Monthly Archives: February 2019
Is Your Faith This Strong?
Devotional Thought of the Day:
28 “Come to me, all of you who are tired from carrying heavy loads, and I will give you rest. Matthew 11:28 (TEV)
7 Leave all your worries with him, because he cares for you. 1 Peter 5:7 (TEV)
5 Give yourself to the LORD; trust in him, and he will help you; Psalm 37:5 (TEV)
28 We know that in all things God works for good with those who love him, those whom he has called according to his purpose. Romans 8:28 (TEV)
19 But Joseph said to them, “Don’t be afraid; I can’t put myself in the place of God. 20 You plotted evil against me, but God turned it into good, in order to preserve the lives of many people who are alive today because of what happened. 21 You have nothing to fear. I will take care of you and your children.” So he reassured them with kind words that touched their hearts. Genesis 50:19-21 (TEV)
A test of faith is not a multiple choice or essay test about how much you know doctrinally. None of us can know beyond what scripture teaches, and most of us don’t know all of that. (Even if we pretend to)
Nor is a test of our holiness, and how well we live from an ethical and/or moral standpoint. For while we should strive to live within the way God has laid out, we too often fail. And each of us will tend to look to the sins and failures of others, even counting them eviler, or condemning them, while trying to justify our own actions.
Nor is it a test of our will, and our ability to compensate or atone for our own error. The price is too high, and even if we could atone, why would we? To avoid punishment? To attain paradise? Both are self-centered motives, and therefore, as sinful as the sins we commit.
None of these “tests” measure a Biblical faith. Not one of them testifies to our ability to depend upon Jesus for what He has promised. Look above at the scripture quotes.
Do we have enough faith, enough trust God for the complete rest (physical, emotional, spiritual ) that we so need?
Do we have enough faith to leave our anxieties, our concerns, even our very life in His hands? Do we faith in His promise that all things work for good? Even the sins of our country, even
Do we trust in Him enough to proclaim to those who have hurt us, what you meant for evil, God used for good?
To do these things requires faith in God, confidence that He will do exactly what He said He would. Faith means to depend on Him, even when the guilt and shame are overwhelming, even when the hurt of betrayal is too powerful.
It is then faith is revealed, for it is that certain hope that despite all the logic, despite all the anxiety and fear, despite all the pain and suffering, God will see us through, that He will carry us, and bring us healing, and help.
That is faith. That is what it means to believe in God, to have confidence in what He has promised, that He will heal all that is broken. He will care for us, and never let us alone.
Faith is that feeling you get during communion when you are so overwhelmed by God’s love, that all you can think of is Christ, giving Himself of you, his Body broken, His love shed… and as you are focused on that, everything else falls away.
That feeling for a second or even a minute is a glimpse of heaven, it is a moment of purest faith when all there is, is God, and we depend on Him. letting everything else go.
So next time if you wonder if you have faith, hearken back to that moment you communed.. and relax, you passed the test.
Is Life Broken? Then you need to read this… (it won’t be easy)
Devotional Thought of the Day:
24 “But how terrible for you who are rich now; you have had your easy life! 25 “How terrible for you who are full now; you will go hungry! “How terrible for you who laugh now; you will mourn and weep! Luke 6:24-25
“The LORD did not love you and choose you because you outnumbered other peoples; you were the smallest nation on earth. Deut 7:7 GNT
3† He made you go hungry, and then he gave you manna to eat, food that you and your ancestors had never eaten before. He did this to teach you that you must not depend on bread alone to sustain you, but on everything that the LORD says. 4 During these forty years your clothes have not worn out, nor have your feet swollen up. 5† Remember that the LORD your God corrects and punishes you just as parents discipline their children. Deut. 8:3-5 GNT
What the world needs is God’s love; it needs to encounter Christ and to believe in him. The Eucharist is thus the source and summit not only of the Church’s
The third quote from scripture, the one from Luke 6, is a painful one. It shakes up most of our
This is confusing, yet it will set the tone for the other two readings from the Old Testament. It helps us understand why the wimpiest nation was the one God loves, why there were times where the brokenness would cause them many tears and great pain. They would even long to return to the slavery they once hated.
But they were loved and cared for, and God would heal them, and ensure that even their clothes didn’t wear out.
God stayed with them, in the midst of their rebellion, in the midst of their sin, and called to them to return, to repent, to allow Him to cleanse them, to heal their brokenness.
It is all a parent can do at times… allowing their children to hit rock bottom, but being there all the time, waiting for the moment they cry out.
It sucks to be the parent (God) and we wonder why He would let us get so lost, so in bondage to sin, so broken. So needy. So Empty.
He is there, ready to heal, ready to fill us with love and hope and peace.
He does this through His word, and with that word, through the sacraments. Which is why the quote from Pope Benedict XVI is so powerful.
It is not something we can diagram, this transformation that God is working in us, but it is there. In this moment that is as close to heaven as we can imagine, as the love of God is revealed through this bread and wine, this precious Body and Blood of Jesus our Lord.
And as we experience the dimensions of this love, it is so incredible, we don’t have to be forced to share it, we simply do. A church which has an inkling of the grace distributed in the Lord’s Supper is simply a church that must share that grace with others who are broken. An individual to whom this blessing, that they are given the Body to
If you are a
If you are a pastor who wants his church to grow, help people see this blessing you serve them with…
Look to Christ, be amazed by the depth of His love, the wonderful mercy poured out on you, and realize, despite
Not
Benedict XVI. (2007). Sacramentum Caritatis. Vatican City: Libreria Editrice Vaticana.
