SPEAKER_00: What a great God we serve.
SPEAKER_00: Amen.
SPEAKER_00: We are done with 1 Peter, and for the next four weeks, we're going to be talking about our vision and mission statement.
SPEAKER_00: And our vision and mission statement is connecting people to a loving God as we make the name of Jesus famous by our faith, our community, our maturity, and our mission.
SPEAKER_00: And that's what we're going to cover for the next four weeks.
SPEAKER_00: And what's beautiful about a body of Christ, the family of God, is that as his body, we can operate and activate and energize his spirit together as one body.
SPEAKER_00: Amen?
SPEAKER_00: And that's why life groups are so great.
SPEAKER_00: As each life group gets together, they form relationships, they form a new sense of authenticity.
SPEAKER_00: There's a new sense of transparency.
SPEAKER_00: There's friendships that are being built.
SPEAKER_00: There's a sense of accountability with life groups, and it's a wonderful, wonderful thing.
SPEAKER_00: So I want to stress to you if you're not in a life group, get in a life group.
SPEAKER_00: You'll be amazed by the stories of grace that each of us has.
SPEAKER_00: And it is amazing to see and to hear, fellow believers, fellow church family members, what they've been through and what God has taken them through because of his faithfulness.
SPEAKER_00: And we just sung it right now as we worship the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: Aren't you glad for the faithfulness of God?
SPEAKER_00: Amen?
SPEAKER_00: That he's never given up on you, he's never left you alone.
SPEAKER_00: He's always been with you, leading you.
SPEAKER_00: Even when we don't want him to lead, when we want to go astray, he's there for us and he's there with us to bring us back and to hold us.
SPEAKER_00: So these life groups are fantastic.
SPEAKER_00: What happens is as each life group is built and strengthens, we are able to strengthen others as they come into our body and the church grows, not just in numbers, but in health.
SPEAKER_00: Amen.
SPEAKER_00: And aren't you glad that you're healthy today?
SPEAKER_00: There's breath in our lungs.
SPEAKER_00: Amen, Mario?
SPEAKER_00: There's breath in your lungs, amen.
SPEAKER_00: Breath in my lungs, and we give praise to God for all that He has.
SPEAKER_00: So I want to stress to you.
SPEAKER_00: And we want to thank all the leaders and the host homes that are hosting our life groups.
SPEAKER_00: We want to give you a big thanks and a big shout out because it is wonderful.
SPEAKER_00: We thank you for it.
SPEAKER_00: So today we're going to talk about faith.
SPEAKER_00: Faith is commonly misunderstood because uh most of the time we look at the word faith as it as it relates to a worldly perspective.
SPEAKER_00: Right?
SPEAKER_00: There was that song that uh that artist wrote, You gotta have faith.
SPEAKER_00: George Michael, right.
SPEAKER_00: You gotta have faith.
SPEAKER_00: We are not talking about George Michael's faith today, amen.
SPEAKER_00: We're talking about the faith that God gives each of us as he stirs us by his Holy Spirit and the truth of God's word to come to him.
SPEAKER_00: And there's a faith that God gives and he plants it in your heart through grace.
SPEAKER_00: And the Bible says that the Father draws us, amen?
SPEAKER_00: The Spirit woos us, and Jesus saves us.
SPEAKER_00: And what a what an awesome privilege to be saved and rescued by the word of God and the truth of God's word.
SPEAKER_00: Faith is commonly understood, commonly misunderstood in everyday conversation.
SPEAKER_00: If you look at uh dictionary.com, it shows about seven or eight different definitions for faith.
SPEAKER_00: And one way, one common way people use the word faith is to refer to belief in something, uh, even though there's lack of evidence, right?
SPEAKER_00: Oh, you just gotta have faith.
SPEAKER_00: You gotta have faith.
SPEAKER_00: But what what is that?
SPEAKER_00: What what what is that which the Bible calls faith?
SPEAKER_00: Faith is not optimism.
