at painful goodbyes. However, adjustment turned out to be a lot harder than I thought it would be.
The classes that I chose turned out to be a lot harder than last semester’s, I had finally gotten a job on campus that called for nine hours of my week, I’d been selected to help coordinate an up and coming program for DC youth, I continued to commit to my extra-curricular activities, and I was terribly home-sick all the time. I was emotionally drained and overworked, and I began to feel the weight of stress on my shoulders. Time seemed to fly by at light speed, because suddenly it was time for my midterms, time to turn in my lesson plans, and time for my competitions. It was a complete slap in my face. I felt like the semester had just begun when in reality it was halfway over.
I had been studying, preparing and practicing nonstop, and even though I should have felt comfortable in the upcoming valuations, I, instead, became mentally overwhelmed. There was so much going on in my brain that I couldn’t even begin to classify everything. Thus, in an attempt to calm my nerves, I did what I always do when I’m under pressure like this; I prayed, fasted and read The Word, laying my burdens down. However, something was different. As time went on, my stress increased, even through my seeking God, and I didn’t understand why. As I tried to figure it out I kept a smile on to fool those around me, but in reality my mental state began to spiral out of control.
One afternoon, while taking a walk with my dad, I started to tell him about everything I had going on but he interrupted me with news of his own. He started to talk about faith. He began to talk about a testimony that had given him a renewed trust in the Lord and that he was going to give everything to Him from then on. I went home that weekend and He told me of a problem that has arisen on his computer that kept him from accessing important documents he needed for work. I looked at how calm he was as he nonchalantly explained the situation to me, and asked “why aren’t you freaking out?” He simply shrugged and said “everything going to be ok. I’m claiming it now, in Jesus name.” Then he took the computer out to try to fix it and in no time it was up and running like it was supposed to. After that display, I immediately knew that if I just gave my negative anticipations over to God He would work everything out in my favor, and yet I couldn’t bring myself to do it. At that point, it was easier said than done so I kept the burdens and struggled to carry them until I eventually broke down, lost in my emotions and buried beneath the rubble of everything I have been trying to build up.
Thinking that a break was what I needed, I took another trip back home, hoping to rejuvenate myself and prepare for the exams, competitions, lesson plans and papers due the following week. That night I attended young people service and received a mind-blowing wake up call. The evangelist’s spoke about believing in God, saying that He has things He wants to do in our lives and yet we continually say to Him “thanks but no thanks”. The message was so powerful and I realized that I had been doing just that. I had been praying, fasting and reading in hopes that God would help me through everything I was going through, He heard my request and had been trying to get me to understand that all I had to do it trust Him, but when it came time to give Him my problems I refused. I was pretty much telling God, “I know you can work this out for me but its ok, I’ve got this, just have my back.”
This really hit home and helped me begin to re-evaluate everything. Suddenly, the scripture above popped in to my head: “Faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.” (Hebrews 11:1) I had to trust that God would work it out even though I couldn’t see the outcome of the situation. I wanted nothing more than to have faith that God would see me through this but, because of everything I had been struggling with, I felt like I had forgotten how to trust, but then I remembered something else the evangelist had said that night: “if you don’t know how to pray, He’ll teach you how to pray.”
When I got home that night, I fell to my knees and with a sincere heart said “Lord, teach me how to trust you.” After that, I vowed to myself and to God to exercise faith. God truly answered my prayer, but let me clarify that God is not a genie. I didn’t ask “to learn how to trust Him” and then *poof*, I did. He worked and is still working with me in increasing my faith. With all of the stressful things I had coming up, I took it as my first opportunity to put my faith before my fears. I kept in mind the scripture that says “Faith without works is dead” (James 2:26) and did everything I was supposed to do. I studied hard for my mid-terms, sent in the lesson plans for the DC program, clocked in to work on time everyday, and stayed dedicated to my extra-curricular activities, all while trusting that God would see me through it all and work It out in my favor. Slowly, my stress level went down and I found myself getting excited in expectation for good grades, approval for my lesson plans, a nice pay, and a win in my competitions.
God wants us to trust Him. He desires for us to go to Him with our problems. He took on our biggest burden; sin, and if He could die for us to set us free from something as binding as that, then I know that no issue is too big or even too small for Him to handle. We must continue to go to God instead on trying to handle them ourselves. Every trial and tribulation is a testament to God’s perfect plan for our lives and to be in His will we have to let Him lead us and guide us but we can’t do that unless we submit to Him, and trust that He’s got our back but it all starts with faith.
#'nuffsaid
