A verse on the page becomes a living word when we carry it into fear, temptation and hardship.
By Fr Joby George VC
I once came across an acronym for faith in one of my old session notes: Faithfulness Applied Inevitably in Temptation and Hardship. It is simple enough to remember, but it says something demanding about the Christian life. Faith is not merely an idea we accept, a feeling we enjoy in prayer or a word we use when life is peaceful. Faith becomes visible as faithfulness, and faithfulness is tested precisely when temptation presses upon us and hardship makes obedience costly.
That is why I wanted this retreat session to be more than another teaching about faith. I wanted us to think about testimony. When we hear that word, we often think immediately of a healing received during Eucharistic Adoration, a prayer answered in an unexpected way or a crisis from which the Lord rescued us. Those are precious testimonies, and we should give thanks for them. Yet there is another kind of testimony that can be quieter and more gradual: the testimony of a particular word of God that entered our struggle, remained with us and slowly changed the direction of our life.
A verse may be familiar for years before it becomes personal. We may know where it is written, hear it proclaimed at Mass and even repeat it to other people, while it still remains outside the deepest place of our fear or weakness. Then a moment comes when that same verse seems to stand before us with new clarity. We carry it into prayer, return to it again and again, and discover that the Lord is not only speaking to a prophet, an apostle or a distant generation. He is speaking His living word into the situation in which our own faithfulness is being tested.
Faithfulness Applied Inevitably in Temptation and Hardship
Faithfulness is never vague. It is applied in the real places of life: in the conversation where we are tempted to speak falsely, in the private habit we are ashamed to admit, in the disappointment that makes us question God’s care, and in the responsibility for which we feel completely unprepared. We can admire faith in theory and still compromise when pressure arrives. The invitation of the Gospel is to let what we believe become the way we remain with God when an easier path appears.
The word of God is given to us for those places. Scripture does not become powerful because we use it as a slogan or repeat it mechanically. It is powerful because the Holy Spirit takes the word inspired by God and brings it into contact with the truth of our life. The verse may correct us, console us, expose an excuse, strengthen a weak decision or remind us that the power of Christ is greater than the fear standing before us. When we stay with the word in that way, it begins to move from the page into the heart.
This does not mean that every difficulty disappears at once. Sometimes the first fruit of Scripture is not the removal of the hardship but the grace to remain faithful within it. The word gives us enough light for the next step and enough courage not to abandon the path God has placed before us. Looking back, we may then recognise that the verse which accompanied us through the struggle has become inseparable from the story of God’s work in us. It has become our testimony.
A Word for a Ministry I Did Not Choose
One word that became very close to my heart is Jeremiah 1:9: “Then the Lord put forth his hand and touched my mouth; and the Lord said to me, ‘Behold, I have put my words in your mouth.’” I already knew that verse, but it became personal during the second year of my priesthood, when I was appointed assistant director at the Divine Retreat Centre in Delhi. I had not been preparing myself for full-time preaching ministry, and a retreat centre was the last appointment I expected to receive so early.
My hesitation was serious, but there was also humour in it. I had watched some older priests enter retreat ministry and become so absorbed in preaching, prayer and preparation that they seemed to stop laughing and making ordinary conversation. There was nothing wrong with their dedication, but I looked at them and became afraid that the same thing would happen to me. Without talking, Father Joby cannot survive. I imagined entering a retreat centre and becoming silent, and I decided that this should certainly not happen during the first five years of my priesthood.
When my superiors asked what I wanted to do, I first suggested further studies because I thought I was good at studying. They reminded me that I had only just begun priestly ministry and could study later. Then I suggested a seminary because I liked being with students, although I must admit that the afternoon games were part of the attraction. They told me that the seminaries already had enough people. When they finally asked about a retreat centre, I answered honestly that I was not ready. Only then did they inform me that the appointment had already been made.
I accepted the appointment and went with genuine joy, but the challenges soon became obvious. The centre ministered in three languages, and one of them was Hindi. I had studied Hindi at school without becoming comfortable in it. My father was a businessman, and he had once urged me to learn the language because he hoped it would be useful if the family business expanded beyond South India. I found it so difficult that I could not even learn to count money confidently in Hindi. Years later, God placed me in a ministry where I had to preach in that same language. After almost a year, I called my father and told him that his desire had been fulfilled, although in a completely different trade.
