Strengthening Exercises
Word 3. Strengthen.
It’s January, a time when many renew a commitment to exercise. Time to get healthy, eat better, become stronger, faster, better! Right after the faith chapter (Ch 11) in Hebrews, we are hit with this verse in Chapter 12: “Therefore strengthen the hands which hang down, and the feeble knees...” (Hebrews 12:12).
We have to get strong in the faith walk. Hear it? No feeble knees people. We aren’t going to get sprinkled with fairy faith-dust and automatically have great faith. We do have a deposit of faith hidden inside of us, given by God when we were created, but it’s dormant and it’s weak. We get to make a free will choice to activate our faith and then we can strengthen it and live in it!
The writer of Hebrews takes us from the subject of faith to strength through a bunch of verses about chastening. He says that God corrects those who He loves, as a good Father should. That word ‘chasten’ in the Greek really means instruction, tutorage, education, or training. In other words, God has an expectation over us to utilize our faith and therefore He is willing to teach us and train us in the use of it.
Faith is like a muscle. It has to be exercised to be strengthened. Ask any weight trainer and they will tell you that in order to build up muscle, the tissue actually has to be damaged first. It has to be extended to the point of tearing through an effort to lift something beyond its ability to do so. We could say that our faith is strengthened by having the weight of the impossible being put on it. And in order to enlarge our faith, our response must be to lift up the impossible to God and believe for it.
It’s comforting to me to understand that God actually expects it to be hard for me to build my faith. He is establishing me. He is empowering me. He sets me up to be an overcomer. According to buitlean.com, to build muscle we have to “continually put more stress on the muscles….and disrupt homeostasis within your body.” Stress? That’s not a politically correct word at all. We hate stress. And what’s wrong with a little homeostasis, am I right? Well, comfort equals small and we are going for increase. Wherever we’re comfortable, we’re not growing. That means our mindsets must be stretched and severed by things we don’t understand. We have to tear to pieces the doubts we have in ourselves and in God. We have to rip away that fear of failure and toughen up with an attitude that failure is our friend. It shows us exactly where we need to tone up and fortify.
What comes next in the process is kind of amazing. Muscle is actually not built in the exercise itself, but in the resting that comes right after. Let me say it like this. Faith is built after you choose to believe. Here’s a picture that may help: You bend your knees to sit on a chair, believing that it will support you, and then your butt hits the seat and you rest on it- and it does! Your faith is reinforced by believing. It is sustained by doing what seems impossible. It is supported by putting that foot out when it looks like water everywhere and stepping anyway.
“I’ll show you how to take a real rest. Walk with me and work with me—watch how I do it. Learn the unforced rhythms of grace. I won’t lay anything heavy or ill-fitting on you. Keep company with me and you’ll learn to live freely and lightly.” (Matt 11:28 MSG).
See? Amazing. What God has for you to do is impossible but it’s not heavy. It’s work but it’s rest! Look to Jesus, the author and finisher of your faith. He will uphold you, cheer you, refresh you, prepare you, prosper you. He’s your trainer. And He has a work out plan for you that will invigorate you, enliven you, cause you to bloom into what He created you to be! So let’s do this. Let’s step up and lift up our hearts to believe. Don’t let those hands hang down! Enhearten yourself and get training.
The reps look like this: Impossible. Believe what God says. Go for it and rest in Him while you do. Faith grows. Repeat.
If you look back over your life and you have been exercising your faith, you can see how each rep with God has brought you to a new level of believing and your faith continues to be conditioned to grow. It’s a life-long training session really. If you are new to faith workouts, it’s January..a new year! Time to start that program, do some strengthening exercises, and get some sinew on that faith muscle!
“Blessed are those who make You their strength, for they treasure every step of the journey.
On their way through the valley of Baca, they stop and dig wells to collect the refreshing spring water, and the early rains fill the pools.
They journey from place to place, gaining strength along the way; until they meet God in Zion.”
(Psalm 84:5-7 The Voice).
