5/19/2019

I want to welcome you all to worship this morning. We are glad that you are here and that we have gathered to praise together.

This morning we are talkin about faith. faith is kind of like one of those words that we don't really easily Define for ourselves like heavy as anyone hell told you to just have faith.

You just have to have faith. Will he ever wanted to say to them? What does that mean? What exactly does faith mean? Well face.

Non-Christian definition would be trust and confidence faith is putting trust or confidence in someone or some thing. You all have faith in the chair that sits beneath you. Hopefully it holds up. You have safe in. people

sometimes we can begin to feel as though we have to Define our faith for others. Sometimes as a group of people, sometimes we want to instill our faith in others like to share our faith right like not like to share it is in like to get someone else to believe but to give someone else the faith that we have so that they can have the same Faith, right? And so sometimes that can lead us if everyone just decided to do this or do that then then things would be better. We would be more faithful people and and so one of the things you can't

Legislate is Faith. You can't legislate Faith. You can't make people believe something until all so you shouldn't just make people do an action that you decide is to be faithful right like ever since Calvin. No didn't really work out that way.

We all have faced here. But through our lives we have faith in different things.

For everybody above the age of 35. No, okay. 40. All right, maybe. Okay, let's go start here 60. Do you remember the first time you couldn't open a jar? Like that first feeling that you thought that the factory had vacuum-sealed this jar in an inappropriate fashion, and you certainly were not getting weaker. They done something wrong.

See many of us put Faith in our bodies, which is really easy to do when we were young. I I spent part of Friday with the kids at the school for a play day. None of them had to think. Okay. I'm going to stand up now know they just got up and they clung to the monkey bars and it held their entire weight. And so their bodies hadn't yet failed them. They had the confidence that they knew what they wanted to do it would do. Late in the afternoon Vero was on the swing in the principal mrs. Homers was over there and bira asked for me to come push her on the swing and and I said sure I'll be right there and mrs. Homer says now now mr. Gillingham. No underdogs. The Underdogs is evidently where you push the kid and then you try to run between their lug does it look like I can duck I know like it's not going to happen. And so we learned over time that our bodies phelous, right like our bodies. We can't put our faith in our trust in bodies cuz their frail they're deteriorating and so we learned over time that we can't put our faith and trust in the human body. And so after some years then we begin to put our faith in our trust in something else. We put our faith in our trust in money. Give me that first time you got a $10 bill or a $5 bill from mowing the yard. And you were like all now that's like the start of the car fund right or the start of a pain for some a car or some makeup or address or whatever, right? And so we begin to put our confidence in money. And sometimes we spend much of our careers putting our confidence in money. And we even put our confidence and money and putting it away in retirement. And then what do we learn?

There's no guarantees when it comes to putting our confidence in money. Plenty of people lost plenty of money and things like Enron or or other bad Investments. And we know that overtime money can buy many things, but it cannot buy contentment. And money can also never by health. It can clearly by access to bed or Healthcare that is a fact, but it cannot buy health.

So we know that putting our faith in money is certainly a temptation. But it's not what God calls us to do. And so also then we also begin somewhere between the first right like the confidence and body which we don't even realize we have and the cop is the Trust In in money. They're begins in our lives to put the faith in our relationships.

I sometimes it's relationships of family and sometimes it's relationships of friends.

We can call on them in and they'll answer. They'll be here in our times of need. But the reality is we live in a broken world. And it doesn't take long for us to figure out that we can't put Faith in family either.

hurts happen relationships break a conflict exists

you know one of the one of the I can't tell you how many times I just waited for the other shoe to drop as a pastor when it comes to people arguing over money after people pass away. Like just give it time. It happened. It's one of the signs of our Brokenness that we can't put all of our faith in that either not even in the family until we can't put our faith in our family can't put our faith in our money. We can put our faith in our time and I want to add another one. The other one is what a lot of people My Generation do and that's we put our faith in dizziness. We put our faith in being busy. We're so much more efficient with the technologies that we have, but we're all that much more busy. Going from one activity to the next one project to the next it's almost as if some day we may be content.

The Washington Post says that there there's a decline in youth sports. in this country I have my own Theory.

it it's so we have currently the first generation to the second generation. That was really raised at the ball field. Like really went from sport to sport to sport to sport to sport. That ended travel ball and all of that and so those folks now we're having kids kind of, you know, like kindergarten agent and a little bit older than that. And I think part of what's happening. This people have decided that they don't want to do that for their kids. That that maybe that didn't bring them as a child complete contentment.

