LIFE WITHOUT FAITH

LIFE WITHOUT FAITH

Heb. 11:6 So, you see, it is impossible to please God without faith. Anyone who wants to come to him must believe that there is a God and that he rewards those who sincerely seek him.  NLT

     You will never please God without faith actively working in your life. Faith is not just what we believe about God, it is putting into practice what we believe. It is living as if it were true. There is a huge difference between mental belief and living belief.

      If you want to have an audience with God, you are going to have to live connected to Him. You cannot get by with what you know to be true. You must let Jesus purify your heart and then live like you are pure. You must practice what you preach and then God will reward you.

      Of course, the reward every true believer longs for is heaven. We live for heaven and we die for heaven. We sincerely believe that what God has promised is true on earth and in heaven. We strive to do our very best to actively pursue Him and let Him live out His life in and through us.

      In a sense, the reward of heaven is ours to have today. When we are living a life of faith rooted in the life of Christ, we are living in heaven. We are living in the presence of God. Heaven is far more than what we have now in Christ, but it is also an eternal life in Christ. In Christ, the glory of heaven fills our souls and helps us deal with life on earth. Faith is the unleashing of heaven's glory and power in our lives.

      Do you have a faith rooted in a relationship with Christ or rooted in your knowledge of Him? Only those who take God seriously and live out their faith in Him will please Him and see Him someday.

       Life without faith is a life lived in hell eternally and a life lived in misery here on earth.  It is a life without hope and peace.  It is life lived without God in it

PLEASING FAITH

PLEASING FAITH

Heb. 11:6 So, you see, it is impossible to please God without faith. Anyone who wants to come to him must believe that there is a God and that he rewards those who sincerely seek him.  NLT

      There are many, many people today who try to please God without faith in Christ.  They are willing to confess belief in God, but not in Christ as the way to God.  They strive to be good people and convince themselves that it is enough in order to be accepted by God.  Some will profess to believe in Jesus but their belief in Him is nothing more than lip service.  They do not entrust themselves to Him for salvation and strive to make it to heaven on their own.

      It is impossible to please God apart from a living faith in Christ because Jesus is the only one who truly pleases God.  Jesus perfectly obeyed God and offered himself up as the sacrifice for our sins.  Jesus alone is the glory of God personified.  There is no way to please God outside of the righteousness and holiness of Christ which He bestows on those who trust Him to be their Savior.

     It is not enough to believe there is God; we must believe in God’s way to eternal life.  Anyone can make it to heaven if they believe in their heart that God has made himself known to man through the life of Jesus and trusts in Him to be his Savior.  Jesus rewards all who come to Him for the forgiveness of their sins with eternal life.  There is no other way that God is going to be pleased with you and accept you as His child.  

      Not only must we have saving faith, we must have living faith.  Saving faith translates into living faith for those who have sincere hearts.  We live lives that are consistent with our salvation.  We allow the Lord to continuously change us and teach us new things.  We grow into holiness of life as we live out our faith.  If you are not growing, you are not going to heaven when you die.  Life begets life.  If you are alive in Christ, you will produce evidence of it in your life.  Faith without works is dead.  There is no life in those who do not show evidence of it in their lives.

       Words spoken without actions to back them up are meaningless.  What we say does not please God unless it is backed up by godly living, which requires much faith to accomplish.  Anyone can claim to be a follower of Christ, very few actually follow Him. 

      It takes no faith to claim to be a Christian, but it takes great faith to actually live like one.  Those who actually live by faith are those who please God and will see Him someday face-to-face.

WHAT IS FAITH?

WHAT IS FAITH?

Heb. 11:1 What is faith? It is the confident assurance that what we hope for is going to happen. It is the evidence of things we cannot see.  NLT

      How much confidence do you have in the Lord's ability to bring to pass what He has promised? Do you act like it's a done deal, or do you act like maybe it won't happen? The Lord often speaks to us through His Word about what He intends to do. He will speak to us through the voice of His Spirit disclosing His intentions for us. He will sometimes use other people to give us direction. The Lord gives us hope in our times of discouragement and despair knowing that we need a fresh voice from God. He spurs us on with His promises when we need help to keep moving forward.

