What is faith?
That was gorgeous on so many
levels. I feel like the Holy Spirit took
those words this morning. Somebody out
there; that was just what you needed. I
want you to to know that God was speaking that to you.
The past number of weeks, God’s had
this one thing on my heart night and day, when it comes to my life, when it
comes to the life of this church. It’s
this phrase: TAKE A STEP OF FAITH.
I’ve been asking this question, what
is it in your life that God is challenging you to trust Him in? What relationship is it in your life? Maybe busted like the song was talking
about. Maybe your marriage, kids, a
grandchild who’s in trouble and God is telling you, “I want you to trust
Me. I want you to step out. Stop manipulating. Stop talking. Stop fretting.
Come and bring it to me. Trust me.”
There’s a relationship you need to
end, but it’s hard. There’s a lot of
emotional attachment there. God’s called
you to take a step of faith and trust Him.
Do that hard thing, believing that the Lord will be with you. I don’t know what it is. It could be a habit, an addiction, and God
wants it in 2016 to go. He is calling
you up higher. It is time. God is saying for you to “come seek Me in My
word. I want you to read the Word. I
want you to get hungry like you haven’t been hungry in a long time. I want you to get humble like you haven’t
been in a long time. It’s time. I want you to see me. Want you on
your face in prayer. Come after
Me. Take that step of faith. Stop being
satisfied with being dissatisfied.”
Take a step of faith. I don’t know what it is for you, but this
morning I want to pose a terribly important question. If faith is this critical thing in the scriptures...
Can I say? It is! From Genesis to Revelation.
Hebrews 11:6 But without faith it
is impossible to please (God)…
Without these steps of faith, it
doesn’t matter what your spiritual resume looks life. You can’t please Him.
Hebrews 10:38 Now the just shall
live by faith…
It’s supposed to be the life blood
of your spiritual walk. Somebody wrote
this:
“Faith is all important in the life
of the soul. Without faith it is
impossible to please God. Faith will get
me anything, take me anywhere in the Kingdom of God, but without faith there
can be no approach to God, no forgiveness, no deliverance, no salvation, no
communion, no spiritual life at all.”
I can promise you this, every single
breathing soul in this auditorium, up in the balcony, back in our children’s
wing; God is calling you to take some step of faith. But that begs a very important question:
WHAT IS FAITH?
I know we call have notions about
what faith is, especially if you’ve been in church for a while.
- Is faith simply a feeling in your gut like
anger, or attraction, or indigestion?
I feel like this thing is going to happen, so I must have
faith. Or if you don’t feel
something is going to happen, I don’t know what’s wrong with me, I guess I
just don’t have faith.
- If you ask the Biblicist “Faith is the substance of
things hoped for and the evidence of things not seen.” (What does that mean?)
How do I take a step of faith? What does
that look like? Should I feel nothing?
Should I feel something? Do I do nothing? Do I do something? How do I know where God is calling me to step
out in faith and Preacher, what would it look like if I did.
We are going to look to an
appropriate place to find our answer this morning. We’re going to look to what has been called the
“Faith Chapter” in the Bible (Hebrews 11) and go further than that and look at
the specific illustration of a man who was referred to as the “Father of the
Faithful” to find out exactly what faith is.
Hebrews
11:8-11 By faith Abraham,
when he was called to go out into a place which he should after receive for an
inheritance, obeyed; and he went out, not knowing whither he went. 9By faith
he sojourned in the land of promise, as in a strange country,
dwelling in tabernacles with Isaac and Jacob, the heirs with him of the same
promise:10For he
looked for a city which hath foundations, whose builder and maker is God. 11Through
faith also Sara herself received strength to conceive seed (to have a baby), and
was delivered of a child when she was past (baby havin’) age, because she judged him faithful who
had promised. 12Therefore sprang there even of one, and him as
good as dead, so many as the stars of the sky in multitude,
and as the sand which is by the sea shore innumerable.
