Faith
Tidbits
Ecclesiastes 12:13 - Let us hear the conclusion of the whole matter: Fear God, and keep his commandments: for this is the whole duty of man.
PUSH - Pray Until Something Happens
Plan ahead -- It wasn't raining when Noah built the ark
& Read the Bible -- It will scare the hell out of you
Christianity is not a religion. It is a way of life. It is a
continuous renewal of the whole man.
- Tunde Itayemi (2004)
Psalm 4
Divine Selection
Thistle in Lebanon
Songs (All time favorites)
The message of the Bible can be summarised by its two shortest verses:
"Jesus wept" (1 John Chapter 11:25) so that we may "rejoice
foerver" (Phillipians 1:4)
NOTE: Some bibles use the longer text "Rejoice in the Lord alway: and
again I say, Rejoice" for Phillipians 1:4
FAITH: what is really going on?
Faith comes up in our conversations fairly regularly - "have faith in
me", "have faith in yourself", "have a little faith in the
system" - etc. But how much faith does the average human have? I am not
talking about faith that can turn water to wine here! Visualize a man lost on a
snowed-up mountain; he has lost everything but the warm clothing on his back,
he is thirsty but all there is is snow everywhere. His eyes catch sight of
something close by which turns out to be a plastic-cup. He fills it with snow
then holds the cup between his two gloved hands. The next minute or two, the
only thing that moves is the mans coat being tugged by the wind. He then tips
the cup to his lips and has a drink of warm water. He repeats this twice over.
Then carefully puts the cup in his pocket and continues on his way.
I ask again, how many people do you know personally that can by faith melt snow
into drinkable water?
Ever wondered why we are not doing the things God said we would be able to do? Because
our faith is so little, it's almost non-existent!
So why is our faith so anemic; so small? It is because of the "cares of the
world" - when nothing is chasing after us, we are busy chasing after
something.
Jesus Christ the Son of God was given the Spirit without measure (John 3:34b) -
why is this possible? Simple, he could receive it since he was totally holy. The
average person limits the Spirit in his/her life becuase of other concerns apart
from the Father's work. "We" venture to say that faith and the Spirit
form the old chicken and egg dilemma - faith gives you more of the Spirit and
the Spirit gives you more faith (when you see his power in action). But due to
sin and numerous worldly cares, the Spirit has little effect in our lives,
leading to lesser amount of faith thus leading to lesser Spirit-ual influence
and so on.
The disciples on the other hand (apart from Judas Is-ca(use)-a-riot) were
able to exercise faith abundantly and do miracles exceedingly because they had
very little cares outside the Kingdom's work. They weren't trying to be like the
Joneses - unless the particular Joneses were closer to God than them; they
weren't trying to amass wealth that spent wisely, their 9th generation down the
line can't exhaust - at the expense of the people; they weren't trying to entrap
(depends on how you look at it though :-) young brainless girls when they had
their own wives at home; they didn't go about trying to buy the latest models of
cars; acquire houses in all the "bubbling" centers of of the world;
getting high on ecstasy et al - if they got high at all, it was on the Spirit
(The "Spirit" not Jack, not Seaman's and definitely not your average
moonshine!)
So any hope of a change soon? Recommendations?
I will not attempt to make any serious recommendations but if you have any,
do let me know. The problem with men is that they never learn, and when they do
they just memorize but do not apply ... . As an illustration, I may be critical
of the government at times, but deep inside me, I can't be certain that things
will be any different if I happen to be president say tomorrow. I suspect after
banging my head against a few walls, I might just conclude that it is easier and
better to just flow with the tide!
So watch out for solutions all the same. As per the likelihood of change, I
hope very much it happens, but outside of that, your guess is as good as mine!
Peace!
29-June-2004 (late at night in Katsina)
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