Bible Teaching

Calvary Temple Teaching Library

I AM Pt.5

Amen. Talked to Tony and Ron yesterday for a good while. They just want to greet you. They said to greet you, to tell you "thank you" for your prayers, and they're very aware of your prayer. The effectual working of it is showing itself in souls that are being added to the Kingdom, so praise God for that!

The church in Nairobi is growing. We're getting some people in of some real substance, not only spiritually, but people that are holding jobs for real. It's a very rare thing there--some people that are higher up in the social structure. It's an exciting thing! Gifts are being added into the church there. So just continue to pray. It's warfare. It's something that the enemy is opposing, and they need us to hold their hands up.

I talked with Pastor Charles also, and to encourage you from the last report we had heard, it was tremendous. So we've actually doubled their support in Kakamega. God is going to be able to express Himself through your faithfulness and see even some greater things being done as the kids are being raised up in the nurture and admonition of the Lord. I think discipleship training is somewhere now around seventy kids. So part of what you're giving is doing over there is subsidizing some of these; it's paying, subsidizing, some of the ministry that's going on there.

It's a whole lot different--you see, when they volunteer their time they don't have another person bringing income into the house. If they volunteer, there is no income. These are some things--we have people that actually walked away from the little bit of income they had to work in the ministry. They virtually were living one hundred percent by faith, and we made no commitments to them. I told Charles--this is why, as we doubled the income, I told Charles, "We don't believe in giving money to start ministry. We believe in responding with offerings because ministry is taking place." It's exciting! It is! It's a good field. You all are continuing to sow into that, so pray and believe God.

Henry, who was an Assembly of God pastor for many years, has been just kind of sitting on the sidelines and being proven faithful. He's still in the church and actually is behind a lot of what's going on, as I shared the testimony with you, among the young people and the revival that's taking place there among the youth. I was sharing with them to allow Henry also to begin to reach out into the Eldoret ministry. Some exciting things that are taking place. So just continue to pray, and pray for the wisdom of God and God's power to manifest itself.

Continue to pray with Janet. As you heard, we had to put her in the hospital the other day--her bowel had shut down. Part of it was because things were looking very, very good. The tumor markers had dropped from four hundred to eighty something, and then just almost instantly in two weeks they reversed back to almost three hundred and grew right through all of the chemotherapy. The doctor just said that as long as they were going down that's good, and if they're not, if they can't stop it, he said you're talking about a matter of just weeks or months. We're believing for God to totally set her free! Amen? So just continue to pray. They've started some new chemical and are hoping that'll reverse the growth, but we know it's going to be by the blood of Jesus or all we're doing is just buying a couple of months. We're looking for the miracle and for God to be glorified in honoring His Word.

Let's turn to the book of Deuteronomy. Good to see Forbe and Ruth here with us. Be sure to greet them. They'll be returning home soon, lowing as they go (Pastor referring to 1 Samuel 6:12--"bellowing" as the cattle did), but God is faithful and has ordered their steps in their obedience to what the Spirit of the Lord has spoken to them. The fruit will definitely be worth the investment.

Deuteronomy, chapter 7, verse 9. We're studying on the attributes of God. We talked about the holiness of God, as you remember--about God being totally distinct: that God is not the first of many beings like Himself, but being transcendent, He is beyond all others. There is none like Him. In His majesty, in His authority, in all of these attributes, as we talk, we need to remember that they are transcending, they are perfect, they are infinite. We can't ever, though we look at the different types and metaphors that we try to use, we can never bring God down to the natural level and fully understand the revelation of Himself. In another words, all that we understand Him to be, He far surpasses that in His eternal, infinite state.