We’re
going to take Abraham, the father of the faithful, and we’re going to go back
to Genesis and unpack this. I don’t know
about you, but I don’t deal with “vagueries”, with just concept. I need it simpler, plainer than that. If faith is this important God, and if You’re
calling me to do it, Lord please tell me what it is! We’re going to see
precisely what it is this morning in the life of Abraham (Genesis 11). So turn, click, flip, power up, rainman it,
whatever.
Before
we start looking at particular instances let me tell you this; faith is always
three things.
Faith
is:
Knowledge
– Belief – Subsequent Behavior
(Head – Heart – Hand)
Genesis 11:27-31 Now
these are the generations of Terah: Terah begat Abram (who became
Abraham), Nahor, and Haran; and Haran
begat Lot. 28And Haran died before his father Terah in the land
of his nativity, in Ur of the Chaldees (that’s a city). 29And Abram and Nahor took them wives: the name of
Abram's wife was Sarai; and the name of Nahor's wife, Milcah,
the daughter of Haran, the father of Milcah, and the father of Iscah. 30But
Sarai was barren; she had no child. 31And
Terah (Abraham’s
Daddy) took Abram his son, and Lot the
son of Haran his son's son, and Sarai his daughter in law, his son Abram's
wife; and they went forth with them from Ur of the Chaldees, to go into the
land of Canaan; and they came unto Haran, and dwelt there.
Not
overly fascinating at first glance. It
really just looks like Terrah living in a city called Ur of the Chaldees, which
is modern-day Iraq. By the way, they
have found all sorts of remnant of this place and it’s a fascinating study if
you want to look up Ur and a ruler named Ur-Nammu and the ziggurat he built. This is an incredibly advanced city; it was
like the mecca of modern civilization back in that day. Had advancements that other cities couldn’t
dream of – it was the place to be!
Terrah had his family there, raising them in Ur of the Chaldees. At some point, the bible says he gets stirred
up by something to go to the Canaan. He
only makes it as far as a city called Haran; so he moves his family there and
he stays there. That doesn’t tell us a
whole lot about Abraham, it simply tells us Abraham went with his daddy. He takes his wife Sarah, who the Bible makes a
very important parenthetical note to tell us she can’t have children. So at first glance, maybe Terrah got a better
job. Maybe Terrah was like “I’m tired of the fast-paced city life. I want to
move a little out of here.” Get to and
maybe “I don’t want to be in Canaan, maybe we’ll stop short.” What I want to tell you is there’s a lot more
going on here than meets the eye.
Do
you remember in the first message of this year, I preached a message on
Stephen. This man of God and he stands up in front of the Sanhedrin in the book
of Acts and he preaches this gorgeous sermon.
The bible says his face was glowing like an angel and he is filled with
the Holy Spirit. Stephen in Acts 7 tells
this same story, but gives us details Genesis didn’t give us. This is what Stephen tells us:
Acts 7:2-3 2And
he said, Men, brethren, and fathers, hearken; The God of glory appeared unto
our father Abraham, when he was in Mesopotamia, before he dwelt in Charran
(HARAN) (God
appeared to Abraham when he was in Ur of the Chaldees, BEFORE they ever moved),3And
said unto him, Get thee out of thy country, and from thy kindred (your family), and come into the land which I shall shew
thee.
Abraham
in Ur, God speaks to him and says, “Abraham, I want you to leave your Daddy. I
want you to leave what you know and what you’ve grown up with. I want you to
leave the land...” which to the people of that day was everything. “I want you to leave behind what you know and
come out to a place you don’t know. I
want you to take a step of faith and trust Me.” They make it as far as Haran,
but they don’t make it all the way to where God called them. OK?
We’re going to come back to that.
·
Knowledge
What
we are seeing is God calling this, what will one day be the Father of the
Faithful. Calling him to his first steps
of faith and it starts with Knowledge.
Here’s what I mean:
Romans 10:17 So then faith
cometh by hearing, and hearing by the word of God.
