Your Faith
Even If Not
My dad and I are pretty tight. So when I learned he had the “C-word”– Cancer! – I was shattered. I didn’t show it, of course. I’m a pastor, after all, and we’re supposed to have faith about these things. Yet, the news was devastating. Nobody wants to hear they have an “incurable” disease. So my family did what any tightly-knit, strong-willed family of believers would do – we refused to accept the news. We saw a bunch of specialists – got second, third, and fourth opinions. We got everyone in our church praying for my dad’s complete recovery: “God, please heal my father. Take this away. Touch his body, Jesus, and remove the disease!” We prayed with great faith and determination – we knew God could do it! But He didn’t. And He hasn’t.
Ever receive tough news that’s hard to accept? Maybe your marriage ended. Or you lost your job. Or you’ve got your own health crisis. Or maybe it’s an ongoing struggle you’ve been wrestling with for years: You’re single and wonder if you’re ever going to meet someone. Or your kids are growing up... and going off the deep end. Maybe your business or career tanked, and you’re in a rough spot financially. Painful news – reality of life on this battered planet – can be hard to swallow. Especially when you were taught in Sunday School that the Christian life is “inright, outright, upright, downright happy all the time!” Whatever.
But through my Dad’s decade-long battle with cancer, my family learned a secret. Painful situations have the capacity to do one of two things: Either shatter one’s faith completely… or grow it to an entirely new level of trust in God’s goodness, in spite of the circumstances. Even if things don’t change. Even when God could change the situation… yet He doesn’t. My family has come to call it an “Even If Not” kinda faith.
Even If Not. Those are three very short, but powerful words. They come from the book of Daniel. You may remember the story of three young men who faced a painful test of their own. Talk about having your feet put to the fire. When King Nebuchadnezzar gave Shadrach, Meschach, and Abednego a searing choice – renounce their faith or be thrown into the fire – he meant it. Literally. He had a furnace heated to the point it could melt iron (Daniel 3:6). And if you’re a kid, this is where you love the Bible’s punch line… Jesus to the rescue! I can remember my Sunday School teacher acting it out. We were wide-eyed as we learned that into the furnace the boys went... and out of the furnace they came! Not a scratch. Not a singe. They didn’t even smell like smoke! Go, God! This is the Christianity we embrace as children… and hope continues as adults. In life, we may be tested. But if we simply have enough faith to believe the impossible, God will quench the flames & save the day! Yet – on the other side of many unanswered prayers – I’ve come to see the story through a different lens.
Nestled in Daniel 3:18 is a little phrase often overlooked – yet, in my view, changes everything. Check this out: Just before Shadrach, Meschach, and Abednego are thrown into the furnace, they’re given one last chance to give-up their faith. Standing on the edge of the oven, with the heat blasting up in their face, they say: “If we are thrown into the blazing furnace, the God we serve is able to save us from it, and he will rescue us from your hand, O king. But even if He does not, we want you to know, O king, that we will not serve your gods or worship the image of gold you have set up.” (Daniel 3:17-18) I love this – it’s what I call an “Even If Not” kinda faith! Trusting that God is capable of delivering you from whatever painful situation you’re facing. Yet, at the same time, declaring: “Even if Not… I will trust Him anyway!” Now this is something wholly different than the one-dimensional “God-will-save-the- day” prayers of assurance I learned in Sunday School. This is an attitude of DEFIANT faith. It’s staring straight down the barrel of your current crisis – a fracturing relationship, a financial bind or bankruptcy, a devastating diagnosis – and saying: I believe God can deliver me; but – EVEN IF NOT – I will trust Him anyway. I will not bend. I will not budge. Because my faith isn’t dependent on circumstances… but on the character of God Himself! Even If Not.