The language was not my only struggle. Two senior priests at the retreat centre were close friends of mine, gifted preachers who knew the language and spoke with confidence. When I stood beside them, I became painfully conscious of everything I seemed to lack. I would stand before the people and feel that my words were not powerful enough and that there was not enough content in what I was saying. To prepare a half-hour session, I could spend two hours, and even then the inspiration did not come easily. Comparison turned ordinary difficulty into a judgement upon my vocation, and I began to think, ‘I am not made for this.’
One day I sat in our private chapel with the Bible in my hand. Jeremiah 1:9 rose within me in my native language: the Lord put out His hand, touched the prophet’s mouth and placed His own words there. The verse had always been in Scripture, but that day it entered the exact fear I was carrying. I began to read it every evening and repeat it while using the beads of the Rosary, sometimes fifty times and sometimes a hundred, continuing until my restless heart became quiet enough to receive what the word was saying.
I was not trying to force God through repetition, and I was not replacing study, preparation or the hard work of learning a language. I was allowing the truth of Scripture to confront the belief that everything depended upon my natural ability. Each time I prayed the verse, I placed my inadequacy before the Lord who calls. If He had put me in that ministry, then He could touch what was weak, provide the word I did not possess and give the inspiration of the Holy Spirit that I could not manufacture for myself.
Towards the end of that year, I sensed the Lord saying within my heart that as long as I remained close to the word of God and prayed the word of God, the touch and inspiration of the Holy Spirit would strengthen me. That was the starting point of my preaching ministry. I had been placed somewhere I neither intended nor felt ready to go, and there the Lord revealed to me that His word carries power for the work He asks us to do.
Jeremiah 1:9 did not become my testimony because it removed every weakness or made preparation unnecessary. It became my testimony because the verse changed the way I entered the ministry. Instead of standing before people as though I had to create everything from myself, I learned to remain close to the word and depend upon the Holy Spirit. The Lord who calls does not always remove our sense of limitation, but He can make that limitation the place where we learn whose word we are carrying.
A Word for a Weakness I Could Not Defeat Alone
A second word became important to me in a more private struggle. During my seminary years, I was dealing with a spiritual weakness and did not know how to overcome it. I went for spiritual guidance and spoke honestly to a priest about what I was facing. He gave me 1 John 3:8-9 and asked me to read and pray it. The central words were strong: “Everyone who commits sin is a child of the devil; for the devil has been sinning from the beginning. The Son of God was revealed for this purpose, to destroy the works of the devil.”
I needed both parts of that verse. The first part exposed the seriousness of sin. It did not invite me to hate myself or to deny the dignity God had given me. It showed me what the sin belonged to and what kind of bondage I was allowing to enter my life. When I prayed the words in the light of my desire for freedom, an aversion began to grow within me. I could no longer treat the weakness as harmless, excuse it easily or pretend that it had no spiritual consequence.
During the talk, I compared this effect to the way some treatments for addiction may create an unpleasant reaction to the substance a person has been using. The reaction establishes distance: the attraction may still be present, but the person remembers the consequence and no longer approaches it in the same carefree way. I was not giving medical advice or suggesting that every addiction is treated in one manner. I was describing what the word did spiritually within me. It brought the consequence of the sin before my mind and weakened the false friendliness I had developed towards it.
As the verse resounded within me, the prayer became very direct: ‘Jesus, I do not want this. I do not want to belong to what opposes You. I do not want to return to this sin.’ That movement away from sin was necessary, but the word did not leave me only with fear or disgust. The second half gave what I called the antidote: “The Son of God was revealed for this purpose, to destroy the works of the devil.” The same Scripture that uncovered the bondage also directed me towards the One who had the power to break it.
Freedom therefore did not depend upon my proving that I was strong enough. I had to hold on to Jesus. The verse taught me that the Son of God had entered precisely to destroy the works that enslave His children. Repentance was not merely a desperate attempt to escape something shameful; it was a turning towards Christ, trusting that His grace could do in me what willpower alone had failed to accomplish.
The change was not as quick as I expected. I thought that perhaps two or three months of prayer would bring the struggle to an end, but it took much longer. I continued to pray the word. Little by little, it created greater distance from the weakness, strengthened the decision to resist and renewed my confidence that Jesus had not abandoned me in the struggle. What had felt like a private defeat slowly became another testimony to the patience of God.