So we talked about His holiness, and in that holiness we talked about the majesty or the power of God. We shared the fact that Satan's power is totally subordinate. He is not at war with God and God is struggling with evil, somehow barely getting by, and in the end finally good will triumph--as the old western fight takes place and the guy with the white hat is getting beat up and down the street and into the horse trough, he finally comes back and with one mighty blow wins the victory. God is not getting slapped around. This isn't even a fight! The only reason this thing persists is for the glory of God and a sovereign purpose that none of us will ever understand. So it's not a matter of God's authority or power; it's a matter of God's love and kindness. We know that He's mighty in power! We talked practically how that power has been given unto us--"I've given you all power and all authority over all the power of the enemy and nothing shall by any means harm you" (Luke 10:19). So we continue to stir ourselves with the power of our Heavenly Father, the majesty--that there's none like Him!

We talked last week about the goodness of God and just rejoiced in Father's pity and compassion and kindness to us. We saw how God is never indifferent toward us. We saw in our study on the goodness of God how that goodness is perfect and it's infinite. It's His good pleasure to give us the Kingdom (Luke 12:32). Every good and perfect gift comes down from the Father of lights with whom there is no variableness neither shadow of turning (James 1:17). We just saw the goodness of our Father who, though we squander our lives many times, is there waiting to receive us back. And it's never on merit, but it's because God is good that we're able to walk back into His presence and say, "I've sinned against heaven and against You," and He welcomes us in and kills the fatted calf, praise God! Why? Not because we deserve it--we deserve hell--but because God is good! He gave us the gift of faith because God is good. He gave us the revelation of His Word because God is good. Praise God! So He's seeking us; we're not seeking Him.

We saw how that goodness then transmitted into everything that we call "the blessings of God." It's something that comes--those blessings don't come by faith; they come as a free gift because of the goodness of God, because faith is a gift from the goodness of God. We can't, as so many have done in our day, pervert faith and make it some kind of great power that stands alone. It's a free gift of the goodness of God.

Tonight we want to talk about the faithfulness of God, as we're looking at His different attributes. Deuteronomy, chapter 7, verse 9 says, "Know therefore that the Lord thy God, he is God, the faithful God, which keepeth covenant and mercy with them that love him and keep his commandments to a thousand generations." As we look at God, we see that He reveals Himself here as the faithful God. This term "faithful," as we look at it in the Greek, is the word "pistos." We see that this word, "pistos," "pistis," it's dealing with faith. The word "faith" itself--or as we look at it here "faithful," and we understand it in the expression of God's action toward us as "faithfulness" (His response to His own character as "faithfulness")--but to be faithful really is to be trustworthy, to be reliable. That's really what we're talking about. So God is infinitely trustworthy; eternally reliable; perfectly, in every way, to be leaned upon as the one who is the provider in whom we live and move and have our very being.

You're going to see, as we talk about God's faithfulness a little bit tonight, that it's going to--as you remember, many of these attributes overlap one another, and they complement one another. We can only really make them distinct for the purpose of studying. We talked about the attributes of God, and you remember the one thing that we said as we study the person of God: we said that He was unitary. "...The Lord our God is [What?] one Lord" (Deuteronomy 6:4). That doesn't just mean monotheistic (just that He is a singular being as compared to polytheism). This unitary being means that there are no segments to God.

In other words--and this will be the best way that you can understand it. Sunday we're going to talk about the justice of God--we've talked about the goodness of God, the mercy of God, the kindness of God--we're going to talk on Sunday about the justice of God. Where we have trouble in understanding God is this. You see, we're tossed to and fro, and we see God this way: being comprised of all of these different elements--very much like the big cables that have been strung to hang the Golden Gate, as they spin all of those fibers and all of those cables and then it makes this cable; then they cluster all of those cables into one large cable, and then they wrap those into this one thing. That's not God! God is not mercy and justice intertwined. When we talk about a unitary being, we're talking about the fact that God is totally justice and mercy--they are never in conflict--always working as one. God is merciful in His justice and just in His mercy.

