A Tug On The Harness

Many of you reading this will be aware that our sweet dog, Jack, has been seriously ill since Christmas Day. He’s not out of the woods yet, but much closer to better health today, than he was two weeks ago. He had abdominal surgery; therefore, walking was slow going for a couple of days after I brought him home. He had to go down a flight of stairs to get outside. Understandably, as he stood looking down, he didn’t want to go. I tried to coax him with encouraging words of what a good boy he is, but he wouldn’t budge. Then I took hold of his harness and gave a little tug. When He could sense that I had hold of him, down he went, slowly, but with ease and no further hesitation.

Later that day as I kept thinking about how I got Jack down the stairs, I began to ponder how every child of God is told to walk by faith and not by sight (II Corinthians 5:7). We all want to live by faith in God. We encourage ourselves with thoughts like — He has never failed, or He knows the way, or His plans are for our good. We talk to ourselves but faith remains weak. How can we, like Jack, walk down flights of scary stairs, when fear makes us freeze in our tracks?

Let’s look at Romans 10:17, Faith comes by hearing and hearing by the Word of God (NKJV). We can quote God’s Word, and this is a good thing, but this particular Scripture says we need to hear the Word of God. We may well ask, what is the difference between quoting and hearing? Don’t forget that even Satan knows God’s Word. He can quote it (and always misconstrues it) but he does not hear it. How do we hear God’s Word? By taking time to meditate upon it, allowing the Holy Spirit to speak its comfort and guidance into our hurting, frightened hearts.

You see, the Holy Spirit knows us better than anyone. When we take time to mediate upon God’s Word, one on one with the Holy Spirit, we are giving Him opportunity to speak personally to us. Then, when we hear God’s Word, we are strengthened. We sense a reassuring tug on our harness, giving us courage to take one step at a time as we descend scary stairs leading to unknown paths of all our tomorrows. We can walk by faith when we hear our Father’s Word spoken just for us in our particular moment of need.

When that happens, Psalm 1 assures us we will be like trees planted along the riverbank. Our roots will go down deep into the rich soil of God’s Word. As we drink, we are made strong to stand against all fear. Our branches will bear good fruit of love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control ( Galatians 5:22-23 NLT). Then our leaves of faith will not wither, and we will prosper in all the ways Father leads us.

Whatever scary stairs you face today, may you feel the loving tug of God’s assurance, and go in gladness, one step at a time.