The Lord of hosts—regard Him as holy and honor His holy name [by regarding Him as your only hope of safety], and let Him be your fear and let Him be your dread [lest you offend Him by your fear of man and distrust of Him]. – Isaiah 8:13, Amplified Bible (AMP)

The Lord repeatedly teaches us in His word that the more we trust Him, the more He’ll reward us for our faith. What we often miss, however, is that our lack of faith not only results in lack of reward; it also results in irritating our Lord.

In both Isaiah 7 and Isaiah 8, God reminds us that He finds lack of faith to be offensive. In Isaiah 7:9, for example, God (through Isaiah) told King Ahaz that if he chose to trust the king of Assyria rather than God to deliver him from his enemies, then God would not allow him to be established in his kingdom. In Isaiah 8:13, God admonished Isaiah himself to trust God rather than fear man lest God be offended at the prophet’s lack of trust. Both passages prove that our failure to take God at His word is irritating to the Creator, and the reason our lack of faith is so irritating is this: when we fail to take God at His word, we call Him a liar.

“Wait a minute now,” you might say, “I have NEVER called God a liar!” Yes you have, and so have I! Each time we have failed to rely on God’s provision and substituted our own solutions for His, we have called Him a liar. Each time we have allowed worry to crowd out from our hearts and our minds His peace that passes all understanding, we have called Him a liar. Each time we have departed from the path of life that He has clearly shown us to pursue, we have called Him a liar. In short, each time we have failed to rely on one of the many promises that God has made to us in His word, we have sinned, for we have called Him a liar, not with our lips, but with our actions. Our behavior is the evidence of what we truly believe, and when our actions evidence self-reliance, they also evidence our lack of trust in God, no matter what we might say.

We offend God everyday on so many levels, but it is perhaps in this area of lack of trust that we Christians fail our Lord the most. Endeavor to trust Him more and more each day, and never cease to pray that needful prayer of Mark 9:24:

Lord, I believe! [Constantly] help my weakness of faith!

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