Faith

all right. This morning, we're gonna be in Mark Chapter five, Mark, Chapter five, starting at verse 21 today as we continue our Siri's unleashing its power last week we talked about belief as a key to unleashing the power of Christ.

This week it's faith now you're going to say now what is the difference? Those Those two concepts are really so closely intertwined. It's hard to know the difference between belief and faith. In fact, most Christians, I think, use those two words as synonyms.

But they aren't exactly synonyms. Not quite. Remember last week, what are biblical? Definition of belief was it's that we are fully persuaded, right? So a belief in Jesus. If we believe in Jesus, then we are fully persuaded that he is the son of God, as he claimed to be that his crucifixion bought our freedom from the penalty of our sin.

His resurrection gives us everlasting life, and he's coming back a man. We believe that we're fully persuaded. So in a way, belief is internal. It's something we hold in our hearts and in our minds, right? It's something on the inside.

We hold in our hearts and we hold it in our minds, faith. And here's where we start to get a little bit of a difference is seen externally. It's the ability to act on our beliefs. It is having such a strong belief that we're compelled to do something with what we believe now.

While faith is still an internal concept, I'm not saying it's not. It's one that becomes an external action. That's why James says in James to 17 faith, if it has no works, is what church dead, It's dead.

James reveals that faith is an internal concept, but that it cannot stay there and thus is an external action or it's nothing but belief so we can believe in Jesus but do nothing to show it unless we have faith in Jesus, we might say, but must be careful in saying it that were saved when we believe.

But once we're saved, we are to walk by faith, so therefore belief can exist and save us without necessarily faith. But faith is dependent upon belief in orderto have face, we have to believe right, but the Bible seems to talk about belief is a concept on to salvation and faith as a walk that follows that I would venture to take a step further and say that if faith doesn't follow belief, then we should stop and consider and examine our belief and how strong it is I've shared.

On Wednesday night a few weeks ago, Natalie and I went to see the documentary Free Burma Rangers, and it's about a group of individuals who have formed basically a help arming in Burma, where there's been a civil war going on for a long, long time.

And this man, David Eubanks, was an Army ranger in our army, and God laid it on his heart to take a step of faith and to go to Burma and begin to help displaced people. Refugees right there meeting them immediately.

At the moment they have been run out of the village. I mean, being there while the fighting is going on on the front line in that civil war and intercepting people is they're leaving, having left dead loved ones behind, laying on the ground and taking them off somewhere, ministering to them and treating their wounds and protecting them.

I mean, he's carrying a rifle, and others that he gather with him were carrying rifles to protect these individuals. That was a step of faith to say, God, I will go wherever you want me to go, even if it looks entirely crazy to the rest of the world.

Now, I'm not saying that that's something you have to do. But I'm saying that's something he was gifted to do that God had provided the training for him to do and called him to do. Now he could have said, Well, I believe in you, Lord.

But I'm not doing that. That would've been a lack of faith that I've been saying I believe in you, but I don't have the faith to obey you. You see where the difference starts to become when you start to look at the difference between belief and faith.

Our savior also taught that it doesn't take much faith to accomplish great things and see his power unleashed. Just listen to these words in Matthew. 17 20 is Jesus says if you have faith the size of a mustard seed, you will say to this mountain move from here or there and it will move and nothing will be impossible to you.

Now the average size of mustard seed is about 1 to 2 millimeters. That's less than 1/10 of an inch. So according to Christ, it doesn't take much faith to do great things. And according to Christ, and this is something we might miss here it's really settling.

You could say I'm just getting into semantics. But according to Christ, faith does something. Let me eliminate most of the words out of adversity. Just say it this way. If you have faith, Jesus says you will.

He doesn't say you might. He doesn't say you can. He says You will. You will speak to the mountains in your life by faith, and I will move them. You will do it. Otherwise, you're not walking about. Otherwise, your faith is not even the size of a mustard seed.

So I think the conclusion is obvious that the power of God's not evident in our lives, and we probably are exercising less than a minute school faith, you might believe, Do we believe strongly enough to act upon our belief in faith? May we act by side and call it faith, but God doesn't move mountains.

