Episode 14: Discerning the Patterns of God’s Faithfulness?

We say God is faithful all the time.
But most of us still live like everything depends on us.

We stress about the future.
We try to control outcomes.
We assume something is wrong when things take longer than we expected.

So what would actually change if we believed God is faithful?

In this episode, we look at what Scripture shows about God’s faithfulness and how it should shape the way we live. Not just what we believe, but how we make decisions, how we handle uncertainty, and how we walk through seasons that don’t make sense yet.

Transcript

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Welcome to Rooted with Emily Talento, where we explore who Jesus is through context, culture, and covenant. Lately, we've been talking a lot about God's faithfulness. Last week we took a break and we talked about my experience in going to Israel and getting stuck in Israel and then escaping Israel through Egypt. If you haven't listened to that, you should definitely check that out. If not, welcome. Today we're going to be talking about God's faithfulness. Right now, just so you have a little bit of an idea of where we're at. So, since the beginning of the podcast, actually, let's zoom out even further. In looking at our society, looking at the world that we're living in, the number one issue that I'm seeing is we're lacking a biblical worldview. What does that mean? We're not looking at the world through our faith, through scripture, through what we know to be true. We're really just going based off of what we see, based on what we're experiencing, based on what people are telling us, without it actually being anchored in something eternal. So my hope in starting this podcast is that you walk away a little bit more grounded, a little more rooted in biblical truths. Because it doesn't just happen, right? We're not just gonna wake up one day and suddenly God has downloaded to us a biblical worldview. It's just not how that works. We have to continue to go back to scripture. We need to continue to be reminding ourselves of what truth is. So as we're getting caught up in what we're seeing and as our feelings are starting to rule the way we live, we can go back to what we know to be true. That being said, the way the podcast has been structured, it started with these big questions, right? Why does God let bad things happen? Why does this world feel broken? Can scripture be trusted? Those types of questions. And then it turned into this deeper look into God's faithfulness, because if God isn't faithful, he can't be trusted. And so that's where we've been. We're almost out of this section on God's faithfulness, and we're entering soon something I'm very excited about, something I've been wanting to talk about way longer than the podcast has existed, which is how do we read the Bible? Not, I mean, we are going to be looking at literally how do we read the Bible, but conceptually, why does context matter? Is the Bible one story or many stories? That kind of question. So when we zoom out of scripture, we can identify certain patterns that emerge. And these are a lot of the themes that we've been talking about the last few weeks. So we talked about waiting on God. That is a big one. We see it throughout scripture. We talked about human failure and what that looks like and why that happens and what happens after humans fail. We talked about God being silent or absent. These are all just very real parts of the biblical story. Now, when we see these patterns, we can learn something about God in each of them. And that's honestly the point of reading the Bible in general, right? It's to learn more about our God. And sometimes I think we go to scripture for comfort, and there's nothing wrong with that. But true comfort only actually comes from the confidence of knowing who we're held by, the security of knowing who our God is. And how do we know who our God is? By reading scripture, by looking at who his character is throughout the story. So in identifying these patterns, each one shows us a different element or attribute of his character. Pattern one. Promises often begin long before we see the outcome. So we're going to read Genesis 12, verses 1 through 3 together. Now, this is a passage that we've read at least once together. It's just so foundational to the story of Scripture. So, 12, 1 through 3, it says, Now the Lord said to Abram, Go from your country and your kindred and your father's house to the land that I will show you, and I will make you a great nation, and I will bless you and make your name great, so that you will be a blessing. I will bless those who bless you, and him who dishonors you I will curse, and in you all the families of the earth shall be blessed. It's a lot of promises that God made right there to Abram. Now, we talked about this in depth. I don't feel the need to go into all of the weeds this time around, but just a reminder, Abraham didn't have any children. Not only did they not have children, they could not have children. They were very elderly at this point. And so this idea of having descendants was not really in the cards for Abraham that he thought or that he knew. It took time, but God was faithful to his promise. But even when Isaac was born, 25 years later, the promise wasn't fulfilled. That was just the first sign that the promise would be fulfilled, right? So what was the original promise in Genesis 12, verses 1 through 3? There were three parts to