Faith
always starts with God telling you “this is what I want you to do. This is how I want you to live. This is how I want you to treat your wife or
husband. This is how I want you to raise
your kids. This is how I want you to
interact with your schoolmates and the citizens around you. This is how I want you to worship me and
relate to me. These are the things I
want you to avoid and these are the things I want you to do.” God says to Abraham, “I want you to trust Me
and leave it all behind. Take a step of faith, leave your Daddy behind, and
come on out.” It starts with the word of
God and knowing what He says. Here’s the
thing friends, this book is filled with instruction on how God wants us to
conduct our marriage. How God wants us
to raise our kids. What our values
should be in this pagan land around us.
Where He wants us to invest our time, money, abilities. There are all these things God calls us
to. All these things that He tells us,
“This is My will for you”. There are
also times when God takes a passage, and I’ll tell you He’s done this with me,
that wasn’t originally written for you; it may have been written to Abraham or
written to Moses, but God illuminates that thing and it shines on your heart
and the Lord says, “I want you to do that. I want you to follow Me like
that.” You say, “how will I know if
that’s coming from God?” Because it will
be consistent with [the bible]. God will
NEVER tell you to do something He told you not to do in the Word. God will never lead you in a way that He
wouldn’t lead you through this book. It
starts with the Word from God. Let me
ask you this, before we go any further, how important is it that we gather
together in the House of God to find out what He said? How important is it that we gather in Sunday
School classes to break this book down a little bit? How important is it that we spend time each
day in the Word and say, “God, you invented life. Tell me how to live it. You invented this beating heart, breathing
lungs, firing neurons. God show me how to live.” Faith starts with KNOWLEDGE of
what God said about your life.
You
know I like three points, so here’s the first one:
THOUGHT #1: The Word of God will most often contradict
your perception, understanding, and intuition.
Hebrews
11:1-3, 13 Now faith is the
substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen. 2For by it
the elders obtained a good report. 3Through
faith we understand that the worlds were framed by the word of God, so that
things which are seen were not made of things which do appear. Here’s
what he’s saying, God tells you life, the world, and He work in way that you
can’t physically perceive. When He created the universe... you know what
evolution is? It’s man’s lame attempt to
try to figure out how we all got here.
There must be some linear “this” must’ve crashed into “this” and this
explode... instead of saying “You know what, maybe there’s a God in Heaven
who’s so big and vast beyond my comprehension that He just spoke it into
existence.”
Faith, most often, is not you go
with your gut. Faith, most often, is not
you projecting out in the future; “you know, I wouldn’t mind marrying
them. I think they’d make me happy. I think that line of work would be the one
that I ought to follow, that seems like it would make me money and give me a
good life. I think if someone does this
to me, my natural response should be to do this to them.”
You know what? Faith is God telling you your natural
response will be wrong about 99% of the time.
Faith is God saying “Listen, I am asking you to step out on things that
you wouldn’t naturally do.” We’ve been studying
the beatitudes in Sunday Schoool: love your enemies, bless those who persecute
you, love those that hate you? Who comes
up with that on their own? What’s
natural is, “if you’re nice to me, I’ll be so sweet to you but the moment you
cross me, I will break you.”
“You want to talk about me, if I
hear about it, you’re going to know about it.”
“You want to hurt me, want to hurt
my family, I’ll crush you.”
That’s natural.
Jesus said, we are so warped by sin
that what we think is natural, is unnatural.
We have it so flipped upside down, when Jesus said love you enemies, it
seemed upside down to us that He said that.
What is faith? It is going with God’s version of how your
life should be lived and saying, “Lord, you know what? I hear you.
I’m going to trust you. “
Here’s Abraham, and he knows God’s
called him to do it, but it goes against everything in his gut. “I’m going to leave behind my kindred, my
family? I’m going to leave this city
that has a lot going for it and go out in the boonies with dangerous people and
not know what’s going to happen to me?”
