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Thursday Thoughts

July 27, 2023

Last week’s topic for TT was having faith that our story would turn out alright. If we are believers in Jesus Christ we don’t have to worry how our life will end as our story has a “happily ever after.” This week I want to continue with that thought. It is easy to say we have faith while in worship repeating the Apostles Creed stating that we believe in God, Jesus Christ, and the Holy Spirit. But what happens we leave the church building and are faced with the circumstances and complexities of life? How do we react to what is going on in our lives? How do we grow our faith? How do we encourage others?

When I was a small child we had a Sunday evening ritual in my home. We would have supper and then go to the living room and gather around our small black and white television that received signals for two channels via rabbit ears, to watch Lassie at 7:00. I had a love/hate relationship with that show. Lassie was the ideal dog, no sass, no holes dug in the flower beds, no tangles in that beautiful coat, no rolling in objectionable material, and no begging for food from the table! Lassie was loyal, disciplined, affectionate, and smart.

In each episode, there was some calamity or situation that Lassie would find himself in that would require his skills of intuition, discipline, and intelligence. Here’s where the show got dicey for me. As the plot thickened and an emergency was unfolding, I would run back to the kitchen and stand behind the door frame and peek around the door jamb to see if Lassie was going to be okay.

My mother would reassure me that Lassie would be just fine. Every week we watched the show and every week I would hide my face. Mother tried to reason with me that if the show's name were Lassie, then Lassie would survive every episode to perform again another week. I was so fearful, that I couldn’t face the entire thirty-minute episode without running away and peeking hesitantly around the woodwork. I had no faith that Lassie was going to be safe or that the episode would end with Timmy and Lassie happily secure in each other’s company.

What is faith? Hebrews 11:1 spells it out for us, “Now faith is being sure of what we hope for and certain of what we do not see.” The Message paraphrased version of the Bible says it this way, “The fundamental fact of existence is that this trust in God, this faith, is the firm foundation under everything that makes life worth living. It’s our handle on what we can’t see.”

Have we ever put our faith in our abilities or someone else? Scripture says to let go of those false pillars of faith because their foundation is weak and will crumble. Only God provides a strong foundation to stand on. Having faith doesn’t mean we will always get what we are hoping for because what we hope for may not be what is best for us. You can see how easy it is to have faith when we get the results we want, but what about when we don’t get the result we desire? Paul writes in Romans 10:17, “Faith comes from hearing the message, and the message is heard through the word of Christ.” That tells us for our faith to grow we must keep on learning, believing, listening, and taking action on the teachings of Christ. It is a lifelong journey to grow faith. Faith is built on our relationship with the living, loving Christ. Once we accept him and honor him, there is nothing that can separate us from his love and protection. There are several steps involved in growing our faith since no one else can do it for us. After accepting Jesus Christ as our Savior, feeding our faith with the word of God, meditating and praying on God’s word, and acting out of loving concern for others, then our faith will grow.

The way we live our lives by what we say, react, and do for others will be a testimony of our faith and hopefully will encourage others to do the same. Paul tells believers it is impossible to be separated from Christ. He died for us to prove his sustaining love. We can have faith that nothing can take that love from us no matter our circumstances, and feel secure and hopeful in all things. “For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, neither height nor depth nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord.” Romans 8:38

I pray that our faith will be strong and growing and that we will not peek around a corner to see if everything has turned out alright for Christ has made it so.

Blessings,

Becky

Bridgewater UMC 

Making disciples of Jesus Christ for the transformation of the world!  

219 N Main Street

Bridgewater, VA 22812

Call Us : +1 (540) 828-0890

Email Us : adminasst@bridgewaterumc.com