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How we walk in simple faith.
No book, tape series, or teaching can change your life. Any who claim their words have life-changing power are overstepping their role in teaching. An author or teacher can present the life-changing principles of the scripture, but readers and hearers must apply their hearts to the word, or it has no positive effect on them.
When the disciples came to Jesus to understand the deeper truths, he said, “Those who are on the outside have these things hidden from them, but to you who are within, these things are revealed.”[1]
The only difference between those outside and those in the inner circle is the response of the individual’s heart. Most people heard the message and walked away. They may have been inspired, intrigued, and even believed. But they walked away without seeking the meaning and how it applies to their life. The word is life-changing, but only when it is received by faith. Take Hebrews 4:2 to heart:
For indeed the gospel was preached to us as well as to them; but the word which they heard did not profit them, not being mixed with faith in those who heard it.
The word is applied by faith. Those who hear the word and then return to their everyday lives do not profit from the word. But those who receive it, take it to heart, and seek a deeper understanding so it can be applied to their lives, do indeed profit from the word.
You and I make the same choice each time we see or hear the word taught. Or when we read our own Bibles. We either walk away and go back to our status quo lives, or we seek a deeper understanding so we can live by the word and abide in Christ. There are many who spend their entire lives in church and hear the word each week, but never mature out of spiritual infancy. Most of us have been there, but none of us have to stay there. One of the clearest pathways to spiritual maturity is found in Proverbs 2:1-9. We touched on this in the last chapter, but I want to take a moment to look at this in a fuller context:
1 My son, if you receive my words, And treasure my commands within you,
2 So that you incline your ear to wisdom, And apply your heart to understanding;
3 Yes, if you cry out for discernment, And lift up your voice for understanding,
4 If you seek her as silver, And search for her as for hidden treasures;
5 Then you will understand the fear of the LORD, And find the knowledge of God.
6 For the LORD gives wisdom; From His mouth come knowledge and understanding;
7 He stores up sound wisdom for the upright; He is a shield to those who walk uprightly;
8 He guards the paths of justice, And preserves the way of His saints.
9 Then you will understand righteousness and justice, Equity and every good path.
It begins with receiving the word, but it doesn’t end there. Those who search and make it their life’s effort to dig the treasures of truth from the word will find it. It doesn’t take a seminary degree or theological training. These treasures are already yours and are awaiting you to dig deep enough to uncover them. Understanding comes from the Lord and is given to any who seek it as taught above. We seek in faith knowing the promise awaits, “Then you will understand righteousness, justice, equity, and every good path.” Every good path. This isn’t a superficial understanding, but a deep knowledge of God, His word, and His ways.
All the wisdom of the Lord is stored within the pages of scripture. God has hidden these treasures for the purpose of being found. Now you must go out and search for it as you cry out to God to reveal these things and provide discernment. God will answer. This is the role of the Holy Spirit. The truths of the word are spiritually discerned and the Bible promises that the Holy Spirit will guide us into all truth[2]. Look at the amazing promise of Psalm 119:98-100
98 You, through Your commandments, make me wiser than my enemies; For they are ever with me.
99 I have more understanding than all my teachers, For Your testimonies are my meditation.
100 I understand more than the ancients, Because I keep Your precepts.
Though the Bible appoints teachers in the church for the purpose of equipping the saints for ministry,[3] we are not dependent upon a teacher to understand truth. Nor does our understanding stop with the lesson taught. Some teach that a believer can’t grow beyond the level of a spiritual leader, but this is not what the Bible teaches. Teachers are gifted by God to equip the saints so they too can learn to walk on their own spiritual feet. Every teacher’s goal should be to make a disciple non-dependent.
This passage affirms this truth. If you and I follow the commands of scripture, our understanding will exceed that of our teachers. The reason is because the Spirit teaches through the word, and any who dedicate themselves to the word will find understanding. Teachers are limited in understanding; the Holy Spirit is not. If spiritual leaders are our source, we are limited to their understanding. If we look to the Spirit, God’s understanding is inexhaustible, and so is the depths of what He desires to reveal to you.
It’s not just studying the word. Look at the secret of King David’s success. He applied the commandments of scripture and found wisdom above his enemies. He was king during a time when Israel was struggling to become a nation. Many adversaries sought to overthrow David, but none succeeded, for the Lord was his keeper.
He understood more than the ancients – those who passed down the word and were used by God to proclaim the word. How did David gain more understanding than his teachers? He meditated on the word and sought understanding. King David didn’t just read the word or hear it and walk away. He didn’t stop at a morning devotional. This man sought understanding and meditated on the word. After reading, he rolled it over in his mind, studied it, sought for understanding, and then applied what he learned to his life. Therefore, God gave him great wisdom and understanding.
