Finishing Faith
Just some early morning thoughts from me to you…
The apostles said to the Lord, “Show us how to increase our faith.”
The Lord answered, “If you had faith even as small as a mustard seed, you could say to this mulberry tree, ‘May you be uprooted and thrown into the sea,’ and it would obey you!”
Luke 17:5-6 (NLT)
Thomas: “Unless I see in His hands the mark of the nails, and place my fingers [there] and my hand into His side, I will never believe…”
Lord: “He said to Thomas “Put your finger here, and see my hands and put out your hand and place it in my side. Do not disbelieve, but believe.”
John 20:25-27 (ESV)
From that first passage above and that moment with his twelve Apostles, we see that the Lord asked them, as He asks us, to have faith.
Faith in His promises.
Faith in everything He says and does.
Faith that He has a plan and purpose for your life and mine.
Faith in Him.
Faith in all of that, at all times—even when we don’t know how.
He asks us to believe without doubting, as written in James 1:6. To ask, to seek until we find, to knock because the door will be opened, as recorded in Matthew 7:7-8. To pray without ceasing, written in I Thessalonians 5:16. Simply believing that what we ask for, seek, knock and pray for—He will do something about.
But He also knows that we sometimes have a hard time believing. Having faith. Trying to wrap our limited, finite brains around what our infinite all-knowing, all-powerful God says and does. Sometimes like Thomas, we need to see it to believe it, and can’t seem to believe it on faith alone. (more…)