And he’s just a human being, not a superhero. He struggles with that.
So here’s the next piece of this
puzzle. Faith starts with Knowledge of
God’s Word. In a particular area of your
life, no matter how you feel, what you think, what your gut tells you, God says
“this is the way I want you to do it.
This is what I want you to believe.
That’s what I want to do.” He knows it but here’s the next step.
·
Belief &
Behavior
Faith is Knowledge, Belief, and
Behavior. You know I like three points,
but I can’t separate belief and behavior.
They go together – INSEPARABLY.
In other words, if you don’t act on it, you don’t really believe it yet.
James 2:19-20 Thou
believest that there is one God; thou doest well: the devils also believe, and
tremble. 20But wilt thou know, O vain (FOOLISH) man, that faith
without works is dead?
You say, “God I believe Jesus. I believe you’re the one and only
Savior. I know it and I BELIEVE in
Jesus.” But Jesus says, “listen, if it
doesn’t go past there to actually expressing itself through your life, you
don’t really believe it.”
That’s not faith if it’s dormant
somewhere in the regions of your academic understanding. You know what Tony Evans said one time and
I’ve never forgotten it, he said “if you want to know about your faith, don’t
check your feelings, check your feet. That’s
what you really believe.” Some of us are
like “Oh man, I’m in trouble” Well, I
guess so was Abraham. Now there’s a
little conjecture here on my park, OK, but I believe (and I think it’s
justifiable to the text) Abraham gets this word from God, “Abraham, I want you
to trust me. I want you to step out. I
want you to leave your family. I want
you to come on out of that land and go with me.” And Abraham’s like, Lord, you
know I want to follow you, I want to do the right thing, but maybe I can leave
some of the family... Some of those cousins I’m not crazy about, a brother in law
about there like I’ll leave that dude behind
but I can’t leave my Daddy. And
Lord, you know, Canaan is pretty scary and I don’t know. I’ll talk Daddy into coming with me to
Haran. It hadn’t made it to his hand or
behavior yet. Listen, this is where a
bunch of us are living, 99% obedience.
I’ll give you a little bit God but
I’m also going to put a toe in the water, but keep the rest of me out so if you
don’t keep your promise I can bail out of this thing. You know something? I read in the AA book, which has a lot of
good stuff by the way, these alcoholics said we have learned that half measures
availed us nothing. Abraham doesn’t
trust God enough yet, he doesn’t have enough faith to do what the Lord said to
do. Look what happens,
Genesis 11:31-32 And Terah
took Abram his son, and Lot the son of Haran his son's son, and Sarai his
daughter in law, his son Abram's wife; and they went forth with them from Ur of
the Chaldees, to go into the land of Canaan; and they came unto Haran, and
dwelt there. 32And the days of Terah were two hundred and five
years: and Terah died in Haran.
Before we go to far here, you can
easily read into this, oh Abraham wouldn’t obey God so God killed his
Daddy. I don’t believe that’s the way to
frame that at all but I will tell you this:
THOUGHT #2: God will use your pain to strengthen your
faith.
When his Dad died, I think it shook
Abraham hard. It jolted him and now some
of the stuff he used to love so much, he didn’t love as much anymore. Some of the stuff that captivated him and
kept him a little bit scared a little bit cautious didn’t seem to matter
anymore. He shook off some stuff . Some of the stuff that he believed about life
when his Daddy died, changed his view.
Changed his beliefs. God let Abraham get shaken hard.
This may be a sermon later so I
don’t go too far, but even that section where Jesus tells Peter the devil (some
translations say) has demanded to have you that he may sift you like wheat, but
I’ve prayed for you that your faith will not fail. FAITHFUL.
And when you get turned around again, strengthen your brothers. Satan has demanded to have you that he may
sift you like wheat.