The gift of teaching plays an important role in the church. God intended this gift to be for equipping the saints for ministry.[4] Part of that ministry is discipleship. Each of us should be equipping fellow believers so that they learn how to seek the Lord. We don’t seek the teacher’s understanding. We glean from it, learn from it, grow from it. But there must be a time when we cease from thinking as a child and begin maturing in the faith. We never stop benefitting from what God reveals to our fellow believers, but we are also learning directly from scriptures and sharing what God is revealing to us.
No one should be an island, but neither should we be dependent upon being spoon fed the gospel. God’s desire is for each of us to grow and share what we are learning from our own walk of faith.
Why God didn’t give us a checklist.
Most people look for a list of rules, but Christianity is not based on just keeping a holy checklist. It’s about seeking understanding. There are many things that are not sins that we deny ourselves. Not because it is a rule, but because we see a value greater than the pleasure of a distraction. And we have liberty where God has not given specific commandments. If something isn’t a distraction, and is not a sin, we have liberty to enjoy many things in life.
All things are gifts from God. We don’t live for pleasure, but we are given good things to enjoy. Keeping the commandments should be a joy. Making a list and forcing ourselves to do what we don’t want to do, or struggling to not do what we shouldn’t do isn’t a joy. God could have given a list of things to do, and things to not do, but this misses the whole point. Consider Romans 2:14-15
14 For when Gentiles, who do not have the law, by nature do the things in the law, these, although not having the law, are a law to themselves,
15 who show the work of the law written in their hearts, their conscience also bearing witness, and between themselves their thoughts accusing or else excusing them)
As mentioned earlier, a Gentile is anyone who isn’t a Jew. The Jews, or people of Israel, lived by the Law given through Moses in the Old Testament. The first Christians were Jews, for Christ came through Israel, but the gospel included Jews and Gentiles alike. A Gentile would not have known the Law of Moses since he or she would not have been raised in that environment, yet they were somehow practicing the heart of the law. Their lifestyle showed that the Spirit of God had written the law in their hearts.
Some mistakenly believe the above passage means that commandments are no longer relevant, but this scripture says so much more than this. Notice, the Gentiles did not have the law, but somehow kept the things in the law. This is the key to understanding what the Bible is teaching here. Being a law in themselves isn’t saying they make their own rules; it’s saying they are enforcing the law in themselves. And they are doing so without even knowing the rules of the law. It’s the Holy Spirit within them guiding them into all truth.
Without a list of rules and laws, the unlearned Gentiles were keeping the commandments of God by nature. It’s not by human nature, for this is in rebellion against God. It’s the new spiritual nature given to those who are transformed by the Holy Spirit and have become a new creation.
As they sought God and lived out their faith, something within them created the desire to follow the things of the Spirit and please God. Thus, they fulfilled the law without having to be instructed through the law.
Instead of being a rule follower and forcing themselves to do what they don’t want to do, Gentiles followed the new nature to do the things they wanted to do, which was also where God was leading. Through following the faith shared to them through the gospel, they accomplished the same things the law followers attempted to do. Yet if you study the results, those who sought righteousness by the law failed to find it. They never pleased God and never fulfilled the law. Those who followed obedience out of a love for God found both righteousness, and fulfilled the law.
Today the same holds true in our churches. Rule followers become bound by legalism. Legalism causes people to try to justify themselves by keeping rules. Legalism binds people under a burden that cannot be carried. There is no joy, for the only focus is on dos and don’ts. Add to that, the person who has their burden lifted by Christ has an appreciation for grace and a deeper love for God. The one who attempts to lift his own burden through rules does not.
A legalist never finds freedom, for every mistake is followed by the perception of God’s anger. There is no room for error, and the human weakness prevents us from living error-free. The one who walks by faith and the one who walks in legalism both attempt to please God, and both fall short. But faith calls us to reach out and allow God to pull us from the mire of failure, while the legalist feels God’s rejection. His works are rejected, but he is not. But because rules are the pathway to acceptance, anything short of success creates feelings of God’s perceived anger and rejection.
It’s a burden too hard to carry. It’s also a burden we were not intended to carry. Jesus said, “My yoke is easy and my burden is light.”
Is your burden light and easy to carry? It will be if you are yoked to Christ. A yoke is something that connected two oxen so they could plow in unison. The great benefit of being yoked to Christ is that when the burden is heavy, He bears it, not us. Legalism and to-do lists put the burden solely upon our own necks. That’s why joy and peace are stripped from the lives of those bound to legalistic thinking. They can boast of their success, but this is nothing compared to what Christ can do, and will do to those who depend upon His yoke.