SPEAKER_00: You ever met somebody with a positive attitude all the time?
SPEAKER_00: They're optimistic.
SPEAKER_00: They have a sense of being positive.
SPEAKER_00: That is not faith, biblical faith.
SPEAKER_00: Faith in faith is not faith.
SPEAKER_00: Amen?
SPEAKER_00: Faith in a good feeling.
SPEAKER_00: Maybe you're having a great day and your faith, your faith, you think, is really, really high and really, really strong because everything's going well for you.
SPEAKER_00: That is not biblical faith.
SPEAKER_00: Most times that you exercise your faith and you're walking in faith is when you're in a crisis or a circumstance that you don't understand, and God is telling you to trust me.
SPEAKER_00: Amen?
SPEAKER_00: Trust me and walk in faith.
SPEAKER_00: That's when faith is energized.
SPEAKER_00: Faith in God can move a mountain.
SPEAKER_00: So Bible faith is not optimism.
SPEAKER_00: Just because you're feeling pretty good about the future and you've got positive vibes going on.
SPEAKER_00: That's not what biblical faith is.
SPEAKER_00: So, what does faith mean?
SPEAKER_00: What is faith in the Bible?
SPEAKER_00: How faith is defined shapes how scripture is interpreted, how doctrine is taught, and how ministry is lived out in our local church.
SPEAKER_00: Amen.
SPEAKER_00: Here's the thing: we are saved by faith, we are kept by faith, we are we walk by faith, we pray by faith, we overcome trials and tribulations by faith, and we energize our spiritual gifts by faith.
SPEAKER_00: Amen?
SPEAKER_00: Faith in God.
SPEAKER_00: Everything that we receive through the Spirit of God is received by faith.
SPEAKER_00: Faith is confident trust in God, his word, and his promises, even when we cannot see him, or the outcome of what he has spoken.
SPEAKER_00: It is not wishful thinking or blind belief.
SPEAKER_00: It rests on God's character and his faithfulness, and that's the object of our faith.
SPEAKER_00: Amen.
SPEAKER_00: Our faith is rock solid because our faith is in the rock who is Jesus Christ.
SPEAKER_00: Let's turn over to Hebrews chapter 11, and we're going to read this awesome passage of scripture, which is known as the hall of faith.
SPEAKER_00: Hebrews chapter 11 and verse 1.
SPEAKER_00: Now faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen.
SPEAKER_00: For by it the people of old received their commendation.
SPEAKER_00: By faith we understand that the universe was created by the word of God, so that what is seen was not made out of things that are visible.
SPEAKER_00: By faith Abel offered to God a more acceptable sacrifice than Cain, through which he was commended as righteous, God commending him by accepting his gifts.
SPEAKER_00: And through his faith, though he died, he still speaks.
SPEAKER_00: By faith Enoch was taken up so that he should not see death, and he was not found because God had taken him.
SPEAKER_00: Now before he was taken, he was commended as having pleased God, and without faith it is impossible to please him.
SPEAKER_00: Without faith it is impossible to please God, for whoever would draw near to God must believe that he exists and that he rewards those who seek him.
SPEAKER_00: By faith Noah being warned by God concerning events as yet unseen, in reverent fear constructed an ark for the saving of his household.
SPEAKER_00: By this he condemned the world and became an heir of the righteousness that comes by faith.
SPEAKER_00: By faith Abraham obeyed when he was called to go out to a place that he was to receive as an inheritance, and he went out not knowing where he was going.
SPEAKER_00: Have you ever been in that situation in life, friends?
SPEAKER_00: Where you wake up one morning and you just say, Where in the world am I, and what am I doing, and where am I going?
SPEAKER_00: Abraham ventured out.
SPEAKER_00: And when he ventured out, friends, it's not like taking your two kids and your wife in a suitcase.
SPEAKER_00: They had huge caravans that they had to walk in, they had to bring their cattle and their oxen and their goats and their cows and their sheep and their servants and everything.
