In everyday life every person alive expresses faith in something. Each time we drive down the road we have faith that the person in the other lane will remain where they are supposed to so we do not have a head-on. When we take a drink from the faucet we have faith that the people at the water purification plant had done their job. Each time we sit in a chair we express faith that it will indeed hold us. A doctor we hardly know tells us he must cut us open to repair something, and we trust him to do so. Faith is on every hand and the human heart is well exercises in believing.

The question then becomes, in what or whom do we believe, and when it comes to issues of eternal life and the kingdom of God, our faith must be properly placed and properly expressed. Most people, unless they are totally taken with themselves, will admit to belief in God. This seems like it should suffice, but it does not. We are told that even the demons believe, and tremble, but that does not save them from their fate.

Our text states that faith, biblical faith, has two main ingredients. First, we find confidence, confidence in the substance of our belief. Confidence has to do with believing those things God has spoken in His word regarding spiritual realities. In order words, faith has substance, a belief system, which makes belief Word oriented. Faith, someone has said, is taking God at His word. I am confident that what God has said regarding salvation, regarding life, and regarding eternity is true. I rest my confidence in God’s Word, which assumes that I know God’s Word. Faith comes by hearing and hearing from the Word of God. People of faith are people of the Book. Their belief has substance.

The other element of faith is conviction. This is an interesting word and one that will determine whether my confidence will work out in my life. Believing God’s Word is right and proper, but having the conviction to put it into practice is quite another thing. In our times we have seen the rise of easy-believism, a belief system that states one must just believe the facts to get to heaven. Such a form of Christianity has produced people who say they are saved and yet they live like the devil. What they lack is true faith that is filled with conviction. Conviction brings belief to life’s arena and makes faith work. This is James’ point when speaking about Abraham being justified by works. Abraham not only believed God, had confidence in His Word, but he also acted upon his belief. That is conviction. Faith can be seen in what people do. Jesus said that fruit reveals reality. Faith simply works.

Joseph believed God enough not to commit adultery. Daniel was such a man of conviction he went to the lion’s den. Faith both embraces God’s Word and acts upon it; confidence and conviction. Faith has both ingredients and thus changes our life. I want the world to convict me of being a Christian. God bless.

David H. Seefried, Pastor (7/20/2000)

David was in deep trouble both physically and kingly. His enemies were pursuing him and the advice he was receiving was to flee to the mountains like a bird (vs. 1). David’s world was falling apart and this troubled him and rightly so. It is in this setting that our verse for today is penned. When things fall apart, what are we to do? There are two answers I would suggest.

First, humanly speaking, things around us could fall apart today. In this world we live surrounded by shakable foundations, things that are here today and gone tomorrow. World peace is shakable at best and things could crumble quickly. We note the shaking financial matters in Asia, that economic power- house just yesterday. Nothing says our mutual funds must keep growing as they have. And, there is the issue of our health. I used to say that I was as strong as a bear, never broke a bone and never spent a day in the hospital. As I said, that foundation shook and nearly broke.

What can we do when the foundations of this world shake? We can trust the Lord. Our hope is not built on world stability or big bank accounts but rather on the Lord. When the doctor looks us in the eye and says to us that it looks like we are going to die, we can trust the Lord because for the Christian to die is gain. Nothing that happens on this earth can disturb our security in the Lord. If the foundation shake Christians will simply step up to the plate and serve humanity by offering a dying world eternal hope.

Second, in answer to this question of what the righteous will do if the foundations are destroyed, we can answer: Our foundations cannot be destroyed. Take away our health, wealth and citizenship and all things eternal remain in place. We build upon the eternal, not on the temporal. We have the Word of God which cannot be shaken but which is settled in heaven. We have Jesus Christ, the eternal Son of God who lives again. We have salvation which is eternal life and which can never be taken from us. We have the church, which Christ is building and which shall never be destroyed by hell. We have a home in heaven waiting for us. God’s foundations are unshakable!

We worry and fret about shakable items when we should not. Our ability to hold fast when things seem to be falling apart is based on the foundations of our focus. Look to the temporal and you will fall apart. Look to the eternal foundations and you will hold together. When they told us they could not get a liver for me in time, I began to make funeral preparations. You see, the bottom never falls out for the Christian, that is, if we are building on the eternal foundations. Take heart; the Lord is in His holy Temple (vs. 4).

God bless. David H. Seefried, Pastor

Recently in reading through B. B. Warfield’s Selected Shorter Writings once again that truth became evident once again. This old Princeton Professor of Theology wrote essays on the Book of Acts in his second volume. After speaking of the Gospel of Luke and the work of Luke on this second of his treatises (Acts), Warfield states: “To him, thus, this second section of his history was not the ‘Acts of the Apostles,’ except in so far as the apostles may be conceived as the instruments through whom Jesus prosecuted his work of establishing his Church in the world. It was specifically the “Acts of the Risen Christ” (pages 26-27, volume two).

A bit later in speaking of the supernatural work of Jesus Christ recorded in Acts, he states, “but much more because the whole history is conceived from a supernatural point of view, and developed as a distinctively supernatural product. To the author of Acts the Church was not established in the Roman Empire by self-directed efforts of men who wrought no doubt with divine approval. It was established by the constant and unintermittent activity of the Lord Jesus, sitting on the throne of the universe and ordering the course of history according to his will, so that the whole development is to be conceived as a supernatural work.”

In reading these words of Warfield, it strikes me how close we come sometimes in the work of missions and in the ministry to what the Puritans called “practical atheism.” Practical atheism is something that plagues believers, not unbelievers. It is expressed in those times and in those experiences when we begin to believe that everything in ministry depends on us, our strength and our wit, and begin to think that if all organizational matters are perfect, that if the right leadership is in place, that if we can learn the latest methodologies of ministry and mission, we will certainly be able to accomplish the task whether the Lord is in it or not.

When the supernatural is present, as it is in Acts, those naturalists like the religious-political Pharisees of our Lord’s time hate what they see, cannot defeat the movement and thus attempt to stamp out the work to keep a grip on their so called power. We see this in their putting to death of our Lord and we see it in their treatment of the men and women in the Book of Acts. If God is in control supernaturally, then men lose their control and that angers them because it takes away their false sense of power.

May the Lord never allow us to slip into naturalism – practical atheism – but to cling to the supernatural activities of our great God and Savior. Francis Schaeffer likened naturalism to alpine fog that fills the valleys and then works its way up the mountain. If windows are left opened, the fog will creep into the house in a slow and subtle way. So it is with naturalism. It captures the mind and heart before we realize that we are falling prey to its atheistic influences.

Supernaturalism is the way to reach the world with the Gospel. It goes without saying that I am not speaking of wild and crazy activity but rather a solid trust in what the Lord can do. We can give it the old college try in our own strength, but nothing of lasting value will be accomplished for the glory of the Lord. Too many souls are at stake, too much money is needed and too many lives are at risk to go the way of Naturalism. May the Lord bless us with high and supernatural thoughts of our Lord.

Pastor Seefried