Up-Again, Down-Again Faith

"I don't understand myself sometimes. One day I am on fire for the Lord and doing great. The next day I feel like God is a million miles away. For a while my life seems balanced. I am reading my Bible and active in sharing my faith. My relationship with the Lord seems like it could not possibly get any better and then I hit this skid where I feel my faith slipping and my old temptations start coming back. What is wrong with me?"

Have you ever heard these words, maybe even felt this way yourself? As much as we would like for faith to be a steady ascent of Mount Zion, in reality the journey is almost certain to have its peaks and valleys. Nearly every Christian goes through a period of back-sliding. It is embarrassing and frustrating. Thank God for His amazing grace.

Many Christians go through Up-again, Down-again faith. You are not some rare exception. This spiritual roller coaster ride sells lots of tickets. We all are going to have our peaks and valleys, our mountain top experiences and our pits of despair. But for some it becomes an addictive cycle, a love/hate relationship with the different aspects of the Christian walk. That is not good for your spiritual health.

Christians the world around get caught up in this cyclone of Up-again, Down-again faith. When you talk to someone in this pattern you are not sure which slope they are going to be on. Will it be the up-slope, where they are eager to serve the Lord or a period of decline, when it is best not to bring up the subject of serving God? Read your Bible and you will discover believers back then had the same problem.

As soon as God called Abram to leave Ur in Genesis 12, Abram went, no questions asked. He uprooted his whole family, sold the farm and started down the highway. He did not even know where he was headed, Hebrews 11:8, but he went because God said go. Genesis 12:1-4. Abram's faith was definitely up. But later on when he was forced into Egypt because of a famine, he feared for his life because his wife Sarai was a beautiful woman, so he lied and said she was his sister, Genesis 12:10-13. This was obviously not by God's design. He acted contrary to his faith and things turned out badly. His faith was down.

When Abram was settled in the Promised Land, life was good again until his herdsmen started fighting with Lot's herdsmen over the land. The conflict was serious enough they had to part and go their separate ways. Abram told Lot to choose whatever land he wanted and he would take what was left to him, Genesis 13:5-12. Abram did so in faith knowing that God had promised him all the land of Canaan. His faith was up again.

In Genesis 13:16, God promised Abram that his family would become a strong nation and his offspring would be too numerous to count, "like the dust of the earth." The only problem was he and Sarai did not have any children yet. When God gives a promise, we, His children should trust Him and know that He always makes good on His promise. Abram and Sarai did not do that. They thought they needed to help God out.

Sarai had the brilliant idea of giving her maidservant, Hagar, to Abram so he could have children through her and Abram went along with the idea without consulting God. Abram got Hagar pregnant. Hagar despised Sarai. Sarai abused Hagar. It was a big mess. This was another spiritual valley for Abram. His faith was down again. He did not allow God to guide him. Abram, a man known historically for his incredible faith, had Up-again, Down-again faith.

There are other biblical examples as well. The Israelites as a nation, suffered from Up-again, Down-again faith. When Moses led the tribes of Israel out of Egypt their faith in God was at an all-time high. God had delivered them after 430 years of Egyptian slavery. They had seen the plagues and how God Almighty had delivered them from the tight grip of Pharaoh. Their faith was up.

But when they saw themselves trapped against the Red Sea by Pharaoh's army they were angry at God for not leaving them in Egypt, Exodus 14:11. In such a short time their faith plummeted. Then when Moses parted the Red Sea the Israelites once again trusted God and walked through on a dry sea floor. There was no mud oozing between their toes or bogging down the wheels of their carts, Exodus 14:22. Only God could have made that possible. There were walls of water on both sides. That took some faith just to pass between those walls of water. Their faith was up.

Later when the Israelites noticed they were running out of water in the Sinai Peninsula they began to panic. They found water but it was bitter, undrinkable, so they panicked even more, Exodus 15:22-24. Their faith in God was down again. You can trace this pattern of highs and lows all the way through the Bible with the Israelites. They had Up-again, Down-again faith.

Let us look at a third example. You can see this pattern of Up-again, Down-again faith with Elijah who faithfully and boldly challenged 850 false prophets of Baal to a sacrifice showdown, I Kings 18:19-24. They failed to incite their god to answer by fire, but Elijah called on God who burned up the sacrifice, the wood, the stones on the altar and the water in the trench, I Kings 18:38. He confidently showed why God was God and his faith was up.

Shortly after this, a woman named Jezebel was told about how Elijah had defeated and had killed the prophets of Baal. She sent a message to Elijah saying she was going to kill him and Elijah ran scared for his life, I Kings 19:3. His faith plummeted.

Or how about John the Baptist? We see him confidently proclaiming that Jesus is the prophesied Messiah, John 1:29-34. Later on, however, he is asking, "Are you the one who was to come, or should we expect someone else?" Matthew 11:3.

In most of these cases of Up-again, Down-again Faith you could argue that circumstances had an impact on how strong their faith was. Granted, but should circumstances dictate the strength of our Christian faith? As was pointed out in the last chapter, we either believe God and trust Him or we do not. The circumstances we find ourselves in can and do change at any time. True faith is not swayed by circumstances. Our faithless nose-dives have more to do with how prepared we are to take on the challenge than they do with our circumstances.

Mature Faith does not waiver with changing circumstances. It holds firm in the fiery onslaught of Satan's attacks. Those, however, who do not solidify their faith (chapter ten), are vulnerable to the terrorist style attacks of Satan and his cohorts. There are spiritual choices we make that weaken our defensive position and cause our faith to waiver. Up-again, Down-again faith is preventable.

