Sunday, August 25, 2002
Grace Christian Center
Message: “Faith in Grace”
Luke 8: 22 – 25 (Matthews gospel says “without warning a furious storm”)
Hebrews 11
Faith’s location, operation and destination
Jesus woke up by his disciples rather than the storm, isn’t it nice to know that our Master is caught off guard by our storms and that only the voice of one of his children woke him up. If what you are putting your faith in and expecting to get you through the storms of life is just as worried about your storm as you are then they aren’t worthy of your worship. You see Jesus didn’t ask them about not having faith, rather he asked them the faith that do have, where are you putting it, what are you putting your faith in? I used to look to natural things for a supernatural answer. In other words I sought help from the government when I needed a miracle of deliverance, I used to look to my spouse to save me when what I needed to do was look to the Heavenly bridegroom. Someone in here today needs to stop looking to earthly treasures and start “lifting thine eyes unto the hills from whence cometh your help, your help comes from the Lord, the Maker of heaven and earth. He will not allow your foot to stumble.” Psalms 121: 1,2 Hebrews 12:2 “Let us fix our eyes on Jesus the author and the perfecter of our faith.”
That’s faith in its proper location!
Hebrews 11
We will focus on vs. 1- 8 however we need to blow through the whole chapter so hold on tight and let’s rip through this.
What an awesome chapter. Starting off with a biblical definition of faith in verses 1 & 2. Then Jesus being the author of faith shows us His faith which gets this whole chapter started.
Verse 3 – Creative faith of God, framing the worlds. Genesis 1
Verse 4 – Sacrificial faith of Abel offering unto God a more excellent sacrifice.
Genesis 4:4
Verse 5 – translating faith of Enoch as he was taken up that he wouldn’t taste death.
Genesis 5:21-24
Verse 6 – The necessity of faith to please God
Verse 7 – Active and persevering faith as Noah prepared an ark being warned of things not yet seen. Genesis 6:8-9
Verses 8 - 10 – Obedient faith of Abraham as he was called to go, went, not knowing where yet. Genesis 12: 1-25
Verse 11, 12 – Life giving faith of Sarai delivered a child even though she was past age.
Genesis 17:15
Verse 13 – 16 – Patient and hopeful faith of these great saints that we just talked about
Verse 17 – 19 – The tried faith of Abraham as he offers up his son Isaac that by the way was his promised child from God. Genesis 22
Verse 20 – Revelational faith of Isaac as he blesses Jacob and Esau concerning things to come. Geneses 27:1-40
Verse 21 – The prophetic faith of Jacob blessing the sons of Joseph in the famous “X” blessing Genesis 48:1 – 22
Verse 22 – Authoritative faith as Joseph gives a commandment concerning his bones.
Genesis 50: 22 –26
Verse 23 – We see the fearless, sacrificial, and suffering faith of Moses’ dad and mom Amram and Jochebed as they hid the baby Moses because they saw something special in him. Exodus 2:2
Verse 24 – 27 We see that same faith past down from Moses’ parents to Moses himself in action as he fearlessly stood before Pharaoh, as he sacrificed his position as Pharaoh’s son, and he suffered with God’s people as they were in bondage Exodus 2 – 5
Verse 28 – 29 The protecting faith of Moses and Israel as they marched across the Red Sea on dry land after being protected from the angel of death Exodus 12 –14
Verse 30 – The conquering faith of Joshua as the walls of Jericho came tumbling down
Joshua 5 –6
Verse 31 – The delivering faith of Rahab the prostitute as she received God’s people with peace. Joshua 6:25
Verse 32 – 38 We see the wonderful miracles of faith through more OT prophets and saints as they: Subdued Kingdoms, Brought forth righteousness, obtained promises, stopped the mouths of lions, quenched fire escaped the sword, made strong in battle, victorious in fight as they put armies to flight, children resurrected from the dead, endured torture, mockings, scourgings, and imprisonments, as they suffered stonings, endured death by being sawed in two, suffered temptations, death by martyrdom, and suffered wandering and wondering while in destitute places.
These the bible says that the world wasn’t worthy all obtained a good report through faith, did not receive the promise of seeing their Messiah the sum and substance of all OT promise. This leaves us not having an excuse for leading an overcoming life!
Back to the top:
I want to take you through some steps of practical applications that we can put to use in our lives that will allow us to experience God in an intimate way.
Step one: verse 4 says that Abel offered a better sacrifice, what made it better was the fact that is was the sacrifice of worship. He gave a sin offering, a blood sacrifice, recognizing his sinfulness and God’s holiness. Cain gave an offering from the fruit of the ground ignoring his sinfulness and personal need of God. Step number one to knowing God, we need to worship Him in the beauty of His holiness.
Step two: Enoch walked with God. In order to know somebody you have to spend time with them. A walk to me signifies some casual time, relaxing time; we need to begin practicing the presence of God in our everyday agenda, recognizing His presence in all we do, developing that relationship, nurturing our love relationship with God. The bible says in 2nd Corinthians 2:14 that we are to “spread the fragrance of the knowledge of God everywhere we go.” ILLUSTRATION OF PERFUME AND COLOGNE
Step three: Verse 7 tells us that Noah worked with God moving out of fear. I believe that we have to many people that want to work with God but haven’t yet spent time worshiping him and walking with him. In most cases these people experience burn out and dissatisfaction because they have entered into the harvest with a preconceived notion about God. It becomes a duty and obligation rather than a response to God’s love and affection for us.
Step four: Abraham obeyed God. This is the place that we want to find ourselves at. The bible says in 1st Samuel 15:22 “that obedience is better than sacrifice.” Notice that at the very core of the word obedience is the word die. We need to be willing to die to our own agenda’s and plans and follow hard after the one who hung willingly on the Cross for us. In order to do this though we first have to worship, second have to walk with, third have to work with and then we will find ourselves in love with the One who first loved us.
So let me ask you Where is your faith?