You know how wheat gets sifted? They put those wheat kernels in with all the stuff. You really want the wheat between all the stuff. They shake it. Shake it hard and the stuff falls through, but the wheat is left. God says, you know what? Job-style, the devil thinks, Peter, if you get shaken hard your faith will fall through. He thinks you’ve only been serving me for what you can get. He thinks you’ve only been following me because I’ll bless you. But, Peter I’ve prayed for you. I know there’s more than that. I know there’s faith there. Peter gets shaken hard in his faith doesn’t fall through, thank God. Do you know what falls through? His self-confidence, pride, arrogance, and his belief that he can do it. Some of you are being shaken hard and it’s not because God’s forgotten about you or hates you. He is going to shake out some stuff. He’s going to shake off some old beliefs that enable you to trust Him to take this step. Some of you, I love you, are dwelling in the same old land you’ve been in forever; half-hearted steps, half-hearted commitment. I’ll be here, I won’t be here. I’ll follow you, I won’t follow you. I live in sin, I’ll be back. I’m telling you, I love you, if you’re His, he’s going to shake you hard.
You know what? After it, you’re going to trust him. I gotta move on... God will use your pain to strengthen your faith. Here’s Abraham. God gave him a Word, “Abraham trust me. Step out. Leave the land, leave your daddy...”
“God, I’m not quite ready. I’ll do this....” Life hits him hard.
You know how wheat gets sifted? They put those wheat kernels in with all the stuff. You really want the wheat between all the stuff. They shake it. Shake it hard and the stuff falls through, but the wheat is left. God says, you know what? Job-style, the devil thinks, Peter, if you get shaken hard your faith will fall through. He thinks you’ve only been serving me for what you can get. He thinks you’ve only been following me because I’ll bless you. But, Peter I’ve prayed for you. I know there’s more than that. I know there’s faith there. Peter gets shaken hard in his faith doesn’t fall through, thank God. Do you know what falls through? His self-confidence, pride, arrogance, and his belief that he can do it. Some of you are being shaken hard and it’s not because God’s forgotten about you or hates you. He is going to shake out some stuff. He’s going to shake off some old beliefs that enable you to trust Him to take this step. Some of you, I love you, are dwelling in the same old land you’ve been in forever; half-hearted steps, half-hearted commitment. I’ll be here, I won’t be here. I’ll follow you, I won’t follow you. I live in sin, I’ll be back. I’m telling you, I love you, if you’re His, he’s going to shake you hard.
You know what? After it, you’re going to trust him. I gotta move on... God will use your pain to strengthen your faith. Here’s Abraham. God gave him a Word, “Abraham trust me. Step out. Leave the land, leave your daddy...”
“God, I’m not quite ready. I’ll do this....” Life hits him hard.
Genesis 12:1-7 Now the LORD
had said unto Abram, Get thee out of thy country, and from thy kindred, and
from thy father's house, unto a land that I will shew thee: 2And
I will make of thee a great nation, and I will bless thee, and make thy name
great; and thou shalt be a blessing: 3And
I will bless them that bless thee, and curse him that curseth thee: and in thee
shall all families of the earth be blessed.
That
is a promise to Abraham the father of the Jewish people. That is still a promise to the Jewish
people. Can I say? When you bless the Jewish people, God blesses
you. When you curse the Jewish people,
God will curse you. Sometimes I pray
that our country and our President could re-remember that.
4So
Abram departed, as the LORD had spoken unto him; and Lot went with him: and
Abram was seventy and five years old when he departed out of
Haran. 5And Abram took Sarai his wife, and Lot his brother's
son, and all their substance that they had gathered, and the souls that they
had gotten in Haran; and they went forth to go into the land of Canaan; and
into the land of Canaan they came. 6And
Abram passed through the land unto the place of Sichem, unto the plain of
Moreh. And the Canaanite was then in the land. 7And
the LORD appeared unto Abram, and said, Unto thy seed will I give this land:
and there builded he an altar unto the LORD, who appeared unto him.
Do
you see that?
THOUGHT #3: When you take a step of faith – God will show
Himself to you.
