God's Promises

For all the promises of God in Him are Yes, and in Him Amen, to the glory of God through us.

Every promise God has ever made finds its confirmation in Christ. Not some promises. All promises. The Yes is already spoken. When you bring a promise to God in prayer, you are not asking whether He meant it. You are agreeing with a Yes that was already declared. In Him, every promise is Amen.

God is not a man, that He should lie, nor a son of man, that He should repent. Has He said, and will He not do? Or has He spoken, and will He not make it good?

The reliability of God's word rests on His nature, not on circumstances. Men lie. God does not. Men change their minds. God does not. What He has said, He will do. What He has spoken, He will make good. The question at the end of the verse is rhetorical: of course He will. Every promise is backed by the character of the one who made it.

So shall My word be that goes forth from My mouth; it shall not return to Me void, but it shall accomplish what I please, and it shall prosper in the thing for which I sent it.

God's word does not fail. It goes out with a purpose and it accomplishes that purpose. When you stand on a promise, you are standing on a word that is already accomplishing what it was sent to do. It does not require your performance to become effective. It requires your faith to receive what it is already accomplishing.

And we know that all things work together for good to those who love God, to those who are the called according to His purpose.

The word know here is settled confidence, not a nervous hope. All things: not selected things or pleasant things. God has promised that His purpose will be accomplished through everything that touches your life. The promise is not that everything will feel good. The promise is that everything will be worked toward good by a God who holds the outcome.

For I know the thoughts that I think toward you, says the Lord, thoughts of peace and not of evil, to give you a future and a hope.

God's thoughts toward you are peaceful, not harmful. He has plans for your future and your hope. This was spoken to Israel in exile, to people in the worst circumstances imaginable, and God's plan had not changed. Your circumstances do not revise what God has planned for you. The plans were made before the problem arrived.

For the Lord God is a sun and shield; the Lord will give grace and glory; no good thing will He withhold from those who walk uprightly.

The Father is not a withholder. No good thing will He withhold. This is a promise about the generous nature of God toward His children. When you are walking with Him, you can trust that what is good for you will not be kept from you. The promises of God are backed by His nature as a Father who delights in giving to His children.

Through the Lord's mercies we are not consumed, because His compassions fail not. They are new every morning; great is Your faithfulness.

Written in the middle of complete devastation, Lamentations 3 turns on this verse. The compassions of God do not fail. They are renewed every morning. Faithfulness is the character of God, not a performance He is trying to maintain. Whatever He promised yesterday is still promised today. Whatever ran out, His mercy did not.

For with God nothing will be impossible.

The promise you are holding is not too big for God. Nothing is impossible with Him. This was spoken to Mary when she was told she would conceive a child as a virgin, which was humanly impossible. The promises God gives are often humanly impossible. That is not a disqualifying factor. It is the category in which God works.

Let us hold fast the confession of our hope without wavering, for He who promised is faithful.

The reason to hold fast without wavering is not your strength. It is His faithfulness. He who promised is faithful. The promise does not depend on whether you deserve it or perform well enough to maintain it. It depends on whether the one who made it is faithful. And He is.

by which have been given to us exceedingly great and precious promises, that through these you may be partakers of the divine nature, having escaped the corruption that is in the world through lust.

The promises are described as exceedingly great and precious, and Peter says through them you partake of the divine nature. The promises are not just blessings on the outside of your life. They are the means by which you are transformed from the inside. Receiving what God has promised is not greed. It is becoming who God made you to be.