SPEAKER_00: It was a big ordeal, and God said, Go, and Abraham said, Yes, sir.
SPEAKER_00: By faith he went to live in the land of promise, as in a foreign land, living in tents with Isaac and Jacob, heirs with him of the same promise.
SPEAKER_00: For here it is, for he was looking forward to the city that has foundations, whose designer and builder is God.
SPEAKER_00: By faith Sarah herself received power to conceive even when she was past age, since she considered him faithful, who had promised.
SPEAKER_00: Therefore, from one man and him as good as dead were born descendants, as many as the stars of heaven, and as many as the innumerable grains of sand by the seashore.
SPEAKER_00: These all died in faith, not having received the things promised, but having seen them and greeted them from afar, and having acknowledged that they were strangers and exiles on earth.
SPEAKER_00: For people who speak thus make it clear that they are seeking a homeland.
SPEAKER_00: If they had been thinking of that land from which they had gone out, they would have had opportunity to return, but as it is, they desire a better country.
SPEAKER_00: That is a heavenly one.
SPEAKER_00: Therefore, God is not ashamed to be called their God, for he has prepared for them a city.
SPEAKER_00: Lord, we thank you for your word, and we thank you for this chapter that we're diving into, this chapter of faith.
SPEAKER_00: We pray, Lord, that today we'll and through this week, as we meet in life groups and discuss these passages of Scripture, that we'd have a greater understanding of what faith is all about, and how we can trust you, Lord, how we can put our confidence and our boldness in you, for who you are, for what you say, and how you work in our hearts and in our lives.
SPEAKER_00: And we give you praise in Jesus' name.
SPEAKER_00: Amen.
SPEAKER_00: Hebrews 11 defines faith.
SPEAKER_00: Faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen.
SPEAKER_00: This word assurance means a reality, a concrete sense of being on a found, firm, firm foundation.
SPEAKER_00: Faith gives us confidence in what we hope for because God has promised it.
SPEAKER_00: And this for the church of Jesus Christ in this day and age, as the enemy is coming against us to deter us, to distract us, to delete the things of God in our heart and in our mind.
SPEAKER_00: The Bible says that men's heart will fail them because of fear.
SPEAKER_00: They'll be always learning, but never coming to a knowledge of the truth.
SPEAKER_00: Men's faith will depart.
SPEAKER_00: The Bible says that there'll be an apostasy, a moving away from faith in God.
SPEAKER_00: And we see over and over again, pastors, worship leaders, deconstructing their faith because they're relying on man's wisdom and man's argument and man's speculation to determine their fate.
SPEAKER_00: But here it is, friends.
SPEAKER_00: We know that our uh insight, our wisdom, our knowledge is falls short of the glory and the wisdom of God.
SPEAKER_00: Amen.
SPEAKER_00: His wisdom is unsearchable, his wisdom is awesome, his wisdom is eternal, his wisdom is just, and his wisdom is right.
SPEAKER_00: So we trust in the living God.
SPEAKER_00: And that's why we have the word of God, friends.
SPEAKER_00: Do you still believe that this is the inerrant, infallible, authoritative word of God?
SPEAKER_00: Amen.
SPEAKER_00: 66 books written by over 40 authors over 1,500 years gives us a common thread of God's grace, of God's story, of reaching down to mankind to save and redeem and to bring sons and daughters back to God.
SPEAKER_00: Amen.
SPEAKER_00: Reconciliation.
SPEAKER_00: And this is the beautiful story of God reaching out to us and literally giving us his grace and implanting in us the seed of faith to trust him in all things and through all circumstances.
SPEAKER_00: Faith says, I do not see it yet, but I trust God because He has spoken.
SPEAKER_00: Amen.
SPEAKER_00: Abraham demonstrated this kind of faith.
SPEAKER_00: We read about it.
SPEAKER_00: Abraham and Sarah.
SPEAKER_00: Abraham was about a hundred years old.
