May 16, 2006
Hi, my name is lauren and I was wondering if you would have any scriptures or ideas for me to be able to use on youth sunday at my church next sunday about faith. If you do could you please let me know? Lauren
RTF Response
People often make faith very complex, and yet if you look at the story of Peter and Andrew, you see that faith is a simple invitation to follow Christ.
Matthew 4:18-20
Walking along the beach of Lake Galilee, Jesus saw two brothers: Simon (later called Peter) and Andrew. They were fishing, throwing their nets into the lake. It was their regular work. Jesus said to them, “Come with me. I’ll make a new kind of fisherman out of you. I’ll show you how to catch men and women instead of perch and bass.” They didn’t ask questions, but simply dropped their nets and followed. A short distance down the beach they came upon another pair of brothers, James and John, Zebedee’s sons. These two were sitting in a boat with their father, Zebedee, mending their fishnets. Jesus made the same offer to them, and they were just as quick to follow, abandoning boat and father.
Faith is a journey, an adventure.
Not “how can I feel God in this situation”, but rather where will God take me today in spite of my feelings or my circumstances?
What is God doing in my life?
Will I turn to him and follow him step by step even when things are tough? Will I trust that he knows me better than anyone else and has my destiny secure in his hands?
That’s faith. Jesus calls it a mustard seed. It’s something that he’s looking for in believers — a willingness to believe that God will lead you and is with you, and that the mustard seed will grow. It will take our small efforts and holding the hand of God it will turn into something beautiful — what God knew it could be from the beginning.
It’s trusting God in the hard situations, as well as the good.
Matthew 17:14-20 (The Message)
At the bottom of the mountain, they were met by a crowd of waiting people. As they approached, a man came out of the crowd and fell to his knees begging, “Master, have mercy on my son. He goes out of his mind and suffers terribly, falling into seizures. Frequently he is pitched into the fire, other times into the river. I brought him to your disciples, but they could do nothing for him.”
Jesus said, “What a generation! No sense of God! No focus to your lives! How many times do I have to go over these things? How much longer do I have to put up with this? Bring the boy here.” He ordered the afflicting demon out–and it was out, gone. From that moment on the boy was well.
When the disciples had Jesus off to themselves, they asked, “Why couldn’t we throw it out?” “Because you’re not yet taking God seriously,” said Jesus. “The simple truth is that if you had a mere kernel of faith, a poppy seed, say, you would tell this mountain, “Move!’ and it would move. There is nothing you wouldn’t be able to tackle.”
Sometimes faith is trusting God for the impossible or knowing that he is with us in the midst of an impossible situation.
But bottom line, faith is about trusting something bigger than ourselves and seeing where God takes us.
Sue aka MsCreativity says:
Many thanks for your kind words on my blog.
I’m still learning about my Faith every day. For me, it’s about believing even when there are times I don’t fully understand why I do, I just do.
I’ve now come to the conclusion that God, Jesus and the Holy Spirit are far too big for human minds to fully grasp.
IMHO that’s what faith is all about, believing in something far greater than our human minds will ever understand, but just knowing that it is true.
(Does that make sense? Sorry for rambling…)
Jade says:
A very interesting post!
Your Sister in Christ,
Jade