       Often we need help to keep the faith. We need help to stay focused on the workings of the Lord in our lives. We cannot see God and often fail to see what He is doing. We need God's testimonies of what He is doing. We need to hear how God is living amongst us so we can open our eyes to see it happening. Faith is rooted in our awareness of God and His activities. It is letting God involve us in them. It is going beyond what we see and putting our trust and confidence in God's plan for us. It is living in the certainty that God is true to His word and will bring to pass what He has promised.

      Is your faith rooted in God, someone else, or yourself? Only God is trustworthy. He alone is able to deliver on His word. He alone is able to tell it like it is without the possibility of error. He alone is able to know the beginning from the end and work all things out accordingly. He alone knows what we need and lovingly supplies it out of the richness of His love and grace for us.

      Blessed is he who has a faith deeply rooted in God.

KEEP ON TRUSTING

KEEP ON TRUSTING

Heb. 10:35-36 Do not throw away this confident trust in the Lord, no matter what happens. Remember the great reward it brings you! Patient endurance is what you need now, so you will continue to do God's will. Then you will receive all that he has promised.  NLT

      When the going gets tough, so many of us get going---in the wrong direction. We don't like the tough times of life and rather than face them with confidence and boldness in faith, we flee from them. We try to avoid tough times. We don't like confrontation and are prone to cower away when backed into a corner. When it makes things easier on us we are prone not to express our faith in Christ. We tend to speak out only when we know that it will be well-received by the company we are in. We act sometimes like we are ashamed of the fact we are children of God.

      We are reminded in today's verses that we should never be this way. We are going to face troubles in this life, but we should face them with our eyes fixed on Christ and not our troubles. We should always strive to please Him and represent Him well no matter what happens. What is important is what is before us and not what is around us or behind us. We can deal with whatever we encounter in life with confidence and boldness when we are centered in Christ.

     When we face difficult circumstances in life we need to pray for patient endurance so that we will not waiver or back down in our confidence in Christ or witness for Him. We need God's help if we are to remain faithful to Him in all things. Daily ask Him for whatever it takes for you to remain strong in Him and be a strong witness for Him. He has promised great rewards for us who are faithful to the end doing His will for our lives.

      May the Lord find you faithful today. May we be as faithful to Him as He is to us.

SINNING MATTERS

SINNING MATTERS

Heb. 10:26 Dear friends, if we deliberately continue sinning after we have received a full knowledge of the truth, there is no other sacrifice that will cover these sins.  NLT

      I am not going to attempt to interpret this verse. As with any Scripture, it must be understood within the context of the rest of the Scriptures. I will let smarter people than me wrestle over it. What I want us to think about today is this: God takes seriously how we live. He never has and never will tolerate sin. He cannot for He is holy. There is not any part of His being that is not holy. He is absolutely perfect and sin can never be anywhere near Him. Sin is detested by God. It is what forced Him to allow Jesus to die a criminal's death on the cross.

      God will never allow us into His presence with sin in our lives. Jesus makes us presentable to God by forgiving our sins and making us holy. But if we spurn Jesus and reject His holiness by deliberately sinning, there is no hope for us, regardless of how far along we are in our walk with Him.

      We must deal with our sins by throwing ourselves at Jesus' feet and plead with Him for His mercy. We must not take sin lightly. There simply is no hope for us if we neglect our salvation and refuse to walk in holiness of life.

      Do you have any sin hanging around in your life that you have not let Jesus take care of? Don't let spiritual pride keep you from admitting and confessing sin. No one is immune from sin. We are not God and we do sin. Deal with it. Don't let it hang around and fester in your soul. The longer we let sin hang around, the more of a hold it has on us, and the more likely we are to sin against God. We need to be constantly vigilant over our souls and take our sin to Jesus whenever it rears its ugly head. Today is the day of salvation. Don't blow your opportunity to be forgiven.