SPEAKER_00: Sarah was 90 years old, and it's interesting how the Bible puts it in a comedic, humorous way.
SPEAKER_00: He was as good as dead, the Bible says.
SPEAKER_00: Amen.
SPEAKER_00: But yet this beautiful promise of God that Abraham and Sarah would have a child and would be heirs, would be descendants, coming through Abraham and Sarah, where the Redeemer, the Savior, would come to redeem the world.
SPEAKER_00: Abraham believed God's promise that he would become the father of many nations.
SPEAKER_00: Scripture says he believed the Lord, and he counted it to him as righteousness.
SPEAKER_00: Isn't that something?
SPEAKER_00: He believed the word of God, and righteousness was credited to him, counted to him.
SPEAKER_00: Paul adds in Romans chapter 4 that Abraham was fully convinced that God was able to do what he had promised.
SPEAKER_00: And here's the question for us today, friends.
SPEAKER_00: Are we fully convinced that God is able to do what he promises in his word for us, for our family, for this generation, for Lackawanna.
SPEAKER_00: Amen?
SPEAKER_00: That every man, woman, and child would come to know Jesus Christ.
SPEAKER_00: Fully convinced that God was able to do what he had promised.
SPEAKER_00: Then there's the story of Noah.
SPEAKER_00: What a crazy dude Noah was.
SPEAKER_00: There were not floods in that day.
SPEAKER_00: When we were sitting here this morning, we were talking about maybe having a little dinghy in the parking lot to bring the people to the pavilion because of the massive flood that was here.
SPEAKER_00: Adam and Adam, uh Noah did not experience floods.
SPEAKER_00: This would be the first flood that came upon mankind.
SPEAKER_00: But for 120 years he believed in the promise of God, day in and day out, worked on that ark, knowing that he doesn't know what God has in store, but he trusts in the promise of God's word.
SPEAKER_00: Amen?
SPEAKER_00: What a beautiful thing.
SPEAKER_00: Faith is not blind, it's not a blind leap.
SPEAKER_00: Trusting in and having wishful thinking.
SPEAKER_00: Helen Keller's most famous quote on vision and seeing is this.
SPEAKER_00: And you know that Helen Keller was blind and she was deaf.
SPEAKER_00: But yet she got a college degree.
SPEAKER_00: She learned how to play the piano.
SPEAKER_00: And she said this the only thing worse than being blind is having sight but no vision.
SPEAKER_00: And I wonder today, how many believers in Jesus Christ have sight, but they don't have the vision in their heart about what God is dealing with them and about the promises of God in God's word.
SPEAKER_00: Amen?
SPEAKER_00: See, when we trust in the promises of God, all of a sudden we have this new sense of destiny, this new purpose and passion in our heart and in our life because the promises of God are driving us.
SPEAKER_00: Amen?
SPEAKER_00: It's not our charm, it's not our giftings, it's not our talents, it's not our abilities, it's our availability to believe and trust in the promises of God.
SPEAKER_00: That God gives us vision for the future and we walk in it.
SPEAKER_00: Now, when I met Stephanie, I told you this story.
SPEAKER_00: The Lord put in me this sense of faith that she will be mine.
SPEAKER_00: Amen.
SPEAKER_00: And she, you know, during our time of uh seeing each other, courting, she uh talked to me on the phone and said, I don't think this is right, Dan.
SPEAKER_00: I'm gonna have to let you go.
SPEAKER_00: And I said, Oh, that's fine.
SPEAKER_00: That's fine.
SPEAKER_00: Because I knew that God had put in my heart this sense of faith that I would build this web of love and I would draw her in.
SPEAKER_00: Amen.
SPEAKER_00: Sense of faith that God gives you.
SPEAKER_00: And God works in this way that He puts a vision and a passion in your heart and in your life.
SPEAKER_00: And you know it does not come from your own intellect or your own wishes.
SPEAKER_00: It comes from the Word of God and the power of the Holy Spirit working in your heart and in your life that drives you and that moves you.