I
have a little boy, Vance, he comes up with the funniest things. He’s like his Mom; that’s one of the things I
love about Jenny, she is razor quick.
Vance has got that same thing. He
got up the other morning, I’m trying to have a little time with the Lord, and
he gets up so early. I’m like, “hey bud,
don’t you want to go back to sleep for a little bit?” He goes, “Dad, once I’m awake, it’s
over.” He told me the other day, I was barbecuing
some chicken and he came out there. We’re
having some guy time: daddy, son, BBQ, meat, smoke time and he asked me, if he could
flip them and we were talking. There was
a real beautiful red sky, some of you saw that red sky that night. He said, “you know Dad, sometimes I see that,
clouds like that, the red sky, and I think about when Jesus comes back.” And I was like, “Oh yeah, me too son. I think the same thing sometimes.” I love his
honesty, he said, “I sure hope that when I die and Jesus comes back that I go
with him and I get to go to heaven because you know you really can’t know...” [laughing]
I love his honesty, he’s like “I haven’t been to heaven, I haven’t seen
it.” You know what I told him? And I don’t know if he got his yet, told him,
“Son here’s the thing, Jesus is real and you can’t see Him with your eyes and
hear Him with your ears, but when you see Him and you take a step of faith, when
you do what He told you to do, He will show himself very real to you. You will know that you’re his. You know what he said, “is the chicken
ready? Can I turn the chicken?” I was like “well I got that one second there
Lord, I’ll take it!”
CONCLUSION:
Knowledge – Belief – Behavior(Head
– Heart – Hand)
What
is the step of faith God is calling you to take? If you don’t know, can I
promise you, He wants to tell you. Some
of you are here and the truth is, just like Vance, you can say with honesty, “I
don’t know.” Like we were singing and
playing about, it doesn’t matter where you’ve been or what you’ve done. Your little efforts of coming to God on your
own will only get in the way. Like
somebody drowning, trying to help the lifeguard. Jesus will save you by His sacrifice and His
sacrifice alone. He can forgive all your
sins. He can give you His righteousness. You know what, your one part in that thing
is? I believe that I’m a sinner. I believe Jesus that you have the power to
save me. I believe that the bible says
you’re real and you’re true. Jesus,
today I’m asking you to be my Lord and Savior and forgive my sins and come into
my heart. My friend, he’ll do it today! Can I get an amen from those who know
him? He’ll do it today! For the rest of us, somebody in here, you
know what’s getting in your way? You’re ashamed of yourself. You feel like He couldn’t take somebody like
you. I want to tell you something, He
can and He will. Take a step of faith. Ask Him to increase your faith. Trust Him in the little things. You know, the statement for our church is we’re
here to help people become wholehearted followers of Jesus Christ. I’m not sure that’s not too big for people. I
think people get freaked out when they hear that. You know what our mission is, to help people
take a step of faith. That’s it. Not jump over tall buildings in a single
bound. Take a step of faith today.
We’re
going to have a verse of invitation. If
you need to come talk to God this morning, if He stood you up and maybe your first
step needs to be this morning right down to an alter saying “Lord, I’m serious
about this.” There’s no magical power to
this part, but sometimes you feel the need to physically step out and do
something. If you need to come and pray,
amen. If you need to come talk to a counselor,
take me by the hand and I’ll have Ron or one of our folks talk to you at length
on whatever you need to talk about. Set
up something for this week if you need longer.
But all over this place, can we take this truth we just heard personally? May God just do what only He can do. I leave it at that. Let God do whatever He wants to do this morning. If you need to come right now, we’ve prayed,
we’ve talked, I invite you, God invites you.
Whatever it is, whatever you need to bring to him, whatever step of
faith you need to take, let’s step out right now all over this place while
Brandon leads us.
"What Is Faith?" Brian Loveless Sermon on January 24, 2016 at Calvary Baptist Church, Grand Prairie, Texas.