One thing we do to cause Up-again, Down-again faith is we set ourselves up for disappointment. We do this first by having a:

FALSE EXPECTATION OF OURSELVES

When that frustrated father brought his demon possessed son to Jesus' disciples to be healed in Mark 9, the disciples honestly thought they could heal him. They believed they could do something without Jesus, because they saw Him do it.

All they had to say is, "Let's wait until Jesus gets here." But they arrogantly believed they could handle casting out a demon without the Lord. After all, Jesus made it look so easy. We should not blame others for our Up-again, Down-again faith. We do it to ourselves when we have a false notion of what we can and cannot do; how much we can cram into a weekly schedule, the amount of financial debt we can pile on without busting the budget. It is nobody's fault but our own. We have false expectations of ourselves.

The unsuccessful attempts to heal the boy only served to further frustrate this father.

and whenever it seizes him, it slams him to the ground and he foams at the mouth, and grinds his teeth and stiffens out. I told Your disciples to cast it out, and they could not do it.”

- Mark 9:18

The apostles set themselves up for disappointment because they had a false expectation of their own abilities. But the father also set himself up for disappointment because he had:

A FALSE EXPECTATION OF OTHERS

The father did what so many of us do today. We enter into a relationship expecting things to go a certain way and when it doesn't happen that way, we are disappointed. We are upset and our faith, our confidence in the success of living for Christ takes a step backwards. When you put your confidence in what others are going to do for you, you run the risk of facing disappointment. News flash: people don't always do what they are supposed to do.

Learn to trust people without putting your trust in people. Trust people, the ones who can be trusted. Put your trust in God. Do not listen to Satan. His message is that if people don't do what they are supposed to do, this somehow infers God is no longer on the throne, or that you no longer have to do what you are supposed to do.

Long ago I decided not to let it surprise me when people don't do what they are supposed to. Yes, Christians should be obedient to God and follow His Word. Yes, they should realize that their hypocrisy is a detriment to the kingdom. But can you always count on people to do what they ought to do just because it is right? Do not set yourself up with this crazy disillusionment. If you do it will lead you to Up-again, Down-again faith.

Here's another common trick we play on ourselves. You can set yourself up for disappointment by:

HAVING A FALSE EXPECTATION OF GOD

God can do anything, but that doesn't mean because you want Him to do something, that He is obligated to do it. When you decide God is obligated to do certain things that He never promised He would do, then you will be disappointed when He doesn't do it.

"God is going to give me what I want and if He doesn't..." When things do not happen the way you think they should, you are going to be frustrated and your faith will falter. Hopefully you are thinking right now about how silly that idea is and how unnecessary it is to put yourself through that kind of stress. One of the saddest things about Up-again, Down-again faith is we bring it on ourselves.

A fourth cause of Up-again, Down-again faith is:

NOT HAVING OUR DOUBTS REMOVED THROUGH ENDURANCE

³knowing that the testing of your faith produces endurance. ⁴And let endurance have its perfect result, so that you may be perfect and complete, lacking in nothing.

- James 1:3-4

The experience of going through a trial and relying on God to get you through it, gives you the stability you need so that you do not stumble at every temptation. The experience will solidify your faith leading you to maturity, making you complete. Many Christians dodge this strengthening looking for the easy way out. When Christians choose to medicate their problems or hide them rather than deal with them, the result is spiritual sickness.

Sometimes Up-again, Down-again faith is the result of:

UN-DEALT WITH SIN IN OUR LIVES

Bring to your mind for a moment Jesus' Parable of the Sower. The farmer scattered seed on various types of soil. The seed represents the Word of God, Matthew 13:19; Mark 4:14; Luke 8:11. The types of soil, represents types of hearts of the individuals as they hear the Word. One was the rocky soil. "The one sown with seed on the rocky places, this is the one who hears the word and immediately receives it with joy; yet he has no firm root in himself, but is only temporary, and when affliction or persecution occurs because of the word, immediately he falls away." Matthew 13:20-21.

We are not told what the rocks in the soil represent in this parable. We know that rocks have to be removed from soil before planting in order for the roots of the plants to sink deep in the soil. Since the soil represents our hearts and the seed represents God's Word, sin is a logical parallel to the rocks in this parable.

We know we need to remove sin from our hearts so that God's Word will sink deep. When we hold back on dealing with certain "pet" sins, God's Word is only able to grow in us until that sin stops it. Sin stops God's Word from taking a deep root in our lives. Then "when affliction or persecution comes" we experience Up-again, Down-again faith.

Sixth, and finally, this condition of Up-again, Down-again faith can be caused by:

DISTRACTIONS IN OUR LIVES

This same Parable of the Sower talks about "the anxiety of the world and the deceitfulness of wealth," Matthew 13:22. We worry too much about the bills, sports, video games, computers, cell phones, jobs, and so on. These receive a disproportionate amount of our time and attention. In this 21st century there are so many worldly things competing for our focus. Worldliness restrains us from having a steady walk with God. It is difficult to stay focused on our Lord.

We focus for a while and then something comes along that needs our urgent attention. After the distraction is dealt with, we come back to the Lord. Then we get preoccupied once more. The result is speed-up, slow-down Christianity; Up-again, Down-again faith. I get spiritual car sickness just thinking about it. This can't be the way God intended for us to live. The cure is keeping your priorities straight and your life balanced. Do not get caught up in the things of this world.

These are the things that cause Up-again, Down-again faith. If you know the causes you can head off these obstacles in your life and smooth out the humps. You are going to have your good days and your bad days. We all do. That is understandable. But what you want to avoid is a pattern of spiritual climbs and dives that do not seem to get better. If you see this happening in your life right now, then study and take to heart the scriptures in this chapter. Get off the roller coaster and train yourself to make smooth, steady progress in your spiritual maturity.