SPEAKER_00: Amen?
SPEAKER_00: Every ministry that takes place in the church takes place because of our faith and trust in the God that has called us and the God that equips us.
SPEAKER_00: Amen?
SPEAKER_00: By faith, Hebrews 11:3 says, We understand that the universe was created by the word of God, so that what is seen was not made out of things that are visible.
SPEAKER_00: Amen.
SPEAKER_00: God spoke, and things were created.
SPEAKER_00: God spoke into your heart, and he created in you the life of God that now dwells in you through the power of the Holy Spirit.
SPEAKER_00: Amen?
SPEAKER_00: Aren't you glad for being born again today?
SPEAKER_00: The life of God that is resonant within your heart and in your life.
SPEAKER_00: You don't have to be bound by religious duty or self-righteous good works.
SPEAKER_00: You're empowered and you're equipped and you're enabled and you're activated and you're energized by the very God of creation who is your redeemer, but now is the power of the Holy Spirit that moves us, generates his love for us.
SPEAKER_00: It is awesome.
SPEAKER_00: So we know that Abraham left his homeland.
SPEAKER_00: Moses endured because he valued God over Egypt's treasures.
SPEAKER_00: Amen.
SPEAKER_00: The Bible says he endured as seeing him who is invisible.
SPEAKER_00: These examples show that genuine faith produces obedience, doesn't it?
SPEAKER_00: When you have faith in God and the promises of God's word, you can obey God in the rough times.
SPEAKER_00: Obey God when you know that it's going to uh goes against every every sense in your heart and in your life that what you choose outside of God's will might be the best thing for you, but you know it's not because it's because of uh God's word.
SPEAKER_00: The foundation of faith is God's character.
SPEAKER_00: Amen?
SPEAKER_00: God's character.
SPEAKER_00: Do you trust him today?
SPEAKER_00: That's a question that I ask the Lord every day.
SPEAKER_00: Lord, do I trust you?
SPEAKER_00: Because here's the thing, friends.
SPEAKER_00: Sometimes we don't know what's going on in our heart.
SPEAKER_00: We don't know the thoughts, the mindset that is set up in our hearts.
SPEAKER_00: We don't understand the work of the enemy against us.
SPEAKER_00: We have to ask the Lord, Lord, do I trust you?
SPEAKER_00: David cried out, Lord, create in me a clean heart, O God, and renew a right spirit within me.
SPEAKER_00: Do not take your Holy Spirit from me, but restore the joy of my salvation.
SPEAKER_00: Amen.
SPEAKER_00: Hebrews 10, 23 urges us, let us hold fast the confession of our hope without wavering, for he who promised is faithful.
SPEAKER_00: We may not understand how God will fulfill his promises, but we can trust that he is faithful to do what is right and what is good.
SPEAKER_00: Faith is especially important when circumstances create fear.
SPEAKER_00: Amen.
SPEAKER_00: And like I said before, the Bible says that in the last days there are going to be people whose hearts literally fail them because of fear.
SPEAKER_00: And we live in a culture of emotional breakdowns, mental breakdowns, spiritual breakdowns because of anxiety and because of fear.
SPEAKER_00: And the Lord says, listen, hang on, amen.
SPEAKER_00: Hang on, hold fast the confession of our hope without wavering, for he who promised is faithful.
SPEAKER_00: Faith is especially important when circumstances create fear.
SPEAKER_00: The disciples were in a boat in a storm.
SPEAKER_00: And here's the beauty of Jesus Christ our God.
SPEAKER_00: Do you have the sense that Jesus doesn't worry about anything?
SPEAKER_00: Do you have that sense?
SPEAKER_00: He's in the boat down under, asleep in the storm, and the disciples are railing in fear and anxiety.
SPEAKER_00: And they wake Jesus up and tell Jesus, Lord, don't you know we're gonna perish?
SPEAKER_00: Don't you care?
SPEAKER_00: And Jesus said, Oh, you guys, you of little faith.
