SERMON: ENTERING INTO FAITH

Audio Link

21 July 2013

I.  Introduction

            -- turn in Bibles to 1 Thessalonians 5:23-24

1 Thessalonians 5:22-23 (NIV)

22 Avoid every kind of evil.

23 May God himself, the God of peace, sanctify you through and through. May your whole spirit, soul and body be kept blameless at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ.

            -- not many people today are familiar with the name of Amy Carmichael -- in fact when people mention ministries and outreach to the poor in India, her name is not the one that pops into their mind -- but it was Amy Carmichael who paved the way for Christian evangelism and ministry in India and whose legacy and faith inspired Mother Theresa to devote her life to the mission field

            -- Amy Carmichael was born in Ireland in 1867 and was called by God to be a missionary at the age of 25 -- at first she was led to Japan, but her ministry there was short-lived -- God called again and Amy found herself alone in India in 1895, where she remained until her death 56 years later -- never once taking a furlough -- never once returning home to her beloved Ireland -- the work was too great, she said, the need never-ending
            -- Amy spent her career reaching out to the children who were being sold into prostitution in the temples in India, beginning first with girls, later with boys, and eventually opening an orphanage for both children and infants -- the children there called her "Amma" -- "mother" in Tamil -- and she fought tirelessly to rescue them from the bonds of forced prostitution and to protect them from those who sought to gain from their servitude
            -- how was this ordinary girl from Ireland -- without any formal seminary or Bible college training -- able to survive in a hostile country and make a significant difference in the lives of thousands of boys and girls while influencing untold others to devote their lives to Christ?

            -- in Amy's own words, it occurred when she was ushered into a life of faith -- for Amy this life of faith came after conversion -- it occurred when she finally trusted God for all -- when her fledgling faith became real and she truly believed in a God who could do all

            -- in September 1886, Amy had been struggling with the problem of how to live a holy life, and she found the answer at a series of evangelical meetings in Glasgow -- it was not the message of the speakers that God used to reach her, but the closing prayer of the chairman -- in his prayer he paraphrased Jude 24, which conveys the same message as our text from 1 Thessalonians 5 -- "To Him who is able to keep you from stumbling and to present you before His glorious presence without fault and with great joy"
            -- when Amy heard the promise of God's faithfulness and providence in those words, she realized that God loved her and would lead her down new paths of faith and victory if she would quit trying to live her faith on her own but trust Him instead -- thus started a life of faith that touched others for eternity¹

II.  Aspects of Faith

            -- what is it that keeps Christians today from making an impact on our world like Amy Carmichael? -- what is it that keeps us from reaching our potential in Christ?
            -- ultimately, it comes down to one word -- faith
            -- when we think of faith, we tend to think of salvation -- but over the last several years, I have come to understand the depths of this simple word and have begun to grasp the idea that faith is multidimensional
            -- in order to grow as Christians -- in order to do great things for God -- we have to embrace faith and let it mature in our lives to the point where we trust God in all things and in all ways -- not only for salvation -- but also for our sanctification and our ministry

            -- let me give you an example of what I'm talking about -- when we speak of grace in the church, we recognize three separate aspects of grace in our lives -- first, we speak of prevenient or preventing grace -- the grace that reaches out to us to call us to the cross before we even know who Christ is -- secondly, we speak of justifying grace -- the grace of the cross -- the grace that saves -- and, finally, we speak of sanctifying grace -- the grace that matures -- the grace that grows -- that makes us more and more like Jesus -- the grace that leads us into holiness and maturity

            -- I am convinced that faith works hand-in-hand with grace in every step of our lives -- and that there are aspects of faith active in our life just as there are aspects of grace that God uses to reach us

            -- as such, we move from a reasoning faith -- a faith that believes in the known fact of God's presence -- head-knowledge, if you would -- the faith that says with the intellect, "there is a God and He is real"
            -- to a saving faith -- a faith that includes both the head and the heart -- the faith that says -- not only is God real -- but God has saved us through the atoning death of Christ on the cross -- it is this saving faith by which we know that we know that Jesus is Lord and we receive Him as our Savior -- saving faith comes when we trust God, and God alone, for our salvation
            -- from there we move to a maturing faith -- a faith with feet -- a faith that trusts God in all ways for all things -- as we grow in Christ -- as we begin to live life with Him -- we stop trying to do religion on our own and trust in God, through this maturing faith, to do it all for us
            -- this maturing faith is the faith of relationship -- the faith of true trust -- the faith that allows a 25-year old girl from Ireland to touch an entire continent for Christ

            -- it is this faith that separates people like Amy Carmichael and Mother Theresa and other well-known Christians from you and me

