The Gift of Faith

This blog is designed to give people an inner look at a devotional life. Taking time each day to spend time with the Lord. The hope is if you travel on this journey with Rev. Jacob Shaw, you may be more inclined to spend time with the Lord as well. I encourage the use of a devotional, a scripture reading and prayer, then finally some form of artistic mark to tie it all together. 

Today's devotional is taken from: Zacharias, Ravi. The Logic of God: 52 Christian Essentials for the Heart and Mind. Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 2019. [E-Book] Chapter 31: The Gift of Faith

Opening Thought: There are two types of purchases that happen in day-to-day life that I want to bring to your attention. If one were going to a drive-through fast food joint and order a burger and fries, they would pay for their order and then they would be present with their food. In a sit-down restaurant, often (but not everywhere), one would order their food, eat, and then pay after they had enjoyed their meal. Which of these two methods of payment is more common? The former, we often pay before we obtain our goods. The sit-down restaurant method of payment is the odd one out. Now there is a pragmatic reason why sit-down restaurants hold the bill to the end, because if you have not paid yet, you may order more food and drink, padding your bill. Now depending on where you go in the world, some countries, it is more common to pay ahead of time in a sit-down restaurant, but that besides the point, rather just point of interest. The real point is that we in faith often want to receive the blessing of God before we are willing to "pay" for it. What does it mean to pay for it, well maybe it would be better put, put in the work, i.e., follow the will of God or even believing and trusting in God (together, following and believing can be call obedience). Often what is better for our bottom line is to pay up front, when we take ownership earlier it is easier to avoid unforeseen consequences.

So, is it possible to obey God before knowing His presence? Not only is it possible but I would say it is recommended. There is a misconception that faith is merely solely synonymous with belief, but I would suggest that faith is the crossroad of many experiences, like hope, intentionality, understanding, belief, truth, obedience, fidelity, responsibility, and longing… to name a few. So, in some cases, obedience may be the thing that flushes out the wider breadth of faith. We in fact do this in society all the time, the moral laws which govern our countries point to a higher source, a moral law maker, but we implement the practice or moral living in our children all the time. We teach children love before they could ever conceptualize the abstract nuances of kindness, compassion, and love. The fact that later in life people can talk about abstract notions, such as love at all, is because they have experiences it and been held accountable to it.

Zacharias points out that in the story of Moses, Moses at one point asks God for proof that who God claims to be is actually God. God’s response is, in a nutshell, do what I ask, and I be with you.

If you decide that you want to become a seeker of truth, you can do a mental exercise to help you understand why sometimes obedience to God may come first. If you close your eyes and imagine the perfect being, not in the sense of physically perfect, more as in morally perfection. This being would be infinite in love, justice, mercy, knowledge, and wisdom, perfect in action and perfect in inaction, ideal in balance and harmony and of course omnipotent and omnipresent. Once you see this image, then you have a hypothetical perfect being. As a truth seeker, you would want to seek this above all other things because if there were a being to hold this infinite and perfect definition, then the being's will for your life, would be the ultimate truth for you to obtain. Now because grasping the objective truth of an infinite being is a bit beyond our grasps, what we can do is ask ourselves what if that being was incarnate in our world, what would that being expect of us? Well to do our best, despite our short comings to follow a trajectory which would seek to the will of the perfect moral being. Now in short, because we cannot fully grasp the infinite moral perfection, all we can do is seek it and obey it to the best of our ability.

As soon as you apply the personhood of God and the historical figure of Christ to this exercise, we see the reason why Christian parents often get their kids necklaces and bracelets that say, what would Jesus do? Because living out the actions of the perfect moral example, not only protects us and others from sin, but it also brings us to a deeper hope, understanding, wisdom and knowledge in God, our faith strengthen by the obedience.   

In the story of Moses the proof of God’s call was found after obedience. What we want from God often doesn’t serve us to the will of God, therefore, unless we have a genuine willingness to let go of the self to seek God and His truth, than coming to faith and the reward of faith will be out of grasp. “Faith is that sublime dependence upon God that even though we may not get what we want, we know and love the One who devise us for His good reason and for our ultimate good.” Zacharias says. So it is safe to say that having an unwillingness to obey God, can be a good as not seeing Him, so eventually we don’t.

The devotional begins with: Daniel 3:16-18

Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego replied to him, “King Nebuchadnezzar, we do not need to defend ourselves before you in this matter.  If we are thrown into the blazing furnace, the God we serve is able to deliver us from it, and he will deliver us^[a] from Your Majesty’s hand. But even if he does not, we want you to know, Your Majesty, that we will not serve your gods or worship the image of gold you have set up.”

Second Thought: What if God called you to do something extreme? The reality of the full faith experience of the Judeo-Christian tradition is that God will call us to places that may seem like no sane person would want to go. When God calls us to love our neighbors and enemies alike and to make disciples of every nation, that means we are called to share the gospel with everyone, in all places. Our faith is a faith of adventure, we are called to heal what is broken, to feed those who are hungry, to teach those who are ignorant, and to love all with the full balance of God mercy and justice strengthening our heart. When we come to terms with the fact that our relationship with God is not going to be a safe one, sitting at home and just passively thinking about God once a week, then we realize that the journey with God to obey His will is the daily bread we are working for, it is the meal and the bill all rolled in to one.

Continual Work: Think simply about where God is calling you? I have asked this simple question to you folks before, in one way or another, but it is an important one to ask, but this time frame it with the understanding that where God is calling of you will be defined by the idea of Christ being lived out in your actions, words, and relationships.  

What Rev. Jacob is Working On: I feel sometimes like God is calling me to get more vocal with my beliefs and thoughts. I just do not know where or how I am to do that yet. It seems the world of debate and exchange of ideas has become so hostile with the internet, but maybe that is the very fires I am to face.

Prayer for your day: God, help us to find the humility and confidence to bow to Your will and find obedience in our life. Let us not find obedience as a form of limitation, but rather see it as us coming to terms with our true destiny, of being made whole by the gift and grace of Your son, Christ Jesus. Amen.

Artistic Close: I’ve never been great at training a dog, but what I do understand is that the best relationships between species happens when the species realizes there is a living benefit between of being together. My dog isn’t great at learning tricks, but when I call him, he comes running. Obedience to God does not have to mean broken, but rather running home.

 

Puppy from Drawing-Room Plays (1888) published by Lady Adelaide Cadogan. Original from the British Library. Digitally enhanced by rawpixel.