Don’t Ask, Just Know

Belief.  Fully submitting ourselves to the act of believing anything is demanding.  A little while back I was driving around with my good friend Brad and we listened to Paul Tripp’s sermon: The Difference between Amazement and Faith.  I recommend listening because it worked quite a bit in me but he starts off by saying these words:

“If you’re God’s child, if in fact you have been saved by His grace, if you consider yourself a believer in Jesus Christ, there is one thing you need to know, that God hasn’t chosen any of His children to be just consumers of the faith…It’s God’s intention that all of His children not only are witness to the amazing, gracious,glorious, loving, transforming work of His kingdom, but that all of His children would be participants in the work of His kingdom.”

I would like to argue that I participate fully; I would love to argue that, but I know that I can’t. A large portion of my heart is that I like to be amazed by God and not necessarily have the faith that He would like me to have.  See, being amazed is wonderful.  I can easily just sit back and see everything God has conquered and say to myself, “God is amazing.” but faith is different. Hebrews 11:1 defines faith as being, the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things unseen.  It’s one of my favorite verses in the Bible and at the same time, I hate that.  I don’t want to hope in things unseen, I want it now.  I want to just constantly just be amazed.  But that isn’t how discipleship works.  In order to be a disciple, we can’t want, we just need to do.

MARK 8:1-4 In those days, when again a great crowd had gathered, and they had nothing to eat, he called his disciples to him and said to them, “I have compassion on the crowd, because they have been with me now three days and have nothing to eat.  And if I send them away hungry to their homes, they will faint on the way. And some of them have come from far away.” And his disciples answered him, “How can one feed these people with bread here in this desolate place.”

When I read this I was shocked by the disciples response.  This is the second record of Jesus feeding the crowds in Mark; a mere two chapters before Jesus fed five thousand.  It’s actually funny because they even use the word, “desolate” (Mark 6:32 & 35) in that account as well.  So Jesus had already done exactly what the disciples are now doubting.  They were there for it.  They were amazed by what Jesus had done yet we see a few chapters later they didn’t have faith.  They didn’t believe that Jesus could do it again.  They weren’t participating and believing in His work, they were just waiting to see if they could be amazed again.

It took a lot longer than it should have to realize that I’m more like the disciples than I am Jesus.  Where I realize that I have hardness in my heart. Where the Matthew 7:5 effect comes into play and I realize the log in my own eye.  I don’t say, “Lord, you are able to do these things.” but rather I sit back and try and see if He is actually able. I wait to be amazed.  I have more doubt than belief.  I don’t participate in His work, I don’t work for His kingdom. I ask, “How?” and don’t say, “I know.”

God is working all around us each day, I’ve seen Him do things that I could haven’t even imagined being possible.  He is constantly stretching our faith; we are works in progress being transformed to having a more Christlike heart and Kingdom mindset.  But, He is trying to get us to fully believe and participate in what He’s doing and so many times we doubt He’s actually capable of doing what He’s trying to do and so we take the back seat and say, “How can You do that?” and not, “You’re God. You’re able.”  We need to stop being amazed and rather fully participate.  See, we keep looking for a sign other than Jesus.  We keep looking for something greater than God’s power and divinity.  We keep looking for something better and we are slow to accept the fact that there is nothing greater than the signs that God gives us.

In my realization of my own sinful nature of not fully trusting God, not fully believing, not fully submitting, this just shows how great God is.  How much better He is than me.  He is ever patient.  He doesn’t give up on making us the disciples for Him that He wants us to be.  In all the times that we want to sit back and doubt, rely on ourselves, He is patient. He waits. He nurtures us and He is there for us to run back to Him. He is so much better than me, and He gives me better gifts and amazes me.  But I don’t want to just be amazed by Him, I want to fully actively participate.  He wants us to fully participate. He wants us to believe with our whole heart.  He wants us to stop looking for a sign bigger than Him.  We need to stop asking, and just know.