Monday Thought -- July 18, 2011

Good Morning Friends,

“When the Son of Man comes, will he find faith on the earth?” (Luke 18:8)

What does God want from you more than anything else? According to Jesus’ statement above, He wants faith. Faith is what He will look for when Jesus comes again. Faith is what He will examine in your own life when you stand before Him in judgment. Faith matters to God.

“Without faith it is impossible to please God.” (Hebrews 11:6) You can have a life filled with religious ritual and that won’t be enough to please God. You can have perfect purity and that won’t be enough. You can work hard in your church, attend every service, give generously, and none of those things will be enough. Without faith, nothing is enough to please God.

“That which is through faith in Christ – the righteousness that comes from God and is by faith.” (Philippians 3:9) A right standing before God comes by faith.

“For by grace you have been saved through faith.” (Ephesians 2:8) Salvation comes by faith.

Faith seems pretty important – vitally important – so it would be good to know what faith is.

Faith is not a knowledge of a set of facts. Faith is not just believing the right things, the true things about Jesus. Faith is more than those things.

To have faith is to trust in God. Trust has to be based on knowledge – so there are things that we are required to know in order to have faith – like that God exists, that God wants to have a relationship with us, that God did what was required for us to have a relationship with Him. Trust is also based on believing certain things – that Jesus really lived, that He gave His life for our sins, that He came back to live again in the resurrection by which God established that He has accepted His sacrifice.

But to trust also means that on basis of that knowledge and that belief we believe what God has said and follow Him. We surrender to Him because He has proven Himself trustworthy. We respond to Him.

When the Son of man comes, will He find faith on the earth? When the Son of Man comes, will He find faith in you?

His, by Grace,

Steve