Quiet and Thunderous Assurance

 

“Now faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen.” Hebrews 11:1 (NASB)

 

What is faith? Strong’s Greek dictionary says, “(Faith) for the believer is ‘God's divine persuasion’ – and therefore distinct from human belief (confidence), yet involving it. The Lord continuously births faith in the yielded believer so they can know what He prefers.” Faith comes from the Greek word “pistis,” which has its root word meaning “to be persuaded” or “to persuade”. What we must realize is that faith, for the Christian, always comes from God. 

 

Strong’s continues to teach about faith by saying, “It is God's warranty that guarantees the fulfillment of the revelation He births within the receptive believer. “ That’s powerful! Faith is God’s warranty, His guarantee, that what He promises will happen. Without faith, then, we believers would have no hope that we are saved from our sins, that God is real, that Jesus is God’s Son, and that there’s an eternal life. There’d be no purpose in believing in anything and no purpose for living. God, in His loving graciousness, gives us hope by giving us faith in Him, the entirety of the Trinity. 

 

Now, this faith God gives us is our assurance in what we hoped for. God’s gift of faith birthed in Christians undergirds them. Faith is the guarantee for what God says, reveals, and promises. As Christians, it guarantees the inheritance of God’s promises to believer’s because He is always faithful and Christians are co-heirs with Christ as sons and daughters of God. Rightly understood, God’s gift of faith is the undergirding, the guarantee, of our inheritance—the fulfillment of His promises to us, our hopes.

 

The hope about which the author wrote is actively anticipating and waiting for the fulfillment of promises by God. Without faith, hoping would be futile. It would be like trusting in the role of dice. Hope, to be worth anything, must have a firm and assured basis or it would just be chance, coincidence, and happenstance. God, who is YHWH (I AM), has always existed, created all things, is always faithful and loving, is almighty, omniscient, and omnipresent, is the only one who can know and does know all that will occur in the future, has power over all things, and provides a definite and unchangeable eternity for each person who yields his/her whole self to Him in recognition that He is God, the One and only true deity. Belief in YHWH means Christians can know and trust what He promises is true and will definitely happen. That is hope. It comes from the faith God births in each believer in Jesus. That faith is the guarantee that what the Christian believes and hopes will occur. True faith and hope are not a game of chance. Hope and faith in God comes from God’s love for all people. He wants only the best for us and offers that best through belief in Jesus, His Son.

 

This faith God births in Christians that guarantees in them the hope of God fulfilling His promises is a conviction that propels each believer forward in their faith and in their relationship with God. This conviction  is the proof, certainty, or persuasion of something. The faith inbirthed in a believer by God, that a person actively pins their hopes to and is assured by God because of who He is, becomes the conviction—the proof and persuasion—of the believer’s soul that leads to living out his/her faith in the world and his/her circles of influence fully yielded to God’s plan.

 

Looking at this verse in another way, faith comes down from God to a person to create hope in the person’s heart that leads to assurance of the mind, and transforms to conviction of the soul, which is enacted by the body in the world so that others see and hear about Jesus and lean towards God to hopefully seek and begin this process of faith within themselves. Faith is an all-encompassing gift. It affects a person’s heart, mind, body, and soul. That makes the Shema of Judaism more understandable. This Jewish prayer is from  Deuteronomy 6:4-9. It says,

 

“Hear, O Israel: The LORD our God, the LORD is one. You shall love the LORD your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your might. And these words that I command you today shall be on your heart. You shall teach them diligently to your children, and shall talk of them when you sit in your house, and when you walk by the way, and when you lie down, and when you rise. You shall bind them as a sign on your hand, and they shall be as frontlets between your eyes. You shall write them on the doorposts of your house and on your gates.”

 

Millennia later, when asked byJewish scribes what is the greatest commandment, Jesus replied, 

 

“Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is one. Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.” 

 

Notice the difference between the two passages; Jesus added to the Shema that a God/believing person must love God with his/her mind. What’s most important to note is we are to love God with our whole being—heart, mind, soul, and body. God wanted to redeem the whole person. That’s one of the reasons why faith affects the mind, heart, soul, and body. When a person is redeemed in totality, that person is able to love God with his/her whole being. That enables each of us to be totally renewed. It gives us total redemption from Satan. 

 

God loves us—people whom He created—so much that He sent His only Son, Jesus, to earth to live without sinning and die the perfect holy sacrifice as the sin offering for anyone who chooses to believe in Him so he/shewill not die and be eternally separated from God—His goodness and love—but will have everlasting life with Him in His kingdom. 

 

Faith is a God-given gift to people who yield their lives to Him. It activates hope in the heart. It  provides assurance to the mind. And that assurance becomes active proof in the soul, which leads to actively living out their faith in their sphere of influence. When God speaks, though it’s a nearly silent whisper to your ear, it loudly thunders in your spirit and heart. God desires all people be saved—rescued—from their sins and Satan. He loves each of us and wants to save us. 

 

Hear God’s voice. Recognize His conviction.