When we understand who He is--this is what helps us as we're understanding God to see how He responds to us and to see how we're to respond to one another and to the world and their lost condition as we're heralding the gospel--we can go represent Him properly because we understand Him. We don't misrepresent Him. We don't pick and choose certain attributes. You cannot take one attribute of God and ever express it, apply it, as distinct from any other. To do so is poor theology, and to do so is to show that we don't really know God. So it's very important for us to understand His unitary essence: the fact that this one God--that there is never conflict of any of these attributes within Him. So, therefore, that's why we've said so many times, every time we talk about an attribute we have to then say it's infinite, it's eternal, it's perfect. God's holiness--His uniqueness, His distinct being--is because He is unitary and there's no other like Him.

So when we talk here about the faithfulness of God, we're not talking about something that God does; we're talking about something that God is. God does not show faithfulness to us--God is faithful, and we enter that faithfulness. You're going to miss this whole thing if when we talk about faithfulness, you're thinking, "Praise God. God is faithful to those that love Him. That means that He treats us nice, and He's going to keep His covenant promises to us," and you're focusing on us as the recipients, again, of the goodness of God. What we need to really do when we understand faithfulness is this: know that God is trustworthy and reliable, and we can run into Him and be safe, praise God! That we're seeking His person and not the benefits, not the privileges. So when we talk about the faithfulness of God, He is not faithful to us; He is faithful to Himself--He is faithful to who He is. Because of that, we can trust Him, and because of that, His promises are sure to a thousand generations. It's not necessarily relational except on the fact that we're pursuing God, and hungering and thirsting for His presence, and apprehending by faith who He is and what He has promised us.

So let's look at this aspect of the faithfulness of God and this faithful God we serve. He is faithful to be holy. He is faithful to be merciful and kind and good. We showed you how that would kind of work with that aspect of God that we call "immutability," or the fact that God doesn't change. Immutability is a little distinct from faithfulness in that faithfulness has to do with God's extending of His good intentions toward us, where immutability is distinct in the unchanging aspect of God's character and His nature. We see Him being immutable in that He doesn't change. We see Him being faithful in that He doesn't change His goodness as extended to us. This is kind of where we make a distinction. One expresses itself to us; the other is the composite--see, trying to express God even--"composite" is the wrong word when you're talking about His unitary state, but we use it just to speak toward our comprehension or understanding of how these attributes work in harmony. "Harmony" is a bad word. "Harmony" implies that there are two distinct essences that are acting as one or complementing one another. Isn't it great to have a God that's bigger than you can understand or even express?

We talked, then, about the faithfulness of God. Deuteronomy 7 says that He is the faithful God, and He keeps covenant. So when we understand God and His faithfulness, then we understand that one of the things God does to show His faithfulness is that He honors His Word. His Word is sure to a thousand generations. Heaven and earth will pass away, but His Word will not pass away. His promises are yea and amen in Christ. So we see, then, the expression of God's faithfulness through the unchanging Word of God--the more sure Word of God; the reliable, the trustworthy, Word of God. Not one of His good promises are ever going to fall to the ground. So we look at that faithfulness of God. The Scripture says that He is faithful as a covenant keeper to those that what? Love Him. You see, God is faithful, but this faithfulness has to be pursued for it to be effectual in our lives. When you draw nigh unto God what happens? His faithfulness draws nigh unto us. So it's important to understand, then, that He is the faithful God to those that love Him.

Now, God in His goodness--we saw in our last session that God, in His goodness, allows His rain to fall upon the just and the unjust. God is even good to the sinner. God is good to those that hate Him. God is good to those that defile His Word. But we're going to see Sunday that God is also just. We segment and fragment, through time and space, a response to different things, and if we're not seeing justice immediately--and by the way, man's perception of justice is, most of the time, vengeance. God's justice is so merciful that we can't even perceive His justice many times because it doesn't satisfy our natural evil to be vengeful. God is not vengeful. God is just.