SPEAKER_00: Amen.
SPEAKER_00: You of little faith.
SPEAKER_00: He calmed the storm, he calmed the seas.
SPEAKER_00: And the men responded by Looking at Jesus and saying, What manner of man is this?
SPEAKER_00: Amen?
SPEAKER_00: That he would calm the very seas and the storms.
SPEAKER_00: So the storms of life that we go through, guys and gals, we know that Jesus is being very peaceful.
SPEAKER_00: He understands what is what we're going through.
SPEAKER_00: And he moves on our behalf.
SPEAKER_00: And the beauty thing is, when Jesus Christ left, he said, My peace I give to you.
SPEAKER_00: Amen?
SPEAKER_00: The peace that enabled Jesus to sleep in a storm.
SPEAKER_00: The peace of Christ, knowing that he's sustaining the entire cosmos with just the very thought of his grace and love for us.
SPEAKER_00: The peace of Christ is what we rest in today because we know that he has our best interest and our good in mind.
SPEAKER_00: The people in Hebrews chapter 11, they died without receiving the complete fulfillment of God's promises, yet they continued to trust God.
SPEAKER_00: Their faith didn't depend on immediate results.
SPEAKER_00: How many believers do you know that were praying for a certain thing, but they never got it, and they blame God and walked away from God.
SPEAKER_00: That's a trick of the enemy, and that's the trick of Satan.
SPEAKER_00: To cause us to walk away from the grace and the goodness and the glory, the greatness of our God without trusting him.
SPEAKER_00: Faith is believing God when we cannot see.
SPEAKER_00: It is assurance concerning that we hope for and conviction concerning what is unseen.
SPEAKER_00: It trusts God's character, obeys his word, looks beyond our present circumstances to his eternal purposes.
SPEAKER_00: Amen.
SPEAKER_00: Aren't you glad that you don't know everything, people?
SPEAKER_00: You know that the older I get, I'm learning to love this phrase when people ask me questions.
SPEAKER_00: I don't know.
SPEAKER_00: What do you think?
SPEAKER_00: I love that.
SPEAKER_00: I don't know.
SPEAKER_00: What do you think?
SPEAKER_00: We don't know everything.
SPEAKER_00: We don't know what God is working in each of your lives today.
SPEAKER_00: But God is engineering eternal purposes in our hearts and in our lives, driving us more towards Him to receive a greater revelation of who Jesus Christ is.
SPEAKER_00: Because when we have a greater revelation of who Jesus Christ is, we're able to receive his promises and trust in him.
SPEAKER_00: Because aren't you glad today that we don't have to have a memorization class of just wrote doctrine and teaching?
SPEAKER_00: Amen.
SPEAKER_00: I wouldn't show up for that because I have ADD, adult deficit disorder.
SPEAKER_00: What I need is a personal relationship with Christ.
SPEAKER_00: Friends, when I was a kid and I it seems like my mother spewed me forth on the first pew of the church.
SPEAKER_00: I was in church every time it was open.
SPEAKER_00: Being a good boy.
SPEAKER_00: And I laid my head down on the pillow and I said, God, if this is if this is it, I'm out of here, man.
SPEAKER_00: I need a relationship.
SPEAKER_00: Amen.
SPEAKER_00: I need a transformation in my heart and in my life.
SPEAKER_00: And this is what the author of Hebrews is saying in verse 6.
SPEAKER_00: Let's turn to it.
SPEAKER_00: Hebrews chapter 11, verse 6.
SPEAKER_00: It says this without faith it is impossible to please him.
SPEAKER_00: For whoever would draw near to God must believe that he is, and that he rewards those who seek him.
SPEAKER_00: It is about a personal God, friends.
SPEAKER_00: And maybe you're here today and you've never really given your heart to Christ, intimately, personally, relationally, where you've said these words, Lord, I am a sinner and I need a savior, and you are the only way, the truth, and the life.
SPEAKER_00: I understand that nobody gets to the Father.