it. There was descendants, so nation, there was land, and there was blessing. We're not going to talk about blessing today. So that answers, Isaac answers the descendants, but it's still not nation. What else is there? Land. The land promise wasn't fulfilled for hundreds of years. We talk about this, I think, in episode 10. If you enter the story at any point between Abraham and Joshua entering the promised land with the Israelites after their forty years of wilderness wanderings, any person would have been able to say, yeah, God failed. He's not faithful. God didn't fail. The only problem is where they were sitting. They were sitting in the middle of the story. Now, it took hundreds of years for God to fulfill that promise, and we get upset when God makes us wait, I don't know, a couple days, a couple weeks. And that's not to invalidate. I know we all have things that we've been waiting on for longer than a couple days or a couple weeks, but I think oftentimes, especially in our culture, we're very used to instant gratification when things don't happen instantly. It's very easy for us to want to take things into our own hands and play God in the situation. Which brings us to the next one, actually. The second pattern we're going to be looking at is human failure doesn't stop the story. And the scripture we're going to be looking at is Exodus 32, verses 7 through 10. And the Lord said to Moses, Go down, for the people whom you brought up out of Egypt have corrupted themselves. They have turned aside quickly out of the way that I commanded them. They have made for themselves a golden calf, and have worshipped it, and sacrificed to it, and said, These are your gods, O Israel, who brought you up out of the land of Egypt. Not good. Really not good. And the Lord said to Moses, I have seen these people, and behold, it is a stiff-necked people. Verse ten. And then my very next thought is, ooh, but like I do that all the time. Where obviously I'm not I am not sacrificing to a physical idol. But when things don't happen in the timeline that I want it to, how quick I am to go and find my own ways. And somehow in that I feel justified. Crazy. So some background. We'll put all the pieces together. They just get out of Egypt. God has the one himself who rescued them from Egypt. They're in the wilderness. God just made a covenant with them, an everlasting covenant. Like a covenant that gives them security, that gives them purpose, that gives like everything that you would want, right? Then Moses goes up on Mount Sinai, and he's gone for just a little bit too long. He was up there for 40 days and 40 nights, and in that time, all chaos unfolded, right? And you have his brother Aaron, someone that he thought he could trust, kind of leading the way in this complete defilement, this complete act of idolatry. In any relationship, if there's this level of disrespect, this level of disregard, there's no relationship to be had. There's no trust. There's no care. Especially in this case. This level of disobedience. But Moses took too long. He was up there for 40 days. And so what happens, basically. God doesn't give up on his people. I mean, that's a paraphrase, but it goes on. But the point of the story is their disobedience doesn't make God suddenly unfaithful. My favorite verse in 2 Timothy, if we are faithless, he still remains faithful. That's like no other relationship that we possibly could ever have. And it's what makes God so unique. If God's story throughout scripture depended on our faithfulness, then the story would be over. But it doesn't. It's solely dependent on God's faithfulness. So the story keeps going. The third pattern that we're going to look at today is the story sometimes moves through long, quiet seasons. Now, if you've been saved for a minute, you know that that's just a part of life. Not all of the seasons that we live in are mountaintop moments. And you know what's actually very interesting? I was thinking about this the other day. As we continue to grow in our faith more and more, those quiet seasons become more prevalent. It feels backwards. It feels opposite, right? You naturally feel like you should be having these more profound experiences with God as we continue to get. And I think what it comes back to is he gives us what he knows we need. So early, we need the assurance. We need to know that he's there. We're building the relationship. And then once we know who he is and there's a basis of he's been faithful before, I personally believe, based on my own experience, based on reading scripture, based on being in relationships with others and seeing how their relationships with God work, that there are seasons of silence because he's pulling us into deeper waters. When we get saved, we're on the shore. And as we start walking out, we can naturally see God's hand everywhere. He's showing up in our lives in big ways. Trust is built through resistance. It's like anything else. We don't just suddenly get stronger. We have to do hard things. And that's the same thing with the depth in our relationship with God. He wants us to seek us more. We're not going to seek him as earnestly if he's just showing up, if he's just there. And he is always there. Right? That's that's the caveat. Like even when we don't feel him, he is still present. But sometimes he wants us to seek him harder. That might not be fun for us. Nobody wants to feel like we're alone in it. But when we can rely on the truth that we know that we aren't