So as we see the faithfulness of God here, it's to those that love Him, the Scripture says. It's to those that keep His commandments. It's relating, then, to faithfulness as it pertains to promises, to benefits, to our providence, and we're able to then draw unto God and be assured that He'll never leave us nor forsake us. In fact, 2 Timothy, as it speaks towards the faithfulness of God--this is a passage that each one of us is so blessed by. Turn over to 2 Timothy, chapter 2, and look at verse 11. "It is a faithful saying: For if we be dead with him, we shall also live with him: If we suffer, we shall also reign with him: if we deny him, [What?] he also will deny us; [See, He'll be faithful to deny you if you'll deny Him.] If we believe not, [that doesn't change Him] yet he abideth faithful: he cannot deny himself" (verses 12-13).

So, you see, this should be something that excites you. It doesn't depend upon us. God is going to be who He is, perfectly, infinitely. God's promises are yea and amen. They're not dependent upon your faith. They're dependent upon His faithfulness to provide you goodness to enable you to believe so that you can receive. It doesn't have anything to do with what you're working up, what you can bring to the table. You have nothing that benefits God. There's nothing you and I can do to merit the blessing of God. There's nothing that you and I can do to effect the covenant of God, but rely on His faithfulness--just to lean on His reliability, to trust in His trustworthiness. It actually makes it pretty easy doesn't it? What does the Scripture call it? Laboring to enter into rest: the perfect trust in the reliability of our God. He loves us. He is for us. He is holy. He is immutable. He is good, praise God! "I laid me down and slept..." (Psalm 3:5).

So, you see, this is where God brings us in the daily war against our flesh, against principalities and powers, against the cares of this world--when you can really go out each day and say, "God is faithful, praise God! He is for me; who can be against me? God is faithful to bless me with all spiritual blessings in heavenly places in Christ Jesus. It's He that's working in me to will and to do His good pleasure! Every day He is working in me! He is faithful to work in me to will and to do His good pleasure!" Can you say, "Praise God" for that? This is the character of our God. He is faithful to Himself. He is faithful to keep that that we've committed to Him against that day, praise God! Do you believe that? Then there should be in us a rejoicing and an ability to count it all joy when we fall into diverse temptations.

How about 1 Corinthians 10:13? God is faithful, not allowing us to be tempted past that that we're able to stand, but with every temptation He does what? Makes a way of escape. God is faithful to not allow you to be tempted past that that you're able. How many of you have ever felt you were being tempted past that that you were able? God is faithful. God us faithful! It's at those times that He shows up and brings a refreshing, and you understand, then, that this covenant that's been cut with God, that's sure to a thousand generations, is a covenant based on the goodness of God because you didn't bring anything. When David and Jonathon came and made covenant, David didn't bring anything. God is faithful not to allow us to be tempted past that that we're able to stand. You see, beloved, this is going to be one of the most important Scriptures in many of our lives as we enter into this day that's coming upon us.

I picked up a TIME magazine the other day as we were down at the oncologist. I was reading it, and it was interesting. Some of you may have seen it. It was the one that had to do with Tim LaHaye's novels that are being written on the last days. It was interesting to see different people's perspective on eschatology and the day that we're living in. I thought it was interesting; surveys are so strange. In this particular survey that they did here in America, the survey said that almost sixty percent of the people surveyed believe that the world will come to an end as the Bible predicts it. Yet they live denying the one who spoke these words and are going to be judged by the one Revelation calls the Faithful and True.

Now, what's caused this reaction, of course, has been the 9/11 (referring to the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001). You look at where we are and the confusion of our nation. One fool in California tries to get the Pledge of Allegiance changed. All of a sudden the federal court makes their decision; and national media grabs a hold of it, and they put it as though it's a done deal--"No more is it going to be able to be said..., thus sayeth..." Who? Some guy sitting on a bench? Get out of here! I put my political hat on for just a second--it really ticks me off! Wouldn't you think that one of these days Congress would rise up and speak to the judicial branch and say, "Who do you people think you are?" How many of you have even been kind of deluded over the years into thinking the courts have the final say? They don't! There's a balance of power, the way this thing has been set up. Do you understand that those judges were appointed by people that we appointed? We can have their jobs, and they need to find that out--but it's not going to happen.

