We realize that as believers, we’re supposed to trust God with every aspect of life, but circumstances can cause us to waver. This is not a new problem! Every believer will be tested and tried in the area of their faith more than once. God is not caught off guard in this either and had a plan before you ever came to a believer’s faith in Christ for your salvation to help you find His way. He knew that life’s trials would serve to bring you grief and doubt and that your faith would be tested by them, yet He did not leave you helpless against them. You see, the great mystery as it often appears to be, is not that we lose all our faith, but that we fail to maintain our faith and walk in Christ through some awkward difficulty that we encounter and our faith becomes little, not lost. If you look closely in God’s Word, you will see five different times in the book of Matthew, where Jesus pointed out examples and symptoms of what He called “little faith.”
Some people had little faith brought on through their anxiety. In the Sermon on the Mount in Matthew 6:25-34, Jesus addressed people who were worried about their basic needs being met. He assured them of a divine provision, if God’s kingdom was their top priority. The difference between little faith and bigger faith, is only focus. They were wrongly focused by what their eyes and bellies were seeing and feeling. Many had little faith because of the fear of what their physical senses were telling them, not by the Word of God that Jesus was sharing with them.
When a storm arose in Matthew 8:23-27, the disciples were afraid, even though the God of the wind and sea was with them in the boat. Asleep, yes, but He was there. They were concerned, because Jesus appeared not to be concerned. Isn’t that ironic? We are like that as well. We can feel like God is not concerned with our situations when He is not responding to us like we are wanting Him to and even place blame on Him that we know that He could fix the problem but seems not to want to. But, Jesus had no fear or worries because He was the Truth, the Way, and the Life and they needed a good lesson in truth and trust. He was preparing the disciples for a great life-lesson through that storm. Peter had little faith when his focus became skewed and he paid attention to something other than the truth that He had been looking at in Matthew 14:24-33. As long as Peter kept his eyes on Jesus, he had faith to walk on water. But when he took his eyes off of the Truth (Jesus) and focused on his circumstances, he began to sink. See how quickly our faith can become little?
Sometimes, faith becomes little when we are sidetracked and fail to stay on the course that we were planted on. 2 Timothy 3:14 tells us, “But as for you, continue in what you have learned and found to be true, because you know from whom you learned it.” In Matthew 16:5-12. Despite the feeding of thousands, the disciples failed to remember Christ’s past provision in their current situations.
Spiritually laziness happens when believer’s stop attending fellowship with other believers, stop studying their Bibles, their prayer life changes, other things take priority over their spiritual walk. Before they realize it, the enemy has baited them and they have taken the bite, hook line and sinker. They become unconcerned in making Christ Lord and priority any longer and the shift begins. If they are genuine believers, their spiritual conscience will grieve and they will take on depression, doubt and little faith. In each case, the wrong mindset resulted in a lack of confidence in Christ.
Little faith begins not with circumstances but with our thinking and focus. Therefore, if we want to increase our faith in God, we must fill our minds with the truth of Scripture, remember our Father’s faithfulness to us in the past, and look for His hand working in our present situation. When our minds are renewed, our faith will be also.
Hold
Fast,
-Bren
No comments:
Post a Comment