Every Friday I join a community of bloggers for Five Minute Friday. One word prompt, five minutes. Unedited. The prompt this week is … Fast.
I was blessed to be raised in the church. It was a small church and everyone knew everyone. We were in Sunday School every week with lessons to be read, verses to be memorized, and flannelgraph images to bring the stories to life.
Nothing fancy, very plain really, but the stories and verses stuck.
The word prompt immediately brought one phrase to mind – “hold fast.”
Hold fast means to remain secured tightly to something; to continue to believe in or adhere to an idea or principle. Or one might even say, to biblical principles.
As the years pass, it seems the world is changing more rapidly than I would like. Or perhaps I should say, faster than I would like.
“Only be very careful to observe the commandment and the law which Moses the servant of the Lord commanded you, to love the Lord your God and walk in all His ways and keep His commandments and hold fast to Him and serve Him with all your heart and with all your soul.” (Joshua 22:5, NASB)
Scripture reminds us to hold fast to God, to His Word, and to serving Him. And we are to do so with all of our being.
This concept of “holding fast” is repeated as Paul writes to Timothy. The wording is slightly different, but again we see we are to continue in the things we learned and are convinced of; the things that led us to faith in Christ.
“You, however, continue in the things you have learned and become convinced of, knowing from whom you have learned them, and that from childhood you have known the sacred writings which are able to give you the wisdom that leads to salvation through faith which is in Christ Jesus.” (2 Timothy 3:14-15, NASB)
The world is changing fast.
Jesus remains the same yesterday and today and forever.
Hold fast to Him.
Photo by Joel Muniz on Unsplash
Today I may be joining …
Thank you for this beautiful encouragement to hold fast to Him, Joanne.
I love your reflection Joanne – a reminder to hold fast to the Lord!
I grew up in sere desert hills
always on my own,
and life goes as Good Lord wills,
and thus I am alone
even with a loving wife
and church that’s longing to embrace;
community is not my life,
and love is not my grace.
I do my best with what I’ve got
to be a bulwark of support,
but I can’t be what I’m not,
and there is no retort
that I can give, called out for lack,
but to say I wish I could go back.
a good reminder to us all indeed. fmf15
I love this verse and concept. How we need to cling to Him in every up and down.
Praise God we have him to hold on to as he holds on to us–especially during these problematic times! We are never alone, never without his goodness at work in our lives, never without his strength and comfort. Hallelujah!
Learning to “hold fast” to Jesus in this crazy-fast world is such an important spiritual discipline. I needed this post today, Joanne.