Page 21 - Back to Bethlehem

Let me introduce what I’d like to look at now. It’s such
a theme, that’s it’s almost impossible to do in one lesson. The
foundation that I want to discuss is faith; what it means to trust
the Lord. How can we trust the Lord? I have some verses that
illustrate why this is very important. Hebrews 11:6, “And
without faith it is impossible to please Him, for he who comes to
God must believe that He is, and that He is a rewarder of those
who seek Him.” Romans 14:23, “But he who doubts is
condemned if he eats, because his eating is not from faith; and
whatever is not from faith is sin.” 2 Corinthians 5:7, “For we
walk by faith, not by sight…” Galatians 3:11, “Now that no one
is justified by the Law before God is evident; for, ‘The righteous
man shall live by faith.’” All of that to say that faith is very
important. If you don’t have it you can’t please God. Faith is
reckoned as righteousness.

If you tried to study faith in the Bible you would see how
large that is. We talk about faith as a gift from God. We could
talk about God being the author and finisher of faith. We could
discuss how it’s reckoned as righteousness. We could talk about
it being “the substance of things hoped for and evidence of things
not seen.” We could talk about “mustard seed” faith. We could
relate faith to works. We could talk about the difference between
faith and presumption. We could contrast it with the law. You
get the idea.

Faith is not defined in the Bible. It’s described in many
ways but it is not defined; faith is looking, faith is trusting, faith
is eating, faith is drinking, faith is receiving, faith is abiding. It’s
so big that it’s hard to say, “This is the foundation.” So, I thought
I would share two stories with you. The first story, in my
understanding, describes what faith is and what it is not. The
second story describes how I know that I’m trusting God. How
do I know that I have faith?

The first story that describes what faith is and what it isn’t
is the story of the disciples on the stormy sea. That’s in Mark 6.
In the second story I’ll only be looking at one part of it; the
woman that touched the hem of the garment of our Lord Jesus.