How come that we – seeing the faith and trust of others – often feel unsettled instead of happy? A mixture of feelings - like despair and envy - overcomes us, and more than ever we tend to give up everything and succumb to pessimism.
Our response to the testimony of others is often so negative, because we look at it entirely the wrong way. A pure testimony is not about what someone has accomplished in his religiosity, but about what God has done in that person. And what He has done in someone else, He is willing to do in us too.
In this way the great cloud of witnesses surrounding us becomes an encouragement for us to expect much more of God. When we see what God did through them, the desire will arise in us to become useful for the kingdom of God, just like they were. The only valuable response we can then give is not to give up and despair – and surely not to roll up our sleeves either, overly zealous for God – but to submit to Him willingly.
But we regard submission as admitting weakness, a sign of failure. And if we then think of the people around us, how they will react when they see how weak we actually are… Therefore, we read in the Bible verse of today: ‘Fixing our eyes on Jesus…’ Oh, what if Jesus had been bothered even a little bit by the opinion of His disappointed disciples!
Let us therefore, just like Jesus, be focused on the joy that is sure to come when we submit to Him, willingly and full of trust. Then we will never grow weary and lose heart!