            -- it is this faith that we desperately need if we are to be who God calls us to be and to do what God calls us to do
            -- it is this faith that Amy Carmichael responded to when she heard the words of Jude 24 and it is this faith I believe Paul is referring to in this passage in 1 Thessalonians Chapter 5

II.  Scripture Lesson (1 Thessalonians 5:23-24)

            -- let's take a moment here and look at these verses from the concept of maturing faith

            -- if you would, let's read these again -- 1 Thessalonians 5:23-24

1 Thessalonians 5:22-23 (NIV)

22 Avoid every kind of evil.

23 May God himself, the God of peace, sanctify you through and through. May your whole spirit, soul and body be kept blameless at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ.

            -- Paul begins his benediction at the end of this first letter to the Thessalonians with the phrase that marks the difference between a saving faith and a maturing faith -- "God Himself" -- between nominal Christianity and phenomenal Christianity

            -- the agent of sanctification is God Himself -- it is not us -- we cannot be holy on our own -- we cannot do great things for Him on our own, no matter how much we want to
            -- as Jesus told His disciples in the Garden of Gethsemane when He prayed before the cross, "The Spirit is willing but the flesh is weak" -- although we may have the desire in our spirit to do great things for Christ -- although we may have the desire to become more holy in our lives -- our flesh fails us

            -- we simply cannot grow in grace on our own -- we cannot grow in holiness on our own -- holiness in our lives only comes through God Himself working in us and through us -- as Paul says, "through and through" --  to make lasting change in our lives

            -- in order to mature as Christians, our faith must mature to the point where we trust in God and God alone to mold us and shape us into His instruments of grace

            -- Paul goes on to refer to God as the God of peace -- when Paul writes of peace, he is referring to more than just a feeling of calmness or tranquility -- in fact, Paul is referring to peace as the absence of warfare -- spiritual warfare

            -- the Bible tells us that before we came to faith we were enemies of God -- our spirits warred against Him -- but now we are reconciled to God through the cross -- where before we were enemies, now we find ourselves at peace with God -- where before we worked against Him, now we work with Him as we allow Him to control our bodies and minds and spirit

            -- this is a hallmark of a maturing faith -- it signifies the point where we stop struggling with God -- we stop wrestling with Him and kicking against the goads -- and start allowing Him to direct our paths

            -- when Paul refers to the God of Peace, it is a reflection of a change in our nature and our approach to God -- it implies submission and surrender in the arms of complete faith and trust -- it is only when we trust God through faith in our daily lives as well as in our salvation that we begin to do great things for Him

            -- Paul says that God Himself is sanctifying us through and through -- to sanctify means to set apart for a purpose -- to make holy -- to make useful -- in the New Testament, the idea of sanctification is making the common holy through the spirit and power of God -- it is through sanctification that we become the people God can use -- and Paul tells us here this occurs only through God's action in our lives

            -- in all that God tells Christians to do, He never intends that we would do it in our own strength and our own power -- instead, God wants us to rely on His power to do it through us -- we fail when we rely on ourselves rather than God
            -- as Dave Guzik wrote, "more Christians are defeated on account of self-reliance than on account of Satanic attack" -- and as the cartoon character Pogo said, "We have met the enemy, and he is us"
            -- a maturing faith moves us from self-reliance to God-reliance in all aspects of our spiritual and daily lives -- it is when we begin to rely on God that we begin to do great things for Him
            -- notice the order of sanctification is from within to without -- spirit -- soul (mind) -- and then body

            -- one reason we are so ineffectual as Christians is we try to make the body clean without first allowing God to clean the inside -- Jesus reproached the Pharisees for cleaning the outside of the cup while allowing the inside to remain dirty and He accused them of white-washing tombs to make them look good to others while remaining unclean on the inside

            -- God works from the inside out, and His emphasis is on the "whole" person -- the word Paul uses here for "whole" means entire, perfect in every way -- as God sanctifies us, He removes the blemishes from our spirits and our souls and finally from our bodies
            -- and as we grow in our maturing faith, we move from someone who relies on ourselves for our own holiness to God, who alone can make us perfect through Christ
-- it is our maturing faith along with God's sanctifying grace that makes us blameless -- without fault -- whole and complete and perfect

            -- it all comes down to trust -- we have to reach the point in our faith where we believe and trust that our sanctification depends on God and God alone -- and where we believe and trust that He is faithful to complete the good work He began in us

