Taking a step of faith may sound easy, but it means leaving behind what we are familiar with and facing our deepest fears. Unfortunately, our fears can stop us from moving forward with God’s plan. We sometimes think that taking steps of faith is easy for those who have deep faith, but that is not true. “Faith is taking the first step even when you don’t see the whole staircase.” This quote by Martin Luther King Jr. is an excellent analogy for faith. [1]
As we take steps of faith, we discover the Lord is with us and supports us in ways we would not expect. The path ahead may not be easy, especially when you don’t have it all figured out. Sometimes the Lord calls us to wait, while other times, He asks us to take a step in a specific direction. If the Lord is calling you to wait, He is also preparing you for the next step He wants you to take.
Abram Took a Step of Faith
The Lord called Abraham out of idolatry and set him on a path to be a person of faith and the father of a great nation we would know as Israel. Genesis 12:1The Lord had said to Abram, “Leave your native country, your relatives, and your father’s family, and go to the land that I will show you. 2 I will make you into a great nation.[2]
To accomplish what the Lord called Abram to do would require him to leave his comfort zone for an unknown land and future. With reassurance from the Lord, Abram would take the most significant step of his life. Genesis 15:6 And Abram believed the Lord, and the Lord counted him as righteous because of his faith.[3]
Abraham leaned wholly on the promise of God and the God of the promise. We are not saved by making promises to God but by believing the promises of God.[4]
You Can Take a Step of Faith
It may have been a long time since you took a step of faith, or this could be your first step. You may think if you take a step of faith, you will fall flat on your face. When our children learned to walk, they took some very wobbly steps and fell. With each first step, we praised them and helped them to their feet. As we all learn to walk, we are always unsure on our feet and take many tumbles, but we learn to walk.
Walking by faith is similar. With each step of faith, we become more comfortable with God’s call and press on like the Apostle Paul. Philippians 3:12 I don’t mean to say that I have already achieved these things or that I have already reached perfection. But I press on to possess that perfection for which Christ Jesus first possessed me. 13 No, dear brothers and sisters, I have not achieved it, but I focus on this one thing: Forgetting the past and looking forward to what lies ahead.[5] Be encouraged and take the step of faith where the Lord is leading you!
To learn more about taking a step of faith, listen here:
https://podpoint.com/light-of-christ-church-podcast/beginnings-promise
[1] https://northstar.church/faith-taking-first-step/
[2,3,5] Tyndale House Publishers. (2015). Holy Bible: New Living Translation . Tyndale House Publishers.
[4] Wiersbe, W. W. (1991). Be Obedient (p. 48). Victor Books.