The Journey of Faith.
The Christian life is so much more than a ticket to heaven. Those who view Christianity as an escape from judgment or a free pass to heaven are missing the true meaning of faith. The Bible says, “Blessed is the man whose strength is in you, whose heart is on a pilgrimage.”[5]
Life is a pilgrimage – a journey to a destination – our true home. Along the way, we are striving to become the man or woman that will resemble a citizen of heaven. Our purpose is to glorify God, and our mission is to conform to the image of Christ. All the rewards of heaven are promised to those who overcome their flesh in this life as they conform to the person they were created to be.
Few things give greater joy than first seeing the revelation of God through His word, and then seeing it change our lives as we put it into practice. Add to this the teaching of Jesus, “Where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.[6]” Treasure is stored by overcoming. And overcoming is a lifelong process.
Scripture teaches that a wise man will fall, but will keep getting up again. You will fail and fall flat on your face. Some look only at the failure and then grovel in defeat. Others fall, get up, set their eyes on the finish line and the hope set before them, and then begin the journey again.
God doesn’t condemn us for falling. He calls us to get up again and then lifts us out of despair. We feel defeated, but the Lord is looking at the end result. The Bible says that God sees the end from the beginning. God doesn’t deal with you based on who you are, but who you will be when you stand before Him completed in Christ.
No matter how many times we fall, defeat is thwarted unless we give up and abandon the journey. Consider Psalm 37:23-24
23 The steps of a good man are ordered by the LORD, And He delights in his way.
24 Though he fall, he shall not be utterly cast down; For the LORD upholds him with His hand.
Who is the good man? This also applies to women, for it is referring to man in the general sense such as mankind. The good person is not the one who is perfected. The perfect person wouldn’t fall. The good man or woman is the one who is declared righteous by God. Everyone who puts their faith in Christ has been declared righteous by God.
Each step of your journey is directed. God isn’t a passive observer, but He’s there every step of the way, directing you, showing you the right way, and guiding you down the path He created beforehand that you should walk in it. But we can’t see the path and sometimes step in the wrong direction. It could be well intentioned mistakes, or it could be sinful choices. When we step where God isn’t directing, we often fall.
Verse twenty-four should give us great encouragement. When we fall, God doesn’t cast us down. In a moment of defeat, we may feel like the Lord is angry and casting us off, but the truth is that we are experiencing human emotions and the condemnation of the devil. The Bible says that Satan is our accuser who condemns us night and day, but here we see that God does not. When we fall, He takes us by the hand to lift us up. His goal is for you to finish the race and obtain the promise. God is your strength, not your accuser.
Simple Faith.
Do not make faith a complicated process. It’s a gift from the Lord. Faith is an act of grace – unmerited favor. God showed His favor toward us, not because we deserve it, but because we are the Lord’s creation.
If you walk by faith, every promise is an open door. Your heavenly Father wants you to succeed and it’s His good pleasure to give you of the kingdom. Let the Spirit speak through the scriptures and seek to understand so you can apply it to your life.
Never entertain the idea that you have learned all the Bible has to say, or that you have arrived. Each principle that you learn becomes the foundation for what God is going to teach you next. The deeper you grow, the more you’ll realize how little you know. But you will also see how much you’ve gained.
Consider the oak tree. It grows slow and methodical. Compare this to a pine. I live in Georgia, and the most common tree is the Georgia Pine. These trees grow very fast and are tall and thin. When wind storms or freezing weather arrives, they are the first trees to fall. They can’t bear the adverse conditions and snap.
An oak tree grows little by little. You will never see a hundred year old Georgia Pine, but ancient oaks are a frequent sight. I’ve never seen an old oak tree bending over by the wind. They only fall when they are rotten inside, or the foundation isn’t strong enough to hold on to their roots.
Our spiritual growth is much like this. Some Christians take off like a rocket, but the first sign of trouble they fall away. Others take care to grow precept upon precept. They lay the foundation of their lives in Christ and then build one brick at a time.
Jesus used the illustration of a house to explain how to build our lives on the word. The one who hears Jesus’ word and applies it to their life has the sure foundation. To illustrate this, he told the story of two men building their houses. One built on the sand, and the other on a rock.
I mentioned previously that one of my first jobs was construction. I compared the work I had on two job sites, one by the river and one in the mountains. The foundation I dug by the river was very sandy, and easy work. I finished in a day, but that foundation was weak and likely to crack and eventually fail. It is one catastrophic storm away from collapse.