When we approach our problems with reasoning, he moves them when we approach them with faith and step out in faith. Robert Driscoll one theologian Robert Driscoll once said, Belief can be simply a passive mental acceptance, which amounts to nothing when it comes to how it affects our life.

That's what he said. Believe this. In other words, believing might get us into the church building. But it takes faith to be the church when we leave. Amen. You understand what I'm saying? That's where I believe that disconnect comes for many Christians, we believe, But don't expect us to take chances forgot.

I'm not sure how things will work out if I do. I'm not willing to take that chance, I believe. But I'm not sure about this step of faith thing. Chuck's Wendell. I love Chuck. Swindoll once wrote this, and I gotta break it down.

It's Fortune four sentences, and he he can say so much in just one sentence, he says, Your faith ought to get you in trouble at times and just stop think about that for a second. When was the last time you were in trouble? Because your faith, I guess if we're playing it safe, we're not walking it.

Faith right your faith ought to get you in trouble times. If everybody thinks you're nuts, you may be it's okay if some think you are. But then he says this you're probably in trouble if no one thinks you are.

In other words, what he's saying is, you probably not living out your face because face sometimes is gonna lead you to do things that everybody will be looking at. You saying that's impossible. You can't do that.

How in the world could you step out and do that? But God said so and by faith, you know God's gonna do it. Faith has lived down the day to day life as we trust God with everything. And when we trust God with everything, we open up the floodgates of its power to do that, which seems impossible to us now.

There are a lot of abuses on this. Some preach that all we have to do is name it and claim it. I'm gonna tell you something that will shock you with this. I do believe in name it and claim it. I am a name and claim a Christian, but here's the key.

You name and claim what God tells you the name and claim what God leads you to name and claim. You don't claim something for yourself. Name something that got out. I want things, Car. I want this. That or the other thing.

You name it. Claim it. If God says so. I believe Dave Eubanks. Free Burma Rangers. How I believe when God called him, He says fun. I'm naming it. You're calling me to go to Burma? I'm going to Burma, and I'm claiming your protection.

I'm claiming your power and I'm claiming your work's gonna be done because you're the one who called me to do. You're the one that put it on my heart. So I'm gonna name and I'm gonna claim anything God puts on my heart because he's going to do it.

We just have to determine what God wants us to do. And we gotta do it in his name. We've got to do it for his glory. Not for hours. Anything we generally want that will bring him glory. That is in his will.

I believe he will do it if we have faith, period. Why? Because he says so over and over again. Jesus himself says so over and over and over again. You ask anything in my name, I'll do it. What is in my name mean for my glory? That's what it means.

What he won't do is any thing we selfishly desire for ourselves. That has nothing to do with him of than just getting us what we want, he says. He'll give us the desires or heart, but that's when our hearts set on him.

To see his power move mountains and our lives requires a heart that's caught up in the things of God, not ourselves. I don't look at the text this morning starting a verse 21 of Matthew Mark Rather, Chapter five, and I want to look at two people here that exercise their faith and saw the power of Christ, Unleashed says.

When Jesus had crossed over again in the boat to the other side, a large crowd gathered around him, and so he stayed by the seashore. One of the synagogue officials named Gyros, came up on seeing him fell at his feet and implored him, earnestly, saying, My little daughter is at the point of death.

Please come and lay your hands on her so that she will get well and live. And he went off with him and a large crowd was following him and pressing in on him. A woman who had had a hemorrhage for 12 years and had endured much of the hands of many physicians and had spent all that she had and was not helped at all but rather had grown worse.

After hearing about Jesus, she came up in the crowd behind him. It touched his cloak for she thought, If I just touch his garment, I will get well immediately. The flow of her blood was dried up, and she felt in her body that she was healed of Affliction.

Immediately, Jesus received in himself that the power in himself, the power proceeding from him, Rather had gone forth, turned around in the crowd and said, Who touched my garments and his disciples said him.

