Faithfulness and loyalty are virtues that never go out of style. We enter marriages with the hope and conviction that our partners will be faithful to us for a lifetime. We vote for people who we think will be loyal to the values of the platform upon which he or she ran. We look for friends who will go the distance with us. To be a faithful person is to be, as the dictionary tells us, “steadfast in affection or allegiance; loyal; firm in adherence to promises or in observance of duty; conscientious.”
Faithfulness is, first and foremost, an attribute of God. Moses described God like this: “Know therefore that the Lord your God is God, the faithful God who keeps covenant and steadfast love with those who love him and keep his commandments, to a thousand generations” (Deuteronomy 7:9). Throughout the pages of the Scriptures, God’s people continue to praise Him for His faithfulness to them: “But you, O Lord, are a God merciful and gracious, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness” (Psalm 86:15).
Faithfulness is also an attribute that can and should be ascribed to us as Jesus followers. In fact, Paul refers to faithfulness as a “fruit of the Spirit” that should be evident in a believer’s life (Galatians 5:22). Though our faithfulness falls far short of God’s, we are still able to exhibit loyal allegiance and steadfast affection. In Hebrews 11, we learn that faithfulness is a quality God is looking for in His children. The author of Hebrews catalogs men and women who, through faith, lived lives of submission and obedience to the Lord. They were far from perfect but they willingly followed God’s call on their life. They toiled, suffered, and persevered, all awaiting the day when they would be rewarded for their faithfulness in eternity. With these people, “God is not ashamed to be called their God” (Hebrews 11:16).
As you tell your story, make it your goal to be a faithful witness to God’s work in your life. You are not responsible for someone’s response to your story; that is between them and God. God has called you not to perfection but to faithfulness.
The apostle Paul described his understanding of faithfulness like this: “My speech and my message were not in plausible words of wisdom, but in demonstration of the Spirit and of power, so that your faith might not rest in the wisdom of men but in the power of God” (1 Corinthians 2:4–5). Paul was happy to tell his story and to trust that the Spirit of God would move powerfully. He did not want to sway people’s emotions through fancy rhetoric. He was uninterested in impressing others with human wisdom. He simply wanted to share his story as a demonstration not of his own power but as a demonstration of the Holy Spirit’s power. As we give voice to our stories, we need to adopt a similar mindset to Paul’s. We are there to faithfully tell of God’s goodness and then to leave the results to God.