Believe and Speak--Of all that is, seen and unseen

                                    Job 12:22                       

                                    Mark 4:22

                                    Jeremiah 5:21-22           

                                    Romans 1:20

                                    Daniel 2:20-22               

                                    1 Cor. 4:5  

            

                                    2 Kings 6:8-23               

                                    Colossians 1:16

                                    Hebrews 4:13

                                    2 Corinthians 4:13

Job is famous for his great faith in the middle of great suffering.  His friends give terrible advice; his wife's advice is even worse.  He counters their advice with all that he knows to be true about God, including God's rule over darkness and light.  Jesus uses an analogy of a lamp to make the same point.  What is dark and hidden is meant to be light and revealed.  God is sovereign over both.  God created the oceans, and He also created an unseen boundary for it, a constant barrier that it cannot pass.  Seen and unseen.  Paul, in Romans, doesn't stop with the sea; he says EVERYTHING, God's invisible characteristics, eternal power, and divine nature are clearly seen in what He made.  Daniel rightly credits God as chief over times and seasons, kings and kingdoms, wisdom and knowledge, deep and hidden things, light and darkness.  Paul in 1 Corinthians does, too.  The prophet Elisha was the voice of God to the king of Israel when they were being invaded by the Syrian army.  The Syrian king was so mad that his plans were ruined, he sent his army to find Elisha and silence him.  Elisha's servant went outside one morning and saw the advancing Syrian army and panicked!!!  Elisha prayed and asked God to open his servant's eyes to the horses and chariots of fire--God's Army-- all over the mountainside.  Elisha knew our "More Than Enough God" was fighting for them, even if it was unseen.  Everything God created-seen and unseen, visible and invisible--all are naked and exposed before God.  He is over all and through all and in all.  

 Hebrews 11:1 says that faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen.   Job did not see God, but he knew God.  We can't see the boundary of the ocean, but we clearly see the results of it.   Have you ever heard the saying (made popular by social media😁) "Pictures, or it didn't happen!"? We want to see proof.  The opposite of faith isn't fear--it's sight.  God is calling us to believe without seeing.  He wants us to trust that He is in control over what is clearly visible, and what we can't see no matter how hard we look.  Our blind faith is only safe with Him, because He is steadfast in His love, grace, and mercy to us.  We believe in One God, the Father, the Almighty, maker of heaven and earth, of all that is, seen and unseen.  Since we have this same spirit of faith according to what has been written, we also believe, and so we also speak.