The spirit that we're in--and at the same time, Virginia passes a law that every classroom has to put this poster up that says: In God We Trust. Well, we're still a republic, it appears. By the way, to help some of you with your history, you do know that that's why we fought the Civil War don't you? It wasn't about slavery. It was about states' rights. Slavery is what Abraham Lincoln hung his hat on to make it palatable to the North and to cause the emotion to come in to effect the results, which was the North winning the war. Praise God! How fickle men are! Today, as they perceive the hand of God, how fickle they are! Blow up a building, "God bless America!" Let the dust settle--do you know what would have happened to that dude if on 9/12 he had made that proposal? Somebody would have probably hung him out there.

It doesn't take long, does it, for this spirit of humanism and the mockery of God's holiness to manifest itself again? We've already been judged, we've shared out of Romans. God has already turned this nation over to a reprobate mind. The fullness of the winepress of God's wrath hasn't manifested itself, but the nation has been judged! Men have been turned over! If you don't believe so, just look at what was going on last week: the worldwide celebration of "alternative lifestyle." In other words, the exalting of homosexuality! You can't even "jeer at a queer" without going to jail in Europe.

Now what are we talking about? This hour that's on us! These people, the Scripture says, in this hour are going to begin to move in, and especially the church. How many of you would like to be tried by the new world judicial system that just got passed? You all know that just happened in the United Nations, right? They've just set up a new "World Court." Think about it. At least we still have a little bit of influence. I think it's interesting. America said, "OK, you guys can have your World Court, but we don't recognize it." Wonder if this World Court would not be as tolerant of the liberties of America in proclaiming the gospel. Do you understand the resurgence and the emphasis being given to this world organization, the United Nations? It's nothing, and it's constantly reaching out and taking power and wanting now to start its own army. The man of sin is on the horizon. They're going to kill the children of God and think they're doing God's service.

When you enter into temptations like we've never known before--temptations, tests, trials, adversities, persecution--it's going to help to know the faithfulness of God. It's going to help to be able to reach back and remember the times that God was faithful to His Word in your life and be able to draw upon those as an anchor to your soul--the faithfulness of Christ and His promises. What are we doing now to stir up our remembrance of God's provision as we resist, as we said the other day, the temptation to be seduced into everything that technology, that science, that medicine provides and has replaced the goodness of God and the majesty of God? We talked about His holiness and how that gets into divine healing and the redemptive work through the stripes of Jesus and how the holiness of God is being opposed by the technological advances--all that's taking place in genetic engineering and all of these other things. The hour that we're in is only an indicator of the trials that are going to come upon His bride in these last days!

So we're talking about the faithfulness of God, and He will not allow you, 1 Corinthians 10:13, to be tempted--He is faithful and will not allow you to be tempted past that that you're able. Well, what do you do in the midst of a trial when it seems to be overcoming you? What do you do in the midst of the trial when it just absolutely seems to be coming over you as waves that are inescapable? What do you do when you can't pray? What do you do when the Scriptures don't come? "I laid me down and [I rested] slept." I just said, "God is faithful who will do it. He is faithful to keep that that I've committed unto Him against that day. Even though I deny Him, even at this moment that I cannot believe, God is faithful in His goodness to me and will not allow me to be destroyed and tempted past that that I'm able to stand, but will make the way of escape, praise God!

Aren't you thankful for His faithfulness to make you victorious when you can't stand, when there is no faith left, when there are no words to speak! When we deny Him in our unbelief as Peter did, He says, "Go tell the disciples and Peter that I'm risen." Praise God! He is faithful to us when we're not faithful to Him. I think it causes a little bit of humility, doesn't it, in our lives? Doesn't it cause in you a love that goes beyond the appreciation when all things are going well and He's blessing you, praise God, and everything that you touch is prospering? Oh, we love Him at that time, but what about the fact that when we are undone and He continues to love us unconditionally and pursues us because of His faithfulness! When we come back from the pigpen, He's faithful to embrace us, to put the robe upon our back and the ring upon our fingers. He is the Lord and He changes not, praise God. So we rejoice in that faithfulness, and though we believe not, He abides faithful! He can't deny Himself. He will never change. His response to us will always be love and mercy and gentleness and kindness.