You see the crowd pressing on you, and you say who touched me and they looked around to see the woman who had done this. But the woman, fearing and trembling, aware of what had happened to her, came and fell down before him and told him the whole truth, and he said your daughter.

Your faith has made you well go in peace and be healed of your affliction. While he was still speaking, they came into the house of the synagogue officials saying, Your daughter has died. Why troubled the teacher anymore? But Jesus, overhearing what was being spoken, said to the synagogue official.

Do not be afraid any longer, only believe. And he allowed no one to accompany him except Peter and James and John, the brother James. They came to the house of the synagogue officially sauce commotion, people loudly weeping and wailing and entering.

And he said to them, Why make a commotion at week? The child has not died but is asleep. They began laughing at him, but putting them all out. He took along the child's father and mother in his own companions and entered the room where the child waas taking the child by the hand.

He sent her to Lisa Kun. Which translated means, little girl, I say, Do you get up immediately? The girl got up and began to walk, for she was 12 years old and immediately they were completely astounded.

So we have two people here. Jesus is crossing over the Sea of Galilee wants to, and there's a large crowd gatherround. He can't even get away from the seashore. They're just pressing in on him. And he's trying to get through this crowd, and the synagogue official named Gyros comes up.

He's most likely an administrative person based on the terminology that is used here. He's not a teacher. Otherwise, it would have said that that's what he waas. The fact that he falls at Jesus Feet is not necessarily worship, but proves that there was a definite respect for the power Jesus displayed in his teachings and in his miracles and implores him in Verse 23 says.

My little daughter is at the point of death. Please come and lay your hands on her so that she will get well and live two times. This word is used once by him, Hear the word will and the second time by the woman who thought in her mind.

If I just touch his garments, I will get well. Remember last week we talked about belief and the man looked at Jesus that if you km these people are not saying that gyrus is saying, just lay your hands on her.

I know she will get. Well, I know it to me. This is a little bit of a subtle difference between belief and faith. Believe kind of has a belief in him. But Face says I'm gonna reach out to you, Lord, and you're gonna do something.

I know it. Without a doubt. He has that belief. But he has that certainty. The difference between belief and faith has seen this story once heard of a group of people in Kansas who, after a long drought, came together and decided to pray for rain.

As they met, they discovered that only one little girl actually brought an umbrella. Everybody believed enough to shelf and pray. Only one had the faith that she was gonna be going home in the rain. Now we have a break from gyros.

We get this interruption. Is he starting to try to get through the crowd to get too gyros his home? This woman who has been through all of this difficulty physically she has endured a lot at the hands of positions of a riot of unpleasant things of evidently habit.

You're to the point that she had grown worse because I'm gonna tell you man's best efforts were not enough without God in them. She had evidently heard of his miraculous works, heard of him and not only believe, but clearly has faith because her face leads her to say, I will get well in her mind I will get well, If I just touch his cloak, I will get well.

She believed what she heard about Jesus and act upon it with a certainty in her heart, and the power proceeded from Jesus based on her faith. Yes, this is a faith healing in a way, but it does not mean our faith can overcome.

God's purpose is suffering. I would never say that this woman had been sick for a long time. We've got a louder to be that way for a long time. I think he allowed her to be that way for a long time. For this moment in time that would bring him glory in front of this crowd.

I don't know if she was acting in order to glorify him. Most likely she just wanted to get well. But the timing of it is all of it all is what allows her to be healed. It's her faith. But Jesus is walking through a crowd, and when Jesus is in a crowd consistently throughout the Scriptures, he is full of compassion for them, full of compassion.

So I believe that her faith and his compassion and his desire to deal came together. And even though she touched his cloak and didn't ask him to do it, the power just proceeded out of it. Because his heart was already for healing.

Was already in desire ing of healing the people that were in the crowd that day, so his will to hell was already evident. She just didn't wait for him to turn to her. She reached out to him, and that's a face that's a step of faith.

Let me tell you what I believe healing is. Let me just clarify what I believe healing is today. Healing is a result of God's will meeting our faith, period. You can tell me why didn't God hell in this situation, this person seemed to have enough faith will.