In World War II, those three words became a rallying cry in Britain. At a turning point in the war, England had suffered a huge defeat at the hand of the Nazis. The British army had been driven out of France and the nation was reeling. It was a hinge point in the Great Conflict… and literally, the freedom of the civilized world hung in the balance. Winston Churchill, the British Prime Minister, went on the radio to give a speech to the British people. The entire country held its breath as he growled: “We shall defend our island whatever the cost may be; we shall fight on beaches, landing grounds, in fields, in streets and on the hills...We shall never surrender....” The collective soul of the nation stirred as Churchill sounded a defiant rebuke of evil in the darkest hour. Then he paused and landed with these words: “But even if not… (we) will carry on the struggle until in God’s good time the New World with all its power and might, sets forth to the liberation and rescue of the Old.”
Even if not. Guess where he got those words? Today people don’t know the Bible. But in the 40s, everyone in Britain knew. And those three words became a rallying cry across the island: Soldiers wrote it on their helmets… Even If Not! People hung banners on their homes… Even If Not! Children scrawled it on their schoolbooks… Even If Not! And today through the crucible of my dad’s incurable cancer, we’ve come to learn the secret of “Even If Not.” Authentic biblical acceptance is not denial of hard times… but defiance of them! If you’re waiting on a spouse, or a job, or a recovery… do you have the faith to say: “I believe God can save the day. But even if not, I will trust Him anyway. Because even if I don’t live to see it in this life… I know in the next life, I will.” This is a gutsy, defiant faith in the face of adversity. It looks into the flames and – instead of shrinking back – hisses defiantly, “Even If Not!” It’s a gritty kind of faith I don’t recall from my sanitized Sunday School days.
My family’s last decade “in the furnace” with my dad’s lymphoma changed our faith – our prayers – in profound ways. I still pray: “God, I believe you can heal my dad. I know you can heal his physical body in this life. But even if not, I thank you for saving his soul in the next.” Through my dad’s chronic illness, we are learning an “Even If Not” kinda trust in God’s goodness. Knowing that, ultimately, God can be trusted to work all things – including suffering – together for good. How do we know? Because that’s what my Heavenly Father did with Jesus. In his life, death, and resurrection, Jesus endured the worst that the world had to offer… and lived to tell about it. Jesus, like you and I, wanted to avoid suffering if possible. He prayed honestly, “Father, if you are willing, take this cup from me….”
It’s natural in crisis to yearn for a way out. And God can change any situation. Yet, Jesus trusted his Father’s goodness and embraced the painful road before him: “…yet not my will, but yours be done.” (Luke 22:42) Even If Not. Jesus voluntarily entered the furnace of unjust suffering… and lived to see Easter morning. More than that: He lived to walk through the fire with us. Even if the flames aren’t quenched, but actually grow brighter. Friends, this is the heart of Christianity and what sets our faith apart from every other world religion. At the center of our faith is a God who has chosen to save His people by suffering Himself! He is not whimsical or capricious – choosing to answer some prayers, and not others. Rather, Christ voluntarily enters our lives to walk through the fire with us. There’s something about resurrections that first requires a cross, isn’t there? I tread lightly here, but can I ask: Is it possible God yearns to use your current crisis to take you to an entirely new level of trust in Christ? To actually give you a taste of joy in the midst of hard times? See: Happiness depends on happenings. But joy comes from something deeper – a crucified life that trusts Christ is in the crisis. Not above the fire. Not after the flames are put out. But in the midst of them. Even if not.
My dad’s been in remission over 9 years now. The cancer, we’ve learned, will likely never leave his body. In fact, in time, it may overtake him. But by accepting his condition – through defiance, not denial – we’ve learned the secret of joy in hard times. We still ask God everyday to sustain my father’s health. But we also pray “Even if Not”… and release his care into the good arms of our crucified God. When the heat’s turned up in your life, do you have an “Even If Not” kinda faith? Because this is where God is taking you. As James writes: “Consider it pure joy, my brothers, whenever you face trials of many kinds, because you know that the testing of your faith develops perseverance. Perseverance must finish its work so that you may be mature and complete, not lacking anything.” (James 1:2-4)
Whatever struggle you’re going through, know this: It’s normal. It’s part of God’s work in you. On this side of Heaven, God’s growing our faith for eternity. So whatever crisis you’re facing today, may you find the strength to believe the miraculous. To know in your heart that God can and may change your circumstances; but even if not… He will change you! 