Look over at Deuteronomy 9. We were in Deuteronomy 7; look at Deuteronomy 9, verse 5. We'll begin reading in the middle of verse 4, "...For my righteousness the Lord hath brought me in to possess this land: [That's not what it's all about. Don't say that's why it happened.] but for the wickedness of these nations the Lord doth drive them out from before thee. Not for thy righteousness, or for the uprightness of thine heart, dost thou go to possess their land: but for the wickedness of these nations the Lord thy God doth drive them out from before thee, and that he may perform the word which the Lord sware unto thy fathers, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob." You see there the practical keeping of the covenant. Here's a people who are thinking of themselves more highly than they ought; thinking it's because they're better than everybody else that God is giving them this land. He says, "No, it's because of the wickedness of these individuals." God is faithful to His justice, and those who opposed His purposes are now experiencing the justice of God.

Many times we experience the benefits of God's justice toward others, but it doesn't have anything to do with our individual worth. That's why we're never to rejoice when our enemies fall, and that's why we're to show compassion to the stranger and sometimes entertain angels unawares--because we realize the goodness of God and the faithfulness of God to draw all men to Himself. Whatever is necessary, whatever purposes God has to enact to effect His will, we're players in the sovereign purposes of God's faithfulness to love all men and to draw all men unto Himself, for He's not willing that any, the Scripture says, would perish.

1 John 1:9, a passage that we all know pretty well, "If we confess our sins, he is [What?] faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness." You can trust Him. Not part of it gets forgiven; all of it! Not based on merit; based on mercy. We come, and a broken and contrite heart He will not despise, as we come in hatred to that thing that has brought a reproach upon God. Not a sin that we're uncomfortable with--"I hope nobody finds out about it. It would ruin my reputation; it would ruin what people think" or "I'm just uncomfortable with this. I hate the guilt." Whatever it is. It has nothing to do with that. That is not a broken and contrite heart. It's the fact that we have sinned against He who so unconditional loves us and is so unconditionally kind and good toward us, and He that is so faithful in His mercy toward us! We become horrified by our unfaithfulness to Him.

When we see that as sin in our lives and what sin is, it's going to cause us to then establish and work toward this character and to be what? Faithful in the small things that He might make us a ruler in the great ones. Beloved, when we begin to exhibit faithfulness--the requirement of a steward is that he be what? Faithful. You see, this is the character trait that God is looking for in leadership. If you look at deacons, they're to be faithful, teaching and training their own households. It's the fruit of the Spirit.

So let's, as we end tonight, ask ourselves this question: If God is faithful, if the fruit of the Spirit is faithfulness, then how trustworthy are we? Can your spouse trust you? Do your children trust you? Can your brothers and sisters rely upon you? "Sure, if it's convenient, they can rely upon me. Yeah, you know, when I'm in a good mood they can rely upon me." The Scripture says, "...Be ye holy; for I am holy" (1 Peter 1:16). You can very clearly speak from all of those Scriptures that I just shared with you of what God's requirement is of the steward and the spiritual leader to say, "Be ye faithful; for your God is faithful." Practically, if we believe that God is faithful, that God indwells us, that this is one of the things that He is working in each of our lives--He exhibited it in His own ministry. Hebrews 3:2 says He was faithful to Him (Father) that appointed Him to the priesthood, where He became a faithful High Priest. Jesus not only learned obedience by the things that He suffered, but He exhibited authority by the faithfulness of His priesthood.