I share this carefully because spiritual freedom should never be reduced to a formula. Repeating a verse does not give us permission to ignore confession, wise guidance, accountability or appropriate professional care when these are needed. In my own case, the word came through spiritual consultation, and I had to remain with it over time. The testimony is not that I discovered an instant technique. The testimony is that the living word led me away from sin and towards Jesus until grace became stronger than the bondage I had been carrying.
Pray the Word Until It Reaches the Heart
These two experiences were different, but the movement was the same. Jeremiah 1:9 met me in the fear that I was not equipped for the ministry entrusted to me. First John 3 met me in a spiritual weakness that I could not defeat by pretending it was small. In one place, the word gave courage for a mission; in the other, it exposed bondage and directed me towards freedom. Scripture became fruitful because it was carried into the precise place where my faithfulness was being tested.
This is why praying the word is more than collecting attractive verses. We must read Scripture in its proper context, receive it within the faith of the Church and allow it to address the truth of our life. Sometimes a word consoles us; sometimes it corrects us. Sometimes it promises strength, and sometimes it removes an excuse we have carefully protected. If we accept only the verses that make us comfortable, we may miss the word through which the Lord desires to convert us.
Repetition can help because the mind often understands a truth before the heart is ready to live by it. We may read, ‘The Lord has put His words in your mouth,’ and still enter the next responsibility convinced that everything depends upon us. We may read that the Son of God came to destroy the works of the devil and still behave as though our bondage has the final authority. Returning patiently to the verse allows its truth to challenge the fear or desire that has been repeated within us for much longer.
Yet repetition is prayer, not incantation. The power is not in a number of recitations, nor in treating the Bible as a collection of magical sentences. The power belongs to God, who speaks through His word and acts by the Holy Spirit. Our part is to remain attentive, to prepare responsibly, to repent concretely, to seek guidance when necessary and to obey the light we have received. The word becomes testimony as it is welcomed into a life that is willing to be changed.
Perhaps there is already a verse that has accompanied you through a difficult season. It may have given peace when fear was strong, protected you from a wrong decision, called you back after a failure or sustained you while an answer was delayed. Do not dismiss that history. Remember how the Lord used His word, give thanks for it and allow the testimony to strengthen someone else who is now walking through a similar struggle.
Perhaps you are still in the middle of the struggle and cannot yet speak about victory. Then ask the Lord for a word that leads you towards truth and towards Christ. Stay with it. Pray it honestly. Let it examine your choices and shape the next faithful action. The fact that the testimony is unfinished does not mean that God is absent. My own second struggle lasted much longer than I expected, but the word continued to work while I continued to hold on to Jesus.
What Word Has Become Your Testimony?
I asked the congregation that evening whether they had a testimony of the word of God transforming their life. I ask the same question now. Is there a passage that has become more than something you know? Is there a verse through which the Lord touched your fear, corrected your direction, strengthened you against temptation or gave you courage for a task you did not feel ready to accept? That word deserves to be remembered, prayed and shared with humility.
Faithfulness Applied Inevitably in Temptation and Hardship is not an acronym for easy days. It describes the slow and often hidden work of remaining with God when compromise would be simpler. In that place, Scripture can move from the page into our decisions, from memory into trust and from a verse we quote into a grace by which we live. When the word of God is carried faithfully through the struggle, it becomes part of the story of what the Lord has done in us.
Stay close to the word of God. Pray the word of God. Allow the Holy Spirit to bring it into the place where you are afraid, unprepared, tempted or bound. The Lord who touched Jeremiah’s mouth still knows how to strengthen those He calls, and the Son of God is still able to destroy the works that keep His people from freedom. Let the word enter your life until it becomes your testimony.
Pastoral note: Prayer with Scripture should accompany, not replace, sacramental confession, sound spiritual direction and appropriate medical or psychological care. Strong biblical language about sin must never be used to shame a person, deny human dignity or discourage professional help for addiction or compulsive behaviour.
Adapted and edited from Day Retreat Session Four, delivered by Fr Joby George VC at Holy Family Church, Doveton, during the July 2026 Divine Australia programme.