Tuesday, November 8

Understanding Faith

I will be honest understanding faith has been a life long struggle. To put it simply, we are saved upon our faith in Jesus Christ, nothing else. There is no magical number of times you have to go to church. You can't out number the good things you do in respect to the bad things. In Galatians 3 it says that we are saved by our faith in Jesus Christ, so that no one can boast.

So, what exactly is faith. I think faith is a little deeper than belief. You see, faith demands action. It's easy to say I believe something and not do a thing about it. Yet faith requires me to live my life based upon what I believe. That's why the ever popular youth game is called a faith fall, not a belief fall. So, if you are able to take a long look at someone, you can determine what their faith is.

When put in those terms, I'm not certain I want anyone to look that deeply into my life. Truthfully there are lots of times when my faith falls short, when I act without considering my faith in Jesus. There are times when I pray for God's will and then act on mine. So, really my life is full of failures and lost opportunities. Yet, as Paul says in Romans, thanks be to Jesus who freely gives out the grace we don't deserve.

Really faith is a journey. A journey that starts simply with our faith in Jesus. Our actions slowly and ever so slowly begin to demonstrate our faith. Considering the times when I acted with a lack of faith, I can also point out the many times this year I acted upon my faith not even certain how things would turn out and guess what? God took care of me.

This journey of faith is made a lot more easily if we consider a few things about faith. Faith expects us to real. Faith expects us to face the truth. Putting on a mask, lying to yourself about the truth you live in, makes this journey a lot more difficult. Our actions and the fruits of our lives are telling about our faith. But remember, every day God gives us the opportunity to renew our minds and our lives.

I pray that everyone is willing to join me on this journey and I hope more than anything that we can all be real with ourselves and real about our faith.

aaron

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