The mountain job was in solid rock. It was slow and hard work, but because it was laid deep in the rock, that foundation will probably never fail.
Jesus’ illustration is this very thing. I picture the man on sand quickly finishing. In no time he was sitting on the shade of his porch, watching the man across the street picking through hard rock. Perhaps passersby saw the man wasting his life digging through rock and suggested he find an easier way. After months of digging, he finally was able to build the rest of his house upon that sure foundation.
At first glance, his house appeared no better than the house on sand. It could have been years before either of these men had trouble. The two houses may have looked very similar and the house on sand showed no signs of problems. But then one day a fierce storm came and beat on both of these houses. As the rain pelted the foundations, the sand began to wash away and one house had a great fall. In the morning, the house on the rock stood strong, but the one on sand was wiped away.
Life in faith is very much like this. Two people may appear to be on equal footing in the church. Both attend regularly and both have all outward signs of faith. But one has labored in the word to establish his life in the rock of Christ, while the other took the easy route and did the minimum. Both are good people by all outward appearances.
In every life storms arise. When hardship hits, the foundation of a Christian is revealed. We all have to endure pain and hardships. Some will collapse under the winds of life, while the other stands firm. The person built upon a deep foundation in Christ will experience pain, but their lives will not be moved off their foundation.
This is what simple faith is all about. Living a victorious Christian life isn’t complicated. Don’t mistake hard work for being complicated. It takes effort to prepare, but the truth of scripture is plain to him who understands. Or as Proverbs 8:8-9 puts it:
8 All the words of my mouth are with righteousness; Nothing crooked or perverse is in them.
9 They are all plain to him who understands, And right to those who find knowledge.
Nothing in scripture is twisted, or the cause of confusion, but truth is plainly stated and easy to understand – if we find knowledge. And anyone who seeks will find.
My prayer for you is that you apply these things to your life and find the simple faith God has laid out for all who will seek to find it. Do these things and discover the joy of walking through this life in fellowship with your Creator. May you discover what it means to be called a friend of God.
Staying close to the Truth.
Good teaching cannot replace diligent Bible study. Great teaching can’t replace it either. No matter how good teaching is, it only presents a portion of the gospel. This is why good discipleship teaches people how to study on their own. A godly teacher can present insights that refresh and present a portion of scripture from a perspective we may not have considered. However, it’s a mistake to think of that perspective as the only thing to glean from a passage.
Also, a lesson or sermon focuses on a scripture where the teacher is drawing a particular insight. But they can’t present the context of the passage in every case. Nor is a lesson able to fully explore all the supporting passages, or the scriptures leading up to the passage being focused upon.
The point we must not miss is that the only way for you to fully understand scripture is to study to show yourself approved, as the Bible commands. Then when you hear a message, you’ll see how it fits into the context of the whole Bible and not misunderstand or draw a false conclusion of a scripture.
Errors in doctrine arise when the Christian focuses on a man’s teaching. Even if the person has solid doctrine, you are still only getting part of the picture. Groups have a tendency to focus on the man. In time, it becomes a movement. Later still, the movement drifts into error. This can only be avoided by consistently turning our focus back to the scriptures. Glean from good teachers, but don’t make a teacher the focus.
Let me give an illustration from my military days. Every soldier is required to qualify with their rifle on the firing range. The target can be up to six-hundred meters away. Before stepping onto the range, we first adjusted our gun sights. A paper target with a grid was placed twenty-five meters away. We’d fire at the target, and depending on where the holes were, we’d adjust our sights up and down, or left and right. We’d keep firing and adjusting until we were hitting dead center. Then we could have confidence that our aim was correct when qualifying on the firing range.
This is much like what the scriptures do in our Christian walk and biblical understanding. The Bible instructs, reproves, corrects, and gives doctrine. When my assumptions or a message I’ve heard misses the mark, the scriptures correct the error and places my sights back on the center of Christ.
Problems occur when we adjust our sights through a teacher instead of the Bible. Even solid Bible teachers can have misconceptions, or slightly miss the intent of scripture. This does not make them a heretic, but it can affect how we understand. When we use a man as our source of course correction, we miss where he misses and then some. Since we only see the sermons or writings, we cannot see the understanding behind the teaching. So now we only have a limited view of the teacher’s understanding, and an even more limited view of scripture.
Later, another teacher will glean from those who he respects, and may add other misconceptions. This is natural since he is filling in the gaps with his own ideas and philosophies, and not the word. Those who depend on this teacher are now two steps removed from the scripture. Even though they are adjusting their sights to the target, it’s the wrong target. Each generation becomes farther removed from the standard God has given.