Maybe it wasn't God's will. It's always one of the two. If you say to me, somebody didn't get healed in this situates, always one of the two, either It wasn't God's desire. It wasn't his will to do that.

He had another purpose or they weren't really walking in faith They might seem to be, but they might have a lot of belief, but only in their moment of crisis, where they relate, willing to cry out to Jesus.

They're not doing that consistently with their life. And so why would he do that? I know that's hurtful. Maybe somebody might not receive that very well. But I'm telling you, healing is a result of God's will meeting our faith.

If it doesn't happen, it's for one of those two reasons. This incident reveals the need for faith in order to see the power of Christ release. Jesus looked at her in Verse 34 said, Your faith has made you well.

You can't argue with Jesus on that. People were touching him and bumping into him the whole time. The disciples even mentioned that her intentional effort of faith made a difference. Is he compassionately went through the ground 1st 33 the woman's afraid when Jesus called her out on it.

It seems to be at least I'm not sure that she wasn't in all in amazement at what had happened to her. She's trembling. I mean, I can't believe this, but yet she's a little afraid to, because touching him would have made him ceremonially unclean.

And I think she's afraid of what that might mean. What? She doesn't realize that she just touched the savior. She just touched God himself. He couldn't be unclean. He was sinless. She couldn't make him unclean.

They would be unclean till they bore sins on the cross. And then he became totally unclean for us. Took on all our unclean for us that we might be forgiven. So her faith makes her will. Now again, I don't believe the name it claim it.

Faith, healing movement like that. They say sickness goes on, healed solely due to a lack of faith that it's always God's will to heal. I agree with that at all. It's not always God's will. I'll give you an example.

What in the world is a faith healer going to do with Joni Eareckson? Tada. You know who I'm talking about, Some of you do who had the accident many, many years decades ago, when I was a kid that broke her neck and left her in a wheelchair.

Unable to move from the neck down, this woman has painted to the glory of God. She has written books to the glory of God. She speaks to the glory of God, a woman of great faith faith. It will walk up to her and go.

You don't have enough faith, or you wouldn't be in that wheelchair. How in the world could you do that? I'll tell you what. That woman has more faith in her pinky than probably most faith healers have ever had in their whole body.

There is life, the reason she's in that wheelchair. It's got in its sovereignty for whatever reason, new through her accident, Hey would get more glory and more honor through her life that he would have gotten otherwise and that she would end up being used of him to do great things that many people would come to Christ because she's in that wheelchair.

And ultimately that is God's greatest goal. God's greatest goal is not our happiness. It is not our perfect life. It is his glory and his honor and whatever will accomplish that. He will allow the happen or will calls to happen.

Healing is a result of God's will meeting our faith. And if it's not God's will, it's because he has a bigger purpose that we may not fully understand. But he does. But I can agree that faith must be present for God to supernatural hell, because Jesus's words support that here, in fact, I even believe in what's called what I'd call if I carry his faith.

That's where I can pray for someone who is an unbeliever, that they would be healed and God can do it to show him, show that person his power and his glory. In fact, that takes us right back to gyros.

After we finish with this woman, we get back to Verse 35 we pick up with gyros and they find out that the daughter is dead. And it said, Don't bother the teacher anymore. They call in the teacher. I think he's more than that to gyros.

Jesus hears it, says do not be afraid any longer on Lee believe he brings him right back to his point of beliefs. I will tell you something when discouraging a difficult things have we take a step of faith of discouraging things happen.

It challenges us all the way back to our belief. And so Jesus comes back as a shore up your belief gyros. Your faith is going to make her well. Your faith is going to raise your daughter. Jesus looks at his heart hearted gyros.

He sees that despair and disappointment, and he says, Let's keep on going to the house Verse 39. They get to the house. Everybody's weeping. The paid weepers and Mourners are already showing up and entering.

And he said, then why make a commotion? Week? The child has not died but is asleep. This is the perspective of Jesus, by the way, which is often different than our perspective on life. Jesus has a whole different perspective on the situation.