alone, because that's the reality, and we can continue to push through to seek him, he honors that. And that's not to say he doesn't show up in profound ways as we continue to grow in our relationship with God. That's completely false. However, I do find that there is something very unique in the early days of a person getting saved. Let's dive into our well, it's actually not our text just yet, but let's dive into scripture. So what we talked about a couple episodes is the 400 years between the end of the Old Testament and the beginning of the New Testament. So Malachi ends, and after that point, God doesn't speak to his people again through a prophet, through a new book. There's nothing that's happening. And I could imagine that the people in this period felt like God had abandoned them, that God was silent. So we're going to pick up in Matthew 3, verses 1 through 3. It says, In those days, John the Baptist came preaching in the wilderness of Judea. Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand. Verse 3. For this is he who was spoken of by the prophet Isaiah when he said, The voice of one crying in the wilderness, prepare the way of the Lord, make his path straight. Everything before this in Matthew is setting the stage. This is kind of where we pick up in the story. It's actually, well, let me back up. We talked about this when we talked about this in depth, but starting Matthew with the genealogy shows this continuation of the story. We're not starting a new story, we're continuing a story that's existed for thousands of years, right? That's amazing. That's brilliant. I love that God decided to do that. It gives us so much context into his mindset on the whole thing, right? Like we're not picking up something new. However, everything before, we have, you know, the birth of Jesus, we have them, Jesus, Mary, Joseph, fleeing to Egypt. And then we are picking up with John the Baptist. Now, this is where there seems to be a shift in the narrative. So everything before, chapter one and chapter two, are more just setting the stage. They're giving the context. And chapter three feels like, okay, this is this is where we are now. The kingdom of heaven is at hand. This is what we've been waiting for. They're about to introduce Jesus in a very different capacity than he was introduced as a baby in a manger. And this this this is this is that moment right now. Super profound. Even in these long, quiet seasons that we live in, this story, the story of Scripture, but specifically, if we're zooming in on this moment, is a reminder that even in those long, quiet seasons, the story's not over. For a story to be good, there has to be lows and highs and middle ground and all of the things. Sometimes we're in lows, and that's part of the process. But we could rest in the fact that God has purpose in it, and the story isn't over. That also kind of brings me to my next point, pattern number four. The story is moving somewhere. We're gonna read Luke chapter 24, verses 26 and 27. This is Jesus speaking. Was it not necessary that the Christ should suffer these things and enter into his glory? And beginning with Moses and all the prophets, he interpreted to them all the scriptures, the things concerning himself. First of all, this is a super looked-past verse. But could you imagine Jesus sitting down and going through the Old Testament and being like, yeah, that's about me, and that's about me, and people don't realize, but this one's also about me. It just points to this idea that there's one story. This has all been about him this entire time. The entire Bible has purpose, has direction, and he is the fulfillment of that. So if we zoom out, the story of the Bible isn't random. It's moving toward redemption. And this is something that we're going to talk more about in the future. It's actually one of my favorite things to talk about in general. I'm surprised we really haven't zoned in on it too much thus far. But I think it's important that we are looking at the Bible as one coherent story. We see these patterns arise throughout scripture, with these times when people were left waiting, when people failed, when God was silent. But in all of those situations, God remained faithful. So much is based on our perception of reality. And that's why it's important that we know the complete story of Scripture. So when our reality feels threatened based on what we're seeing, we can be strong in what we know to be true. Through all of it, God's story keeps moving. And what's crazy is we're all a part of it. We're all a part of his story of redemption for humanity. So as we're closing out our time talking about God's faithfulness, and it's not the last time we're gonna talk about God's faithfulness, let me tell you, but just as a focus point, right? As we're on our descent, we're gonna close this section out in a very practical way. If all of this is true, everything that we've been talking about the last, I don't know, what has been like eight episodes or four weeks, how ought we respond? How should we live? What does that look like? And that's what we'll be talking about in the next episode. I hope this was helpful to you in continuing to grow in trust for our God. If you liked this episode, if you could like, comment, subscribe, any of the things that you would do for any of the other podcasts that you like. You could also follow me on Instagram at Emily Talento and at rooted with Emily Talento. I hope you have a great day, and I'll see you next time.