This is why groups drift off course over time, and this is why the Bible instructs us to work out our own salvation. That is work out not work for. We have already been given salvation, and we are to work it out with fear and trembling. This is critical and must be taken seriously, for it affects our future in eternity. We are commanded to diligently study and show ourselves approved, not depend on man to teach us, and to commit ourselves wholly to the teachings of scripture.
You can know the truth. If you have the Spirit of Christ, you have the promise that the Holy Spirit will guide you into all truth. But that only happens when we obey the instruction to apply our hearts to the word.
The Open Door is Before You.
The love of God is an open door. Jesus opened the gate that gave us direct access to our Heavenly Father. This is God’s will for your life – to know Him and to experience the love of God. Don’t lose sight of this one thing, “For God so loved the world that He gave.” God doesn’t love you because you have been made righteous in Christ. God loved each of us while we were enemies of the cross. As the Bible says, we love God because He first loved us.[7]
God loved you first, and as the Bible also says, it’s the goodness of God that leads you to repentance[8]. The more you realize God’s great love, the more your heart will be touched by that love. On the cross, Jesus cried out, “It is finished,” indicating our debt had been paid and the work of redemption had been complete. At that moment, the veil of the temple was torn from the top down to the bottom.[9]
The veil in the temple kept everyone out of the holiest place of God. It was called the Holy of Holies. Only the high priest could enter in that place once a year. To do so, he had to go through a strict cleansing ritual, and then he would enter with the blood of the sacrifice and sprinkle it on the Mercy Seat on behalf of the people.
When Christ paid the price, sin was removed, thus opening the holiest place to all who enter by Christ. Rather than it being man reaching up to God, God tore the veil from the top toward the bottom, indicating He was reaching down to man. God removed the veil and now each of us has the right and the privilege to walk confidently to the throne of God.
No longer are we outsiders looking in and trying to find out something about God, but we are now adopted as children and joint heirs with Christ. We belong before the throne, just as the children of any king.
Love from God came first through the faith God gave to you so you can believe. Now you must abide in that love so you can fully experience the joy of fellowship with the God who created you.
Through faith and obedience we keep ourselves in the love of God by keeping His word by faith. God’s love is unchanging, but we are not.
If we aren’t experiencing the love of God, it is we who moved. Jesus explained to His disciples how to experience the love of God. He said, “Just as I have kept my Father’s commandments and abide in His love, if you keep My commandments you will abide in My love.”
The commandments and teachings of scripture are designed to draw us closer to the Lord’s presence so we can experience His love fully. Let’s conclude with John 14:23-24
23 Jesus answered and said to him, “If anyone loves Me, he will keep My word; and My Father will love him, and We will come to him and make Our home with him.
24 “He who does not love Me does not keep My words; and the word which you hear is not Mine but the Father’s who sent Me.
Notice that this is a relationship founded upon love. The phrase, ‘make our home’ literally means, ‘to cause to abide’. The principle is that when we do the things that conform to God’s character (keeping the commands), God creates an abiding relationship with us. We are not merely having a casual relationship or visiting Him, we are abiding, or remaining, with Him. The Lord makes His home with us.
It’s God’s desire to have a relationship so deep, that He abides within us and pours out His love into every area of our life. In John 16, Jesus foretold of the result of His crucifixion by saying that we won’t have to ask Him to intercede to the Father for us, “For the Father Himself loves you because you have loved Me.”
Through that loving relationship, each one of us can experience the fullness of joy and walk with a deep intimacy with our God.
Don’t allow yourself to be swept away by complicated terms, teachings, or formulas. As Paul said, “I fear that your minds may become corrupted from the simplicity that is in Christ.” Let the scriptures speak to you and discover the plainly stated truth. None of us need a spiritual guide, secret knowledge, or to learn a complicated formula. The words of God are plain to those who understand and to those who discover knowledge of the word.[10]
If something presented as truth doesn’t pass the simplicity test, we should be very wary of it. When God enlightens our understanding, we see that the thing that once seemed hidden is actually in plain sight. Rather than discovering a hidden truth, we have had our eyes opened to the plain truth.
This simple truth guides you into a faithful relationship with your Creator as you walk in fellowship through this life.
Walk in simple faith.
[1] Matthew 4:11-12
[2] John 16:13, 1 Corinthians 2:14
[3] Ephesians 4:11-16
[4] Ephesians 4
[5] Psalm 84:5
[6] Matthew 6:21
[7] 1 John 4:19
[8] Romans 2:4
[9] Matthew 27:51
[10] Proverbs 8:9