I know what I'm about. Dude, let me just tell you what's happening here and what do they do? They laugh at him because man does not fully understand the ways of Jesus or the power of Jesus. They think it's over.

That's it done, finished. And he says, You know what? I'll get out of here. Only ones I wanted here is Mom and Dad, Peter, James and John. That's it. I don't need this. This unbelief. I don't need this lack of faith in the room.

Get out! Let me deal with this And he raises this little girl. Now here's the vicarious faith. It was gyros. His faith and Jesus is compassion led to the power of Christ being released for this girl's raising and healing.

He was brought there to healer. He wound up raising her from the dead. And it was her faith. It was not her faith. It was her dad's carries face. You can leave Mark turn to Matthew. 17. We started out there this morning versus 19 through 20 with this mustard seed Faith.

I want to look at that for just a moment. Matthews 17 19 through 20. The disciples had just tried to perhaps the one that we've recently looked at cast out a demon and they have failed. And this account is in math Universe 19.

The disciples came to his private said Why could we not drive it out? And he said to them, Here's what it says in Matthew because of the little nous of your faith for truly I say to you, If you have faith, the size of a mustard seed will say this mountain move from here to there and will move and nothing will be impossible to use.

So he tells them, Basically, your faith was less than that of a mustard seed. What we've learned this morning is that when we believe mean we're fully persuaded. We then should act in faith. Even if our faith is small, God could do big things.

What we have to keep in mind is that our belief that faith is only genuine when it is in him, and we abide in him when we desire his glory above all things, when we have the mind of Christ about our situation and have his spirit in its when we're not going it alone, too many Christians try to go through life alone and then turn to Jesus when they need him or need something from him.

I think these two kind of did that that we looked at this morning, but it was different once Jesus left and gave us its spirit. Those individuals gyros and this woman had to go to Jesus physically he was walking in the face of the earth.

But now you and I born again. Believers have the very spirit of God dwelling inside of us. And yet all too often we ignore him. Live our life day in and day out until we have a need or situation. We need something.

We go. Lord, help me now and expect him to do something in her unleashes power. I want to tell you something. If you want to see the power of God, work in your life and spend time with him when it isn't necessary, spend time with him when everything is just fine.

Spend time with him consistently day in and day out. Don't wait until you have a crisis. He's under no obligation. And I've said this before to respond to people who have better things to do much of the time than spend time with him.

If the majority of her life is being lived out for our glory, we might believe in we might get in the building. But God's power is not gonna be unleashed in our life until our life starts being about him.

Not just our Sunday morning not getting any a men's this morning toes are hurting today. Establish your belief in exercise your faith daily and I'm gonna tell you something. He will move mountains for you because of your relationship with him and he will start doing it consistently.

In fact, there'll be times I believe he'll do without you even asking because you're so close to him and walking throw close with him that he'll see the mountain and he'll move it before you even ask.

Because he knows that your heart is his glory. You are Christian, which means you are in Christ and Christ is in you. Therefore nothing is impossible. Let's pray Almighty God and you are almighty. You're over all things.

You're bigger than all things. You are more powerful than all things you are creator. You are sustainer you our redeemer, You our deliverer. You are our savior. You do what we cannot and beyond what we can even imagine.

So we come to you today, Lord Jesus, The name above all names. And we believe when we fall short God help us with her unbelief! God teach us today tow Walk in faith every day. Not just when we need it to recognize that we really needed all the time Teach us to hear your voice and to obey your voice and God, you may not call us to some far off place like Burma, but you're gonna look at our gifts and you go look at that and you're gonna call us to serve you and honor you with our lives.

And then you'll move mountains to make sure it happens. You'll move mountains of sickness and sorrow and difficulty. If it's to your glory in is your will. God, we just need to walk in faith, a faith that says even if you don't do what we feel like it should be done.

We're still gonna walk with you anyway and trust that you have a higher plan. So, Lord, may we not leave this place today? Having gone to church, may we leave here today being the church, the church triumphant in Jesus Christ, We pray this now in his name.

Hey, man, don't ask you what you're facing that seems