This series will be about moving from where we are to having
the good things God has for us in our lives.
This sermon will lay the groundwork for the rest of the series. We can’t get to where God wants us to be
without laying a firm foundation of faith.
We started in Matthew 9:20 and following, with the story of the woman
with an issue of blood being healed.
Jesus noticed her faith simply in her touching Him and told her that her
faith healed her. She began by
recognizing, knowing and believing who Jesus was, AND believing that He could
heal her. Her faith resulted in the
action of touching Jesus in order to be healed, despite it being forbidden for
an unclean person to touch a Rabbi. She
was risking her life in order to receive healing. Taking action before seeing physical evidence
of truth is true faith.
Matthew 9:27 and on shows the same process again with the
two blind men. They called Him Son of
David, showing their faith in His fulfillment of the prophecy of the
Messiah. They came to Jesus. He asked if they believed He could do
it. “According to your faith, it will be
done to you,” was His answer. Taking
action on faith always involves a risk.
Sometimes it’s a physical risk, sometimes an emotional risk, and
sometimes some other type of risk. It’s
when we get to the place where we have done all we can and put it in God’s
hands to take care of it that we get to a place of faith. Mark 10:46 and on tells the story of
Bartimaeus. He proclaimed who Jesus was
and was rebuked. He continued on with
perseverance despite the rebukes and again received healing.
Remember that faith has to be our own and not based on
someone else’s faith (that would simply be presumption. Faith is a constant process. We are never done. We have to constantly renew our minds because
none of us has perfect faith. We will fail tests of our faith sometimes (or
lots of times), but we can keep moving forward daily. Romans 1, Colossians 1, and 1 Thessalonians 1:8 report
great faith being “reported all over the world.” Are we willing to have faith that would
result in things that would be that famous?
Faith is simple: we just
believe. Faith is also hard because
sometimes it’s hard to believe.
1 Corinthians 2:4 says our faith can’t rest on our knowledge
of the Word but rests on God’s power operating THROUGH the Word. It’s not just the words on the page but the
power behind the words on the page that we are trusting. Ephesians 1:18 (one of my favorites and
something we pray over the church weekly) is Paul’s prayer for the church. This says our faith activates God’s power,
which is the same power that raised Christ from the dead and gave Him the
authority He has. Paul prays that we
would know in our heart the power of God’s word. Hebrews 11 is a chapter I challenge you to
read this week. Faith has substance and
is evidence of the unseen. It is the
thing we must have to please God. When
things get rough, we close off or connect with people who are having trouble,
instead of pushing in and connecting.
That’s human nature. Instead we
need to look at the people like those in Hebrews 11 who succeeded by
faith. That will encourage us to press
on, take action and see God’s victory.
Read John 21 this week. The
disciples felt stuck. See how Jesus
reconnects with them when they went back to what was familiar.
To listen to the entire sermon go to http://ahwatukeechurch.com/ and click on
online media. To learn more about Living
Word Ahwatukee, visit http://ahwatukeechurch.com/.