And then the other part of it is and this is what the The Washington Post says that it is a a disparity of income. Child Youth Sports at the 17 billion dollar a year industry. with a B It's just as big as Major League Baseball without the salaries. I'm sorry, so

What drives us to share with our children and our grandchildren does things we want to instill in them those things that we hope will serve them. Well throughout life, right? Like we want then to to be able to put their faith and trust in things that will bring them fruit for the future stability. It's a part of it as a parent part of it is is doing the the always busy the busyness thing is to make sure that the kids don't have time to get in trouble. Right? Like if I keep my kids so busy, they will not possibly be involved with anyone who I do not like or appreciate. And they will magically get through life without having a problem with drugs or alcohol. It's just not true. Right but it's our love that that drives that right. Like it's a good thing that drives that. But we cannot in and of ourselves put our faith and being busy.

We we have to put our faith in something else because eventually we will not move that faster. Eventually. We don't have that kind of opportunity and So eventually the busyness will fade. And so this morning we're going to talk about what what it means to put our faith and trust in the only thing. That is Christ.

How do we put our faith and trust in Jesus Christ? Well our faith and our trust we understand that in definition of faith for from scripture is from Hebrews 11:1.

the substance of things hoped for the evidence of Things Not Seen

the substance of things hoped for and the evidence of Things Not Seen.

So by faith We are not ashamed to share the gospel.

I see here in in Paul at the end near your room if you're 17, and says the one who is righteous will live by faith.

How exactly do we live by faith?

We live by faith by by doing the actions that Christ calls us to

How do people know you are Christians? Do they know it by our legislation? Do they know it by our beliefs and values or do they know it by our actions? They will know we are Christians by our love they will know we are Christians by our love. That's how we share this Faith with others. by loving them So how do we know where we can grow our faith? Because faith has to be nurtured. It has to be paid attention to just like all of the ways that we put our time and energy and putting our faith in our body by buying all those vitamins and all those things that have no scientific background or those pills that are supposed to help you lose weight or get great grow hair, whatever it is, right and all the times we put our time and investment in learning about money. And how to and how to invest properly so you can have that perfect and retirement goal of this amount of money, which will sustain you in the markets will provide you 8% return every year. all the times that We Takin we invest in family because family is important with those relationships that we make which are not defined by

Biological connection like they're defined by relationships. Right? So whether their family of origin or family of decisions and and deciding for people to be family, then all the time that we've invested in that. How much will you be paying attention to our investment in our faith as well? So, where do we find this opportunity to connect. How do we know that faith is growing somewhere. I went fishing this week. And I fished a lot on a river and I've learned I'm Sorry Charlie I've learned. River fishing in lake fishing are two distinctly different things. and and so we went out trial and I went out and we were on the lake and

one of the ways I find fish when I'm when I'm on a lake run a river is called birds in the water. Okay, if there's a blue heron in the water then you fish near there. And here's the reason why the wind blows The Bait fish up against the bank right Blue Heron eat Bait fish. So they have better eyes than Rob does so there at the bank really big bass or really tiny tiny best are also near there cuz they like to eat Bait fish as well. Right? So that's how I hope to find the fish.

I didn't find it this week, but I'll find him next week. So.

So that there's only one bird in the water. Which kind of method is Pella going to be a really bad day and it was but with my suggestion to you is look for birds in the water. Look for people who you look up to in faith and see and connect and communicate with what grows them in their faith. I'm really really proud to be the pastor here cuz Faith is something that is taken extremely seriously. And that's what grows face. Seeing others live out their faith Inspire still others to grow their faith which inspires still others to nurture their own faith. And so if you're searching for how to grow faith. Look for birds in the water. Look for people who you respect who are living out their life of faith. Seen them is not the most difficult part of this. It's talking to them about how they've done it and what they're doing and it's not a perfect recipe kind of thing, but it's a relationship kind of thing and investment in those relationships is very important.

You know when we talk about faith, we we're not just talkin about something that happens in a vacuum real Community of Faith. We are a family of faith. We celebrate graduations and weddings and burgers and funerals together. That's what it means to be a body of faith. And so we also nurture one another's faith in Christ.

Faith isn't something we have to Define for other people. It's something we live out. It's something we leaned in to.

You know, there's this him called Great Is Thy Faithfulness?

God is so faithful. always to us

that that face inspires our faith. And when your faith is weak lean into God's faithfulness and search out where God is calling you. To invest in your life of Faith so that others may find Faith through you. amen