God promises all the strength we need, at the time we need it. He never fails and never fades in His ability and power. All power belongs to Him, there is no one greater, no other authority in heaven or on earth. His majesty fills the heavens
and in the earth we see the outworking of that glory in everything He has made.

Christians know that power when they first trust in Christ, but that is only the beginning.

As the Christian walks through life, there are many troubles, trials and temptations. They are put in our lives by our loving God. As we learn to conquer these things, so our faith grows and we gain the strength that comes with faith. We rely less and less on others and ourselves, and deliberately put all our needs on Him.

Throughout our lives the pressures increase and we need increased faith to overcome them. This is the walk of the Christian with the Lord Jesus, their closest and best known friend.

We can notice a pattern… As we grapple with the troubles, our faith grows so that we can face the next trials and overcome in faith. As I walk by faith, so God encourages me to walk more in His strength. As life goes on, so the walk of faith goes on and becomes mature.

A problem can arise in my mind…
I realise that the difficulties get more difficult, so maybe if I don’t fight so hard, I won’t have to face greater problems… It’s a bit like the under-achieving child in the class, who deliberately tried less and does less, so they don’t stand out or be asked to do more challenging tasks..!

We are just as weak as we have always been. Without the daily walk and growing knowledge of Christ and The Spirit, we remain infants- babies in the kingdom of God. We avoid the closeness of the Lord, so that we can avoid the corresponding challenges to our faith..! We are less than we could be.. We are afraid of what the gracious Lord might ask us to face, so we feign deafness and blindness.

Our lack of living faith, results in Christian lives that are stunted and shallow. We don’t see and hear what God says, because we don’t really want to. We let ourselves off the hook and lie back on the faith that looks out for itself and protects its interests in a non-committal kind if way.

The result is that we have no courage, or back-bone to strike out for God, or do anything that might make my Christian witness obvious. We cannot stand up for what we believe and we cannot witness to the unbeliever.
Our lives are ordinary, sterile and lacklustre.
When trouble hits us, we are overwhelmed, because we didn’t learn the previous lessons in a spiritual way.

It is a sorrowful state. We are Christians that cannot face the evil of this world and rescue people from it through the truth of the gospel. We cannot involve ourselves with people around us and have no skills to reach out to them as fellow humans. Perhaps in our church life we pay people to do that, and that covers what needs to be done. But we loose out, big time, as we don’t experience the reality of walking with God in the circumstances He asks us to.

Will we dare to step out- stand out- put everything on the line- let go, knowing He is with us- turn our backs on sinning and what other people think..?