SPEAKER_00: Nobody comes back to the Father God and be reconciled to Him as sons and daughters of God, but through Jesus Christ, accepting Him as Lord, accepting Him as Savior, letting the blood of Christ forgive you of all of your sins, and feeling the cleansing work of the Holy Spirit cleanse you and forgive you, and feeling the outstretched hand of the Heavenly Father that says, If you're with Christ, you're with me.
SPEAKER_00: Amen.
SPEAKER_00: And the Bible says that our lives are hidden with Christ in God.
SPEAKER_00: Faith is believing what we cannot see.
SPEAKER_00: Faith is believing in the Word of God.
SPEAKER_00: Faith is believing.
SPEAKER_00: Faith is trusting.
SPEAKER_00: Faith is confidently saying, Lord, I do not live this life with my eyesight.
SPEAKER_00: I live this life through the eyes of my heart, understanding who you are, because I have a personal relationship with you.
SPEAKER_00: I've talked with you, I've prayed with you.
SPEAKER_00: You've been with me, you've showed me your heart.
SPEAKER_00: I understand who you are, and your character and your nature is trustworthy.
SPEAKER_00: And I lay my life down right now in full and complete surrender to you as my God, my Lord, and my King and my Savior.
SPEAKER_00: Amen.
SPEAKER_00: He is God.
SPEAKER_00: Proverbs 3, 5 to 6 says this: Trust in the Lord with all your heart.
SPEAKER_00: Do not lean on your own understanding.
SPEAKER_00: In all your ways, acknowledge Him, and He will make your paths straight.
SPEAKER_00: Amen.
SPEAKER_00: Oh, so many zigzags in life we take, isn't it true?
SPEAKER_00: Like Mike says, rabbit trails.
SPEAKER_00: Rabbit trails.
SPEAKER_00: We go off on our own with our own intellect, with our own uh intellectual acuity that we think is so right, and we think that God doesn't know what we need.
SPEAKER_00: God doesn't see my heart.
SPEAKER_00: God doesn't understand me.
SPEAKER_00: I need this, I need this, I need this, and God is saying, No, you don't, no, you don't, no, you don't.
SPEAKER_00: Trust me, amen.
SPEAKER_00: That's what he says, trust me.
SPEAKER_00: We may not see the way ahead, but we can trust the one who leads us.
SPEAKER_00: Amen.
SPEAKER_00: We may not see the promise fulfilled, but we can trust the one who made the promise, because the Bible says that every promise is yes and amen.
SPEAKER_00: Because it comes from the character and nature of God, who is just, righteous, and true.
SPEAKER_00: My question to you today is do you trust him?
SPEAKER_00: And will you walk in faith and not by sight, receiving the wonder and the wisdom and the insight of God for your life in Jesus' name.
SPEAKER_00: Let's bow for a word of prayer.
SPEAKER_00: Lord, we thank you today.
SPEAKER_00: We thank you, Lord, that the Bible says that if we just have a mustard seed of faith, one of the smallest seeds, but yet one of the most purest seeds.
SPEAKER_00: And Lord, we thank you that we can put our faith and trust in you even when we don't feel like it.
SPEAKER_00: Because our faith is not based on feelings, our faith is not based on our optimism, our faith is not based on our past experiences, our faith is based on the character and nature of God through the word of God.
SPEAKER_00: And we trust you today, Lord.
SPEAKER_00: We thank you, Lord, that people in the Bible responded to you by faith.
SPEAKER_00: Their faith made them whole.
SPEAKER_00: Their faith delivered them.
SPEAKER_00: Their trust in you for what you say healed them and made them whole.
SPEAKER_00: And we pray today, Lord, we'll have a new sense of putting our trust and faith in you in the dark times, in the hard times, in the circumstances that we do not understand, but we understand the God of the circumstance.
SPEAKER_00: And we give you praise and adoration.
SPEAKER_00: As we worship you now in Jesus' name.
SPEAKER_00: Amen.