Sermon Central
-
Where Faith Comes From - Part 2 Series
Contributed by Steve Lawson on Jan 7, 2004 (message contributor)
Summary: God’s word increases our faith and brings us freedom.
Where Faith Comes From - Part 2
Romans 10:17 - So faith comes from hearing, and hearing by the word of Christ.1
2 Timothy 3:16, 17 - All Scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness, 17 so that the man of God may be thoroughly equipped for every good work. 2
James 1:25 - the man who looks intently into the perfect law that gives freedom, and continues to do this, not forgetting what he has heard, but doing it—he will be blessed in what he does. 3
Freedom – free from sin, free from fear, free from worry, free from condemnation,
- Free to approach God with confidence, free to serve God in the power of the Holy Spirit, free to have our prayers answered, free to call almighty god “Daddy”
“Many Christians remain in bondage to fears and anxieties simply because they do not avail themselves of the Discipline of study. They may be faithful in church attendance and earnest in fulfilling their religious duties, and still they are not changed.” – Richard Foster4
In 1728, William Law wrote; “If you will stop here and ask yourself why you are not as devoted as the primitive Christians, your own heart will tell you that is neither through ignorance nor inability but purely because you never thoroughly intended it.”
1. The Word Exposes What Is Hidden
Hebrews 4:12, 13 - For the word of God is living and active. Sharper than any double-edged sword, it penetrates even to dividing soul and spirit, joints and marrow; it judges the thoughts and attitudes of the heart. 13 Nothing in all creation is hidden from God’s sight. 5
As we read the word of God, the Sword of the Spirit, examines us and reveals our desperate need for God.
“The greatest Christian is not the one who has achieved the most but rather the one who has received the most. God’s grace, love, and mercy flow through him abundantly because he walks in total dependence” – Jim Cymbala6
“My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.” – Jesus to Paul
2. The Word Cleanses
Ephesians 5:25-27 - Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her 26 to make her holy, cleansing her by the washing with water through the word, 27 and to present her to himself as a radiant church, without stain or wrinkle or any other blemish, but holy and blameless. 7
3. The Word Re-defines Us
If 2 Corinthians 5:17 is right when Paul says, “Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; the old has gone, the new has come!” 8, then it’s God’s Word that defines what that new creation is. It is the TRUTH about us. Everything else is a lie!
1The New American Standard Bible, 1995 Update, (La Habra, California: The Lockman Foundation) 1996.
2The New International Version, (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan Publishing House) 1984.
3The New International Version, (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan Publishing House) 1984.
4 Richard Foster, Celebration of Discipline (New York, NY, HarperCollins Publishers, Inc.) 1978
5The New International Version, (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan Publishing House) 1984.
6 Jim Cymbala, Fresh Faith (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan Publishing House) 1999.
7The New International Version, (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan Publishing House) 1984.
8The New International Version, (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan Publishing House) 1984.
