Do you have a faithful friend—someone whom you can count on no matter what? We all wish for someone in our lives who is faithful, dependable, and loyal. When we don’t have people like that in our lives, we can feel very lonely. Faithfulness is a quality that God excels in. Actually, the Divine excels in all the qualities that are beautiful and lovely. We, on the other hand, are a bit hit and miss.
Loyal, constant, and steadfast defines faithfulness. Loyalty is rare these days. Constancy is an old-fashioned term that makes me think of the days of Jane Austen. She used the word a lot in her descriptions of people’s character. Steadfastness also seems a bit out of date. Where has the idea of faithfulness gone too?
In a day and age where everything is disposable it is easy to overlook the idea of faithfulness, steadfastness, and loyalty. It seems that the whole world is so eager to get ahead that we easily dismiss long-term relationships in order to best serve our own advantage. You find this true in business and in personal realms as well.
I’m so glad that God’s kingdom is based on faithfulness. It is another gift of the Spirit. This implies that on my own I probably am not very good at it. In fact when I look at my own life I find that being faithful is often times difficult. When I look at the stories of men and women’s lives in the Bible I find that they too had difficulties with faithfulness. We seem to specialize more in fickleness than faithfulness.
When you look at how this relates to different areas of your own life you can see where we are all struggling. Stewardship of the resources we’ve been given, spiritual growth and development, and relationships we’ve been entrusted with are all areas where faithfulness is needed. When we are not faithful, pain and loss usually result.
What lessons are there to be learned regarding being faithful? Showing up is the first step in being reliable and trusted. Just being there is a start. We recently attended a graduation on the other side of the country. It required a day’s travel both directions to get there and a considerable expense. It was tempting to send a card and greetings with some money inside instead. But we had promised. What good is one’s word if it can’t be counted on?
To just keep on keeping on as they say is part of being faithful. Dr. Laura likes to say, ‘Now go do the right thing.” I have to admit, there’s a lot of truth in that, going out and doing what needs to be done regardless of our feelings about it.
That’s part of the problem with our human feelings. Sometimes they support what we know we need to do and sometimes they don’t. Our feelings can, however, be indicators of when things are amiss and need changing in our lives. Not every relationship is one that we should stay in. Not every job is one we should keep forever. How do you tell the difference?
Faithfulness is not about never making changes in your life—it is about showing up for your life. We ultimately must be true to our soul’s calling and purpose in life and be true to God. The only way we will ever be able to sort out the particulars of any situation and what we need to do in it is to maintain a close connection with Spirit. The Spirit of God is the only source that will help us to truly determine what is needed in order to be faithful.
There are many who would make up rules, especially in religious communities to define exactly what faithfulness is, but true faithfulness is about a living connection with God and listening to the voice of Spirit and being true, constant, and steadfast in our relationship with the Divine. If we do this, we will be faithful in the other sacred trusts and responsibilities we have been given. It is impossible to be completely faithful apart from God. When we make this our goal, to have our hearts in line with the heart of God, then we will be on the path of faithfulness and we can have confidence that we will be led to make decisions that honor the path of light.
Loyal, constant, and steadfast defines faithfulness. Loyalty is rare these days. Constancy is an old-fashioned term that makes me think of the days of Jane Austen. She used the word a lot in her descriptions of people’s character. Steadfastness also seems a bit out of date. Where has the idea of faithfulness gone too?
In a day and age where everything is disposable it is easy to overlook the idea of faithfulness, steadfastness, and loyalty. It seems that the whole world is so eager to get ahead that we easily dismiss long-term relationships in order to best serve our own advantage. You find this true in business and in personal realms as well.
I’m so glad that God’s kingdom is based on faithfulness. It is another gift of the Spirit. This implies that on my own I probably am not very good at it. In fact when I look at my own life I find that being faithful is often times difficult. When I look at the stories of men and women’s lives in the Bible I find that they too had difficulties with faithfulness. We seem to specialize more in fickleness than faithfulness.
When you look at how this relates to different areas of your own life you can see where we are all struggling. Stewardship of the resources we’ve been given, spiritual growth and development, and relationships we’ve been entrusted with are all areas where faithfulness is needed. When we are not faithful, pain and loss usually result.
What lessons are there to be learned regarding being faithful? Showing up is the first step in being reliable and trusted. Just being there is a start. We recently attended a graduation on the other side of the country. It required a day’s travel both directions to get there and a considerable expense. It was tempting to send a card and greetings with some money inside instead. But we had promised. What good is one’s word if it can’t be counted on?
To just keep on keeping on as they say is part of being faithful. Dr. Laura likes to say, ‘Now go do the right thing.” I have to admit, there’s a lot of truth in that, going out and doing what needs to be done regardless of our feelings about it.
That’s part of the problem with our human feelings. Sometimes they support what we know we need to do and sometimes they don’t. Our feelings can, however, be indicators of when things are amiss and need changing in our lives. Not every relationship is one that we should stay in. Not every job is one we should keep forever. How do you tell the difference?
Faithfulness is not about never making changes in your life—it is about showing up for your life. We ultimately must be true to our soul’s calling and purpose in life and be true to God. The only way we will ever be able to sort out the particulars of any situation and what we need to do in it is to maintain a close connection with Spirit. The Spirit of God is the only source that will help us to truly determine what is needed in order to be faithful.
There are many who would make up rules, especially in religious communities to define exactly what faithfulness is, but true faithfulness is about a living connection with God and listening to the voice of Spirit and being true, constant, and steadfast in our relationship with the Divine. If we do this, we will be faithful in the other sacred trusts and responsibilities we have been given. It is impossible to be completely faithful apart from God. When we make this our goal, to have our hearts in line with the heart of God, then we will be on the path of faithfulness and we can have confidence that we will be led to make decisions that honor the path of light.