 

Seek God. Receive Faith. Accept His assurance. Gain hope. Live convicted. 

 

Be a life wholly yielded to God. For faith is the assurance of things hoped for and the conviction of things unseen.

Who do You say I am?

“When they had finished breakfast, Jesus said to Simon Peter, ‘Simon, son of John, do you love Me more than these?’” (John 21:15-19 [ESV])

We’ve all heard teachers and preachers teach that the second time Jesus confronted Peter and asked him three times, "Do you love Me," He was reinstating Peter as his disciple. A new thought came to mind as I read this passage. This questioning by Jesus caused Peter to decide and state for himself and for those listening the depth of his love and devotion to Jesus.

Before Peter denied being one of Jesus' disciples after His arrest, he had followed Jesus when his brother Andrew introduced him to Him. Peter, Andrew, James, and John followed Jesus when He commanded them to follow Him at the start of His ministry (Mark 1). These men and other people watched Jesus heal people, cleanse them from demons, and teach with authority. More and more people followed Jesus, but these four men and the other eight disciples did not stop following Jesus, except for Judas when he betrayed Him. When Jesus commanded Andrew, Simon Peter, James, and John to follow Him on the first day of ministry, they did it from instinct. This man, Jesus of Nazareth, was compelling.

On the day Jesus restored him, Peter concluded for himself he would follow Jesus. He did this because of his own conviction of who Jesus is (the Son of God) and because of his love for Jesus. Peter, with his affirmations to Jesus' three questions in John 21:15-19, internally devoted himself and externally testified to those listening of his decision to follow Jesus.

Today, we each must decide for ourselves. Are we following Jesus because we are part of a crowd of people who want to see what He will do? Or are we following Jesus because we affirm He is the Son of God Who takes away the sin of the world and we dedicate ourselves to Him out of love and devotion to Him?

Today is the day for you to decide for yourself who Jesus is to you - the Son of God or a charismatic man. What is your decision?

Lord, You are God above all things and You died to save me from my sins. Forgive me for denying You when You tell me to do or say something. Forgive me this rebellion. Help me to stand firmly stating You are my Lord and Savior. Let the words I speak, the actions I do, and the thoughts that go through my mind, attest to Your Lordship in my life and lead people to seek You as their Lord and Savior. Use my life for Your purposes and glory. Amen.

Living Enriched Lives

In 1 Corinthians 1:4-8, Paul began his encouragement and entreaty to the Corinthian Christians. He began his letter reminding them of the most important thing – God’s grace is all-sufficient. In these five verses, Paul taught very succinctly the four most important things about God’s grace. Most importantly, he said, God’s grace enriches believers’ lives. We today can and need to learn and hold on to this teaching.

First, remember God’s grace is His loving-kindness and mercy given to a person without him or her deserving it. His grace is more than this though. One Corinthians 1:4-8 is where Paul unpacked it for the Corinthian believers. 

God’s grace enriches a believer’s life in his or her speech and knowledge. He fully enriches every believer in all ways so the believer’s words, speech, declarations, thoughts, meditations, reasoning, intelligence, understanding of God and the Christian faith are deeper, more perfect, and enlarged. The understanding by the believer of God and the Christian faith is so enriched and illuminated he or she explains his or her faith with power.

God’s grace acts in a believer’s life so it is visible. His grace enriching the believer’s knowledge and understanding of Him and the Christian faith spoken and testified with power and conviction leads to the believer’s life confirming his or her testimony of his or her faith in Jesus Christ. Faith in God came from His gift and gave His undeserved grace to the believer. That grace then makes itself evident in the gift of knowledge, understanding, and speech of the believer when he or she that testifies of God and the Christian faith

In addition to these, Paul stated God’s grace gives and shows in the believer’s expectant, eager, and watchful hope for the return of Jesus Christ. God’s grace, which provides salvation and adoption, gives hope for the future expected return of Jesus the Christ, a time when all things on earth return to perfection. His grace affects the mind of the believer, affects the believer’s thinking and hope for present and future times. Living with this evident hope testifies to God’s grace.

Finally, Paul said, God’s grace confirms the believer to the end so he or she is blameless and innocent before God. God’s grace given through the blood of Jesus Christ establishes and makes sure the believer is blameless of sin on the day of judgment and for eternity. His grace seals the believer for eternity.

This statement by Paul seems so small when considered in the totality of his writings, yet it is profound though concise. God’s grace enriches a believer’s life in speech, knowledge and insight so he or she lacks no gift from God. The conviction of this faith and the depth of knowledge and illumination manifests itself in the believer’s life and words to confirm his or her testimony of believing in Jesus Christ. God’s grace gives and shows in the believer’s expectant, eager, and watchful hope for the return of Jesus Christ. Finally, it confirms the believer to the end so he or she is blameless before God.

Have you experienced God’s grace?

Is your life a living testimony to God’s grace?

Like the Corinthian Christians who were divided into factions, we need to remember we must choose to live the life God’s grace put into us so our words and actions show His grace to the world as a testimony so others will want to come to know Jesus Christ, too.