Shalom Aleichem...
Reflections is a weekly Christian Teaching Ministry. Each week we will talk about the Bible and lessons we can put to use in our daily life. We will try to, on a weekly basis, provide to you stories, thoughts, and just easy ways to live your life on a straight path.
THIS WEEK'S TEACHING....February 7, 2022
We continue our series on Belief and Faith as a Christian.....What is faith in Jesus?
What does it mean to have faith in Jesus?
I am going to be referencing many pieces of Scripture this week as I want to emphasize to you, as Christians, just how much the Bible needs to be a part of our lives. If we do not believe, have faith in and trust the Word of God, we are then lost...
In order to understand what it means to have faith in Jesus, we must first understand the nature of faith itself. Faith contains three elements: knowledge, assent, and trust.
Firstly, faith contains the element of knowledge. Faith must have content. There must be something or someone to have faith in. It is popular to say things like "have faith" or "believe" but these sayings are ambiguous, and even meaningless, until we define in what or whom we have faith. To have faith in Jesus, we must first have some knowledge about who He is. In order to have faith in Jesus we must know that He is the Christ, the promised Messiah, who came to earth to save His people from their sins (John 1:41; Matthew 1:21).
We must believe that Jesus is God's only Son (John 3:16) who took on human flesh (John 1:14), lived a life of perfect loving obedience to God the Father (John 4:34; Hebrews 4:15), willingly sacrificed His life by dying on the cross for our sins (Philippians 2:8), rose triumphantly from the grave after three days (Matthew 12:40) and is now seated in heaven at the right hand of God (Acts 2:33) from whence He will return to judge the world (Acts 1:11; John 5:28–29) and to bring to glory all who eagerly await His coming (Colossians 3:4; Hebrews 9:28). Our knowledge of Jesus need not be exhaustive, nor can it be (Colossians 2:3; 1 Corinthians 13:9), in order for us to believe in Him. However, we do need to know some essential truths about who He is and what He has done (John 20:31).
Secondly, faith contains the element of assent. To assent means to agree that the knowledge we have is true. Now, we may be tempted to stop here and think we have arrived at a complete definition of faith. However, having knowledge about who Jesus is and even assenting to that knowledge does not mean a person has faith IN Jesus. For example, the Devil and demons know who Jesus is and even acknowledge who He is (Matthew 8:29; Mark 1:24; James 2:19) but they do not believe IN Him, which brings us to the final element.
Thirdly, faith contains the element of trust. To have faith in Jesus means to trust Him. To have faith in Jesus means to rely on Him and resign oneself to Him. Those who have faith in Jesus rely on Him as Savior (John 4:42; Titus 3:4) and resign themselves to Him as Lord (Romans 10:9). To trust in Jesus means to believe that His death was accepted by God as payment for your guilt and sin (Colossians 2:14), that His perfect life and righteousness has been credited to you on the basis of your faith in Him (Romans 3:21–22). To trust in Jesus is to believe that His teachings and promises are true and to resign ourselves to follow Him and live for Him (Matthew 10:37–39; 16:24–25; Romans 12:1; Philippians 1:21).
A helpful analogy which sheds light on the difference between the second element of faith (assent) and the third element (trust) is as follows:
If I were to show you a chair and ask you if you believe it would hold you, you may say you believe it would. You have assented. If I then ask you to sit in it and you do, you are trusting. You see the difference. Having faith in Jesus means not only agreeing with the fact that He can save, but trusting in Him that He both has and will save you.
There are a couple things to remember about faith in Jesus that are vital to a humble recognition of God's work of grace in us and to a proper attitude of gratitude to Jesus Christ for who He is and what He has done. First, believing in Christ is a gift from God (Ephesians 2:8; Acts 13:48) and not a reason for us to boast (1 Corinthians 4:7), as if we are better or smarter than others (1 Corinthians 1:26). If we indeed have faith in Jesus it is because God has given us the faith to believe. Secondly, it is Christ Himself, and not faith, that is the grounds for our salvation.
Faith is merely the instrument through which we receive Jesus. Faith is akin to the tube which transports blood during a blood transfusion. It is the blood, not the tube, that saves the person's life. However, without the tube, the person would not receive the life-saving blood. Comparatively speaking, it is the blood of Jesus that saves us from our morbid sinful state (Ephesians 2:13; Romans 3:25; Colossians 1:20). Yet, faith is the instrument or means through which we receive Jesus and all His life-giving benefits (Romans 5:1–2; Galatians 2:20; John 3:15).
If you have not yet put your trust in Jesus Christ and would like to, you can express your faith in Him by praying something like the following. The words of this prayer are not what will save you; this is simply a means of expressing your trust in Him.
Dr. Billy used to use a prayer similar to this one:
"Dear God, I know that I am a sinner and that apart from you I am deserving of eternal death. I believe that Jesus Christ is your Son, that He lived a perfect life, that He died on the cross to pay the penalty for my sin, and that He rose again victorious over sin and death. I want to put my faith in Jesus today. I rely on Him alone for salvation. Thank you for saving me. Thank you for forgiving me and bringing me into relationship with you. Help me to grow closer to you and to live for you."
DID YOU EVER WONDER???
