Faith Transforms

“Faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen.” From this description of faith in Hebrews 11:1 we learned last week that hope is married together with our faith in Jesus; faith cannot exist without hope and hope cannot be assured without the conviction from faith. We also learned that faith deals with things that are unseen, things like the existence and love of God and the life, death, resurrection, and second coming of Jesus. We also took special note that faith in Jesus is a gift from God. God turns us from skeptics to sold out fanatics who are convicted of the unseen truths of God because of the evidence He allows us to see.

I ended last week by asking each one of us to consider this question: What is the state of your faith? I hope you have thought about that at least a little bit and I hope you will continue to think and pray about that question. As we will see from scripture today, God given faith carries with it an incredible transforming power that affects not only the individual but also people near and far, and so our faith in Jesus should not be neglected.

Only Faith in Jesus Counts

In a world experienced by the five senses, taste, touch, smell, sight, and sound, it might seem odd to say that faith, which concerns things unexperienced by our five senses, should carry with it transforming power. I would like to make clear that the faith I’m referring to is faith in the crucified and resurrected Jesus Christ. I want to make clear that it’s not general faith in anything that has transforming power. Some people fall into this trap and believe that it doesn’t matter what your faith is in as long as you have faith and keep that faith. Universalists and Theological Liberals and others think this and are completely wrong.

Jesus made a very clear and exclusive claim that HE is the way, the truth, and the life. NO ONE gets to the Father except through faith in Him (John 14:6). The reason for this is because no other true and almighty and worthy and capable God exists except YAHWEH, the triune God revealed through the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Faith that finds itself anywhere but in Jesus is worthless, empty and powerless because it’s a faith created by people. It reminds me of the prophet Habakkuk who said in Habakkuk 2:18-20:

18 “What profit is an idol

when its maker has shaped it,

a metal image, a teacher of lies?

For its maker trusts in his own creation

when he makes speechless idols!

19 Woe to him who says to a wooden thing, Awake;

to a silent stone, Arise!

Can this teach?

Behold, it is overlaid with gold and silver,

and there is no breath at all in it.

20 But the Lord is in his holy temple;

let all the earth keep silence before him.”

People do not have the power to create something by their own design that has life and can bring life. We can only use what God has given us to craft lifeless, inanimate things that do not last for eternity. Only God brings life, and so it’s only the faith given by God that brings life and lasts for all eternity. Since God has chosen Jesus to be the object of that saving faith, no other faith matters.

Faith in Jesus transforms us.

As I’ve already alluded to, faith in Jesus transforms us by saving us from our sin and death. “For by grace you have been saved, through faith.” (Ephesians 2:8)

God’s gift of saving faith to undeserving sinners takes us from a place of complete darkness and hopelessness to a place of hope-filled light and glory. The chains of our sin are broken and we are free to experience the eternal life God has ordained for us.

This salvation through faith then makes us a new person. The Apostle Paul said in 2 Corinthians 5:17 , “Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old has passed away; behold, the new has come.” I don’t know if you’ve ever tried changing someone, whether it be your spouse or your children or someone else, but if you have, you must know it’s an impossible task to turn someone into the person you want them to be. Not even the powers of the government can change a person and make them good. If it was possible, it would have been done long ago. No, nothing except the power of God through faith in Jesus can change us and make us new. And the more we live each day by faith, the more we will be changed. This leads the a third way faith transforms us: Faith directs our actions.

Going back to 2 Corinthians 5 again, Paul said in verse 7, “For we walk by faith, not by sight.”

I don’t know about you, but when I walk, my eyes are open. I want to see where I’m going and what’s in the way so I don’t run into things and get hurt. It’s unsettling when I need to get around the house in the middle of the night but I can’t see because the power is out and I don’t have a flashlight. In that case I can manage my way around the house because I’m familiar with it, but I’m then confined to function in the places I know…I can’t go beyond what my limited experience has taught me. It’s like I become trapped, and God does not want us to be trapped and imprisoned by the limitations of our knowledge. Instead, we are to walk by faith. Faith in ourselves? Faith in science? Faith in the universe? No, we are to walk by faith in Jesus because Jesus will guide us in the dark and bring us to the places He wants.

Hebrews 11 is full of examples of people from the Bible whose actions were directed by their faith in God.

By Faith…

o Abel offered to God a more acceptable sacrifice than Cain (vs. 4)

o Noah constructed an ark (vs 7)

o Abraham Obeyed God and left his home to find the land of promise (vs. 8-10) and was about to offer his son Isaac as a sacrifice (v. 17-19)

o Sarah conceived and gave birth (vs. 11)

o Isaac invoked future blessings on Jacob and Esau (vs. 20)

o Jacob blessed each of His sons (vs. 21)

o Joseph made mention of the exodus and gave instructions concerning his bones (vs. 22)

o Moses’ Mother hid Moses when he was born

o Moses refused to be called the son of Pharoah, left Egypt, kept the Passover (vs. 24-28)

o People of Israel crossed Red Sea (vs. 29)

o Joshua and people of Israel walked around the walls of Jericho (vs. 30)

o Rahab helped Israelite spies (vs. 31)

None of these people knew what the outcome of their actions would be, but they still obeyed and chose a godly course of action to the best of their ability. As a result,

o Abel was accepted by God

o Noah saved the human race

o Abraham became the father of many nations

o Sarah became a mother

o Isaac blessed Jacob who carried on the faith

o Jacob’s sons became the 12 tribes of Israel

o Joseph brought hope to the Hebrews

o Moses’ Mother got to see her son grow up

o Moses became the greatest leader of the Hebrews and had close fellowship with God like no one else

o People of Israel survived destruction from the hands of Pharoah

o Joshua and people of Israel destroyed Jericho and took the Promised Land

o Rahab and her family avoided destruction when Jericho fell.

These people did unexpected things: they faced fears, they went against society’s expectations, they broke ungodly laws, they hoped for the impossible, and they risked humiliation and even death. How could they do these things? Because they had faith in Almighty God, and they trusted Him to do what was best.

The author of Hebrews calls these people a great cloud of witnesses because they prove to us that it is possible to live by faith, and they demonstrate some examples of what that can look like. There can be no doubt in our minds that faith in Jesus will absolutely transform us. By faith we are forgiven of our sins and granted eternal life, by faith we are made a new creation, and by faith our actions and choices will be directed in line with God’s will. But there’s one more thing I’d like to show you, and that’s the transforming effect walking by faith has on others.

My faith in Jesus can transform others

Inspires godliness

Think about what we just did for a moment: we looked at past examples of people’s faithfulness so that we would be inspired and challenged in our own faith. The faithfulness of others inspires us to greater godliness and faith. Your decision to walk by faith in difficult circumstances has the potential to powerfully impact other Christian. Here’s a quick example of that:

Jim Elliot, Pete Flemming, Ed McCully, Nate Saint, Roger Youderian were missionaries to the Auca Natives. They were considered crazy to go to these violