Faith, by its nature, involves risk. That’s what makes it faith. I’m committing myself to something I can’t prove. I’m believing that something exists which hasn’t arrived. I’m seeing something with spiritual eyes that I haven’t seen yet with my physical eyes. And if that faith is going to last until the promise is fulfilled, I must make a long-term commitment to that decision because no faith goes untested. I must press past obstacles and nurture my faith so that it will endure over time. Some answers arrive much sooner than others, but in one way or another faith always requires me to walk steadily toward something I don’t see but I believe God told me is there. I’ve decided that what I will gain if I’m right is so much more valuable than what I will lose if I’m not, that I’m going to pursue that promise by faith. The apostle Paul weighed the cost versus benefit of following Jesus this way. “For I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory that is to be revealed to us” (Ro 8:18).

His eyes of faith saw beyond this present world to the eternal blessings of the age to come. In his mind the benefits of eternal life are so wonderful that he gladly paid whatever price he had to pay to go there and to take as many people with him as possible. He saw the prize waiting at the end of the race; he saw the victory waiting at the end of the battle, and he refused to let anyone or anything take that away from him.