I heard a song recently by Sanctus Real entitled Confidence.  I like the song.  It’s got good lyrics, an upbeat tempo, and a singable melody.  There are some parts of it that give me pause, however.

The refrain refers to Daniel’s faith, Moses’ hope, and David’s heart, and the singer asks that God would grant him these tremendous qualities.  These are the kind of qualities that should be the aspiration of every follower of Jesus, examples from Israelite “giants of the faith.”  I aim for them, myself.  I have studied each of these amazing people in depth, and that is what gives me pause.

Moses lived for 80 years before he began to lead the Israelites into the wilderness.  He barely escaped death at his birth, was adopted by and lived in Pharoah’s palace with Pharoah’s daughter, murdered a man and had to run for his life, spent many years in humiliating seclusion, refused to follow God’s call to him in the burning bush (but eventually acquiesced), and finally stared down a different Pharoah in a series of terrible catastrophes that the Lord brought upon Egypt.  Those tragedies left many dead because of Pharoah’s stubborn response to God’s call through Moses to let the Israelites go.   At age 80, he began to lead a bunch of complaining, former slaves through 40 years of harrowing, near-annihilation experiences in the desert.  At one point, he got so frustrated that he disobeyed God’s direct instructions (striking a rock with his staff rather than speaking to it), and was eventually denied entry into the promised land because of his anger.  He received not one, but two sets of God’s instructions on an enshrouded Mt. Sinai.  He received the second after he came down from the mountain the first time to find his brother leading the Israelites in pagan worship.  He threw the first set on the ground in frustration and rage.  He later offered himself as a sacrifice instead of those self-same Israelites to prevent God from finally eliminating them.  When he was 120 years old and close to death, God allowed him to see the promised land from afar, at which time Moses expressed the hope that his bones would one day be buried there.  That’s a rough road to travel in order for Moses to develop his hope.

Daniel was a youth in a noble family in Israel, enjoying a comfortable life until Nebuchadnezzar laid siege to Jerusalem and sacked it.  He was taken hostage, along with other noble children and subjected to indoctrination of a Babylonian sort, which he resisted in the only way he knew how.  Even though he worked with complete integrity in the Babylonian government, his life was directly and indirectly threatened multiple times by at least three rulers in Babylon, mostly by way of political intrigue at court and tyrannical edicts by manipulated despots.  The Lord saved him every time via miraculous means, but the danger was no less real.  In all of this, he remained “blameless” (God’s word, not mine).  Ultimately, the exile was instrumental in confessing the sins of Israel (many of which he probably never directly committed) and lifted a whole-hearted prayer to God Most High.  The Lord accepted Daniel’s prayer and in response returned Israel to the land in fulfillment of His promise through Jeremiah (see Jeremiah 29:10-14 and Daniel 9:2-3).  Daniel developed his faith only being able to worship in hiding with three other folks of like faith, without teachers and leaders to guide him, without a culture to support his faith development, and without being able to control anything around him (at least that we know of).  He had an almost impossible road, but in his early 80s, was granted visions and promises because he was “highly favored” (once again, not my words, but those of the angel Gabriel).  That’s a long, difficult path to a vibrant faith.

David was described in Scripture as someone who was a “man after God’s own heart.”  That is such a wonderful accolade, but he started life as the youngest son of a farming family, meaning he had no status of any sort and little hope of much of an inheritance, so he was sent to tend the sheep.  He was shockingly chosen out of a lineup to become God’s anointed king over Israel, but could not serve because the current king, Saul, refused to acknowledge David’s position.  He spent many years running for his life from Saul, living in caves and deserts, threatened in almost every way imaginable.  The pain he went through enabled him to write many of the most emotion-filled Psalms.  When he finally became king, he was successful at virtually everything he did, including taking another man’s wife and having that man killed.  A man of passion, David listened to the words of his good friend and prophet Nathan, and being cut to the heart by his own sin, wrote Psalm 51, a Psalm of contrition and humility before his Holy God.  His only defense was to throw himself on the mercy of the God who had kept him alive time and again during his flight from Saul and his later military conquests.  He never saw his legacy – a temple built to the glory of his Great God – fulfilled.  God would not allow him to see it finished even though he gathered materials for it for many years.  David’s Lord was merciful to him, but David’s heart was broken many times so that it could be formed into what it ultimately became.

So, when we ask God to form these desirable qualities in our hearts, are we ready for what it takes?  Are we ready to walk the roads of struggle so that our faith, hope, and love (hearts) may be formed as they were in these wonderful examples?  I can’t imagine living with murder on my rap-sheet of life.  Or bearing multiple self-inflicted heartbreaks.  That’s especially true if it means trying to develop a faith walk within a culture that is completely contrary to everything I’m striving to be with little fellowship and no mentors or examples.  Those wouldn’t be easy burdens to bear.

I do not mean by this to criticize the music Sanctus Real has lifted up.  I think they raise up the important reality that comes from these kinds of requests.  We encounter our own struggles, enduring all kinds of abuse, deprivation, temptation, failure, and disappointment in our own experiences.  Our adventures may not be as spectacular as some of those we read in Scripture, but the Father is at work in our lives, too.  He is forming the image of His Son, making sure that our struggles work good things in our lives, in our souls.  This happens when we walk our difficult paths in faith, trusting Him.  Where do we recognize God’s loving hands forming spirits of His design in us through the trials and tragedies we endure? 

Ultimately, we really can’t have a faith like Daniel’s, or a hope like Moses’, or a heart like David’s.  We can’t walk the paths they walked.  We have our own.  God is at work, creating in each of us our own reflection of His image.  We are encouraged when we find God’s work in us and through us.  That’s where I think we find our confidence.  May our loving Father make it so.