So as we look at the practical aspect of why we would study and know that God is the faithful God to those that love Him and keep His (What?) commandments, I wonder if one of His commandments is, "Be faithful"? How faithful are you to the commandments? That's where the practical aspect of the faithfulness of God comes in. How faithful are you to pursue the covenant promises of God? How faithful are you to pursue holiness? How faithful are you to pursue the power that God had promised to us where we could go out and destroy the works of the enemy? How faithful are you to proclaim the gospel to a lost and dying world? How faithful are you to stand and be moved with the same compassion that Jesus was as you look upon the fields that are white unto harvest? How faithful are you in the midst of the trials to proclaim the Judge of all the earth does right, instead of justify yourself and have God answer to you why in your case alone He was proven unfaithful?

Do you see what happens, what's going on in our hearts, when we're unable to stand and declare His goodness in the midst of adversity? We're questioning His love. We're questioning His character. We're questioning His immutability and His faithfulness to a thousand generations. Jesus is very clearly revealed, as the heavens were opened, Revelation 19:11, and beheld upon the white horse; "...and he that sat upon him was called Faithful and True..." He's faithful to Himself. His Word is sure to a thousand generations. Though you deny Him, He cannot deny Himself, for faithful is He that promised who will do it.

Father, we thank You for Your Word tonight and the revelation of Yourself to us. We just ask that we would see You as You are. Not as we perceive You through a dark glass. Not as we perceive You through tears and pain. Not as we see You through a false pride, as we enter in and take the land and think it's because of our own righteousness that we're being blessed and, in fact, it's their wickedness. But like Sarah who received the promise because she judged Him faithful. As Peter, who, firsthand, encountered this faithfulness toward him when he denied You, said, "Though you're suffering, commit your soul unto Him who is your faithful Creator." We can trust You infinitely and eternally, if it was in our capacity. To be truly regenerated is to lay our life on the altar and say, "I absolutely rely on Your resurrection power to raise me up. I absolutely yield my will and trust Your good intentions toward me fully, for You are trustworthy. I no longer care for myself, because You are faithful to care for me, and I just want to say, 'Thank You, Father,' in Jesus' name. Amen."

Let's stand before the Lord tonight. As Gary plays for us we'll take a moment and reflect on what the Holy Spirit said to you in this. The ability--let me paraphrase the Scripture for you--the ability to see God faithful comes by hearing the Word of God. The ability to see God faithful comes by hearing the Word of God. Faith comes by hearing, and hearing by the Word of God. All faith is, is trusting in God's faithfulness. That's all faith is. Faith isn't a power to itself. "Object! I don't understand object." Well, you better, pinhead! (Pastor is making reference to statements on faith made by a nationally known Christian teacher.)

Faith isn't a power unto itself. Faith is a gift from God to cause those of us who are selfish and suspicious and prideful to be able to rely on another--the one who loved us and died for us. Faith is the ability to go totally contrary to our evil nature and rely on a loving God, who our father believed was holding out on him and that's why he partook of the fruit. Everything in us is of our father Adam. Everything in us is to be suspect of God that He won't come through, but, beloved, He is faithful and true--the faithful God to those that love Him and keep His commandments.

Let's sing it together. "Oh, Lord..." Oh, the faithful God! Hallelujah! Just worship Him tonight. Just slip your hands up and declare His faithfulness, praise God! Just rejoice in the goodness of your God! He is trustworthy! He is reliable! Infinitely! Perfectly! Hallelujah!

We delight in Your goodness, Lord! We delight in Your presence to keep covenant with us! Hallelujah! We thank You, Lord, that You're always there to make the way of escape. We thank You that You're always there to give us our necessary food, praise God! You're always there to infuse us with faith, Lord, when we can't believe, for You will not deny Yourself! When we deny You, You give us the ability not to deny You. We thank You for that faithfulness and that You continually seek us out to be glorified in us. Father, it's our hearts' desire, in Jesus' name. Amen!

Before you go turn to somebody next to you and say, "God is faithful." Praise God! Amen. Go in peace. God's love go with you!

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