            -- just as we cannot save ourselves -- just as we cannot do enough good works to win our salvation and atone for our own sins -- we cannot sanctify ourselves -- we have to rely solely on the presence and power of God to sanctify us and make us holy
            -- our faith comes into play in sanctification when we truly begin to realize this and to know we must trust in God and not ourselves for holiness
            -- Paul writes, "God will do it" -- God -- not us -- this is where most Christians fail -- this is what keeps us from becoming who God has called us to be

            -- we have a pretty good concept of salvation -- we understand we cannot save ourselves -- but most of us still have not grasped the idea that it is God who works in us and through us to sanctify us -- we still feel like we should do something after we are saved -- and when we begin to try to do this Christian life in our own strength and in our own power, we fail and we doubt and we falter -- we find ourselves caught up in a cycle of sin, repentance and failure and never grow in our Christian lives

            -- it is only when we trust God with our sins and with our daily lives that we begin to see growth in our spiritual lives -- we can never resolve our sin by working on it -- just as striving to sin less does not keep us from future sins, Paul tells us here that striving to become holy will not make us so
            -- it is only when we allow God to work in us and through us -- when we surrender ourselves to Him and trust in His power in our lives -- that we become truly holy and begin to see victory over sin and begin to grow into the men and women He has called us to be
            -- it is only when we reach the same point that Amy Carmichael and so many others have reached that we truly live the Christian life -- this is the point where we realize that we cannot live this Christian life on our own and in our own strength but we must depend of the God of Peace who is faithful and who will perfect us and complete us and use us to accomplish His will on earth

IV.  Closing

      -- I want to close by sharing with you the story of another person who demonstrated entire and total trust in God through his maturing faith -- George Mueller

      -- George Mueller lived in Bristol, England, in the early 1800s -- and just as Amy Carmichael did, Mueller reached the point in his life where he became determined to live a life of total faith and trust -- he realized that in his own strength he had no power, but through Christ he could do all things -- Mueller dedicated his life to ministry and wanted to prove to others through his life and faith that God answers prayers -- as a result, in the course of his life, he became known as a man who depended on prayer in all circumstance

      -- by the time he died at the age of 92, Mueller's ministry had started five large orphanages in England -- with no income from his ministry, Mueller saw over 50,000 specific answers to prayer and received almost $7.5 million dollars in support of God's work in that place -- all because Mueller trusted in God and no himself to provide
      -- let me give you an example of one famously answered prayer in his life that showed how he depended on God and trusted Him in faith for every minute detail of his life and his ministry

      -- one morning at Mueller's orphanage, there was no food for breakfast and no money to buy food -- all the children were gathered there in the dining hall, waiting to be fed before school -- the workers didn't know what to do, but Mueller did

      -- he told them to go ahead and set the table for breakfast with cups and bowls just like normal -- "God will provide," he said -- then he had the children take their places and he led them in their morning prayer before the meal -- "Dear Father, we thank Thee for what Thou art going to give us to eat."
      -- about the time he finished the prayer, there was a knock on the door -- the baker from down the street stood there, and said, "Mr. Mueller, I couldn't sleep last night -- Somehow I felt you didn't have bread for breakfast and the Lord wanted me to send you some -- So I got up at 2 a.m. and baked some fresh bread, and have brought it."
      -- Mueller thanked the man and they brought the bread inside -- now they had food, but still nothing to drink but water.
      -- No sooner had the baker left then there was a second knock at the door -- It was the milkman -- believe it or not, but his milk cart had broken down right in front of the orphanage -- since they would have to empty the wagon to repair it and since the milk would go bad before they could get it delivered, he wanted to know if the orphanage could use it
      -- within minutes of praying and thanking God, God provided both food and milk to the orphans that morning and showed every single one of them the power of God in response to one man's maturing faith

      -- there is no reason in the world God cannot use us as He did Amy Carmichael and George Mueller, except one -- faith

      -- we must believe in God and in His providential care -- we must trust that God is not only able to save us, but He is able to provide for us in our daily lives -- we must trust that God will sanctify us and make us into the men and women He has called us to be so we will do great things for Him

      -- it all comes down to faith -- it all comes down to submission and surrender -- to humbling ourselves and admitting that we can't do it -- to laying it down -- and trusting in God to do it for us

      -- Amy Carmichael did not do a single thing in India -- God did

      -- George Mueller did not do a single thing to obtain food and drink for his orphans on that day -- God did
      -- the difference between them and us is that they let God do it for them -- they trusted in Him for their salvation and their sanctification and that made all the difference

      -- what great thing does God want to do in your life? -- what great thing does God want to do through you? -- it can only happen if you believe -- it can only happen if you have faith

      -- let's pray

 

¹Wiersbe, Warren W.  10 People Every Christian Should Know, Chapter 8: Amy Carmichael.