When is the last time you’ve had to take
a step of obedience? God has not revealed to you all the details of what you’re
supposed to do. It’s something you know you need to do. But there is something
holding you back from acting, from taking that first step. Is it doubt? Is it a
complaint? Is it lack of faith? Is it rebellion?
Sunday mornings we have been hearing
from God about how our debt to Him has been paid. Our debt is the broken
relationship. He gave us everything, but we rejected it looking for something
which makes us “happy.” We started by seeing how the debt was paid when Grace
replaced sin. Sin brings rebellion, while Grace brings obedience.
But as it grows, God’s grace is not only
the starting place for the replacement of sin but that grace is greater than
anything. If something is “greater than”
that means the one is “covered” by the other. The Blood of Jesus covers all who
believe and brings them into relationship with God the Father. Accepting by
faith the sacrifice of Jesus and how that one act of love covers our sins,
past, present, and future says “God > Me” (Steve Dye). God is greater than
me.
It takes a lot of faith and obedience to
confess that God is greater than me. The writer of Hebrews saw this when he
wrote the 11th chapter. He writes of ordinary people who are people of faith
but notice these are also people of obedience.
“It was by faith that Noah built a large
boat to save his family from the flood. He obeyed God, who warned him about
things that had never happened before. By his faith Noah condemned the rest of
the world, and he received the righteousness that comes by faith.” (Hebrews
11:7) The writer is saying Noah not only had to obey, but in his obedience he
had to take a stand of faith to “condemn” those around him.
Suppose you're a
farmer living in the 1800’s. A passerby comes along and shows you his new
I-phone. It gives the weather report for your harvest season, a rotation
schedule for using the oxen that your village shares, the going price for eggs
from the chickens that your wife raises, music to listen to while you work, and
you can talk to the blacksmith in the next town (and see his face) without
leaving your farm. Would you believe him?
Now consider Noah,
hearing that rain, which he'd never seen before, would fall from the sky and
flood the earth. And what is Noah's job assignment from God for the next 100
years? Build a boat to carry your family and two of every animal to safety.
Noah tried to explain it to his neighbors. But who could believe such a crazy story?
And those that heard Noah mocked him! His was a world full of rampant violence,
and religious indifference. Does that sound familiar? Does that sound like the
2012 world in which we live?
Where is your
faith? Faith says “Yes” and allows God work out the details. Rebellion says
“No” and waits until we have worked out the details. Faith can be a lonely
place. Noah worked day after day on a boat that attracted ridicule and doubt. Yet
he fully trusted God for a flood of rain he'd never seen.
There’s a song with a line that says,
“Jesus shines brighter.” Everything about Jesus Christ, the Son of God, King of
Kings, Lord of Lords, shines brighter than anything you or I can do on our own.
Corrie ten Boom said, “Faith sees the invisible, believes the
unbelievable, and receives the impossible.”
Noah's faithful
testimony gives every believer the strength to hold on in impossible
circumstances. When people insult your testimony, and you wonder how God will
ever bring meaning and order out of the broken pieces of your life, take a
faithful stand for Him and let the Holy Spirit lead to show you and others what
can be brought about with faith.