DELIBERATELY SINNING

DELIBERATELY SINNING

Heb. 10:26-27 Dear friends, if we deliberately continue sinning after we have received a full knowledge of the truth, there is no other sacrifice that will cover these sins. There will be nothing to look forward to but the terrible expectation of God’s judgment and the raging fire that will consume his enemies.  NLT

     We must always let the Word speak for itself.  It is a dangerous practice to fit it into our theology and make it say what we want it to say.  Let us hear what the Word says to us today.  A keyword in our understanding of these verses is the word if.  This is a conditional state.  The consequences of our abandonment of faith are severe.

     If we DELIBERATELY continue sinning after we know better, we are in deep trouble with God.  Deliberate speaks of intent.  Deliberately sinning is not done accidentally, but on purpose.  It is a determined way of life.  It is true of those who have a cheap concept of grace.  The thought is that once we are saved we are not going to be punished for sin so it doesn’t matter whether or not we sin.  It is taking lightly God’s hatred for sin and abusing His grace.  It is essentially saying that Jesus’ dying for our sins wasn’t that big of a deal; it doesn’t affect the way we live.

      Receiving the full knowledge of the truth can be interpreted to mean just intellectual knowledge or heart and mind knowledge.  I will let others determine that.  What matters is the attitude of the heart towards sin.  There is no saving grace for those who determine in their hearts to live a sinful life.  Sinful conduct breeds sinful consequences.  God will never condone sin or excuse it.  Sin in the heart will be punished.  A sin-infested heart will not enter into heaven.  The reality of it is God will condemn all who insist on living in sin and not grace.

      Saving grace changes the attitude we have towards sin.  We no longer can tolerate living in it.  We strive to overcome it.  We seek God’s continuous help in identifying it and ridding ourselves of it.  Godliness becomes our way of life instead of sinfulness. 

       How do you feel about sin?  Does it bother you when you do it?  Are you deliberately striving to not sin?  Are you more concerned about your soul’s standing before God than you are the pleasures of sin?  When we deliberately sin against God, it is showing God great disrespect.  It is abusing His wondrous grace.

DON'T NEGLECT CHURCH

DON’T NEGLECT CHURCH

Heb. 10:25 And let us not neglect our meeting together, as some people do, but encourage and warn each other, especially now that the day of his coming back is drawing near.  NLT

       I cringe when I hear of people who profess faith in Christ and seek to justify staying away from the fellowship of God’s people in worship.  I know how bad churches can be.  I know the hurts that are inflicted by church people on each other.  I know that church life can be detrimental to one’s mental and emotional health.  I understand how avoiding the church can seem like a good idea at times.  The church is made up of sinners and sometimes it really shows.

      However, I believe it is very damaging to the soul to totally dismiss church life because of the actions of people.  There is an ample supply of churches available to us so that we can find a church where we can worship the Lord without strife.  And if the only church available to us is full of problems, we can still worship amongst God’s people without participating in the strife.

      Neglecting the church because of the actions of some of her people is not a good solution to the problem.  We need the fellowship of the church.  We need to know that we are not alone in our walk with the Lord.  We need to know that other people are hearing the Gospel message and identify with it just like we do, even if they don’t live it.  We need to come underneath the spoken Word.  We need to be in an environment where we will hold ourselves accountable for how we live out our faith.  We need to be around people who encourage us in our faith and spur us on to greater faith.  We need to be where we are warned about what happens when we get careless and even neglect our faith.  We need to be challenged by others to stay connected to the Lord through prayer and the reading of the Word.

      The Lord is coming soon.  No one knows how soon it will be, but He is coming for His church.  It is imperative that we stay connected to the church through faithfully being a part of it so that when the Lord does come, we will be ready.  It is very dangerous and damaging to the soul to let other people or things interfere with our need to be involved in the life of the church.  We participate in church life because we love He who is the head of the Church and because we need it for the sake of our souls.