In keeping with our theme of trust in the Lord this week.....
The expression trust in Jesus holds multi-layered meaning. In one sense, trusting in Jesus means believing in Him for salvation (John 3:16). We believe who He is—God in human form—and put our faith in Him as Savior. And we believe what He has done—that He died for our sins and rose from the dead. Since we cannot save ourselves from sin and death (Romans 3:10–20), we trust in Jesus to save us (John 11:25). We cannot receive eternal life and live forever in the presence of God until we’ve trusted in Jesus as Savior and accepted His forgiveness (Ephesians 1:7).
Subsequent to salvation, trusting in Jesus means committing or dedicating ourselves entirely to Him. When we are born again, we become followers of Jesus Christ. As His followers, we put complete confidence in Him and His Word. To trust in Jesus means to believe everything He said and accept His Word as true: “So Jesus said to the Jews who had believed him, ‘If you abide in my word, you are truly my disciples, and you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free’” (John 8:31–32, ESV). The more we know and abide in the words of Jesus, the more we will obey Him, and the more our confidence in Him will grow as we experience freedom in Christ.
A trustworthy promise Jesus gave us in His Word was to come to Him to find rest: “Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy and my burden is light” (Matthew 11:28–30). A yoke is a wooden harness used to join the necks of two draft animals. Together, the beasts can more effectively pull a heavy load. In the time when Jesus spoke these words, farmers would often pair a young, inexperienced, but vigorous animal with an older, weaker, but seasoned animal. The younger animal would learn from the more experienced one, and the older would benefit from the younger one’s strength to help carry the load.
Rest, another way of expressing trust, is a state of leaning on Jesus for strength and learning from Him. He shares the load as we journey together. When we are tired and overburdened, we can come alongside Jesus and find rest for our souls. In this way, we trust in Jesus, by relying on Him for everything in our lives, especially when we are weary and burdened down. Jesus is the believer’s Sabbath-rest (Hebrews 4:1–11).
Jesus understands our weaknesses and knows we will struggle to trust in Him. That is why Scripture says, “Do not be anxious about anything, but in every situation, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God. And the peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus” (Philippians 4:6–7). When we take our anxious hearts to God in prayer, He offers us peace. His presence is peace. The passage does not say He’ll always give us what we’re asking for, but it does promise peace to guard our hearts and minds. To trust in Jesus means to come to Him and believe He has good and trustworthy plans for our lives and our future. We don’t have to fret about tomorrow. When we trust in Jesus, He pours out His peace on us.
Our trust in Jesus grows through experience (2 Corinthians 1:10) as we see God working all things in our lives—both the good and bad—for His purpose (Romans 8:28). Jesus wants us to live by faith in Him (2 Corinthians 5:7; Galatians 2:20), and so the Christian life becomes a testing and training ground in trust: “Consider it pure joy, my brothers and sisters, whenever you face trials of many kinds, because you know that the testing of your faith produces perseverance. Let perseverance finish its work so that you may be mature and complete, not lacking anything” (James 1:2-4).
Jesus said, “Do not let your hearts be troubled. Trust in God; trust also in me” (John 14:1). We may know that Jesus loves us and promises always to be with us (Matthew 28:20), but we can’t see Him, and, during times of trouble, doubt and fear can creep in and make it difficult to apply that knowledge. Peter encourages us that we can trust in Jesus even when we cannot see Him: “In all this you greatly rejoice, though now for a little while you may have had to suffer grief in all kinds of trials. These have come so that the proven genuineness of your faith—of greater worth than gold, which perishes even though refined by fire—may result in praise, glory and honor when Jesus Christ is revealed. Though you have not seen him, you love him; and even though you do not see him now, you believe in him and are filled with an inexpressible and glorious joy” (1 Peter 1:6–8).
Even though we can’t see Jesus with our physical eyes, the Holy Spirit enables us to see Jesus with the eyes of our hearts (Ephesians 1:18–20). Ultimately, our inability to see Jesus physically makes our trust in Him even more secure. That is why Jesus said, “Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have believed” (John 20:29).
The apostle Paul captured what it means for a believer to trust in Jesus: “For our light and momentary troubles are achieving for us an eternal glory that far outweighs them all. So we fix our eyes not on what is seen, but on what is unseen, since what is seen is temporary, but what is unseen is eternal” (2 Corinthians 4:17–18).
Jesus is teaching us to trust Him in all things at all times with all of our heart (Proverbs 3:5–6) so that our faith becomes unshakeable: “Trust in the LORD forever, for the LORD, the LORD himself, is the Rock eternal” (Isaiah 26:4). As we learn to trust in Jesus more, we identify more with the psalmist’s description of a believer at rest in the arms of God: “I have calmed and quieted myself, I am like a weaned child with its mother; like a weaned child I am content” (Psalm 131:2).
BOOKS OF THE BIBLE...A TEACHING
We continue our journey through the briefs of the Bible:
Joshua
Author:
Joshua, however the final 5 verses, 29-33 describe his death
Date:
Approximately 1375BCE
Synopsis:
The Israelites capture and settle the Promised Land
HAVE A SAFE AND BLESSED WEEK:)
Ho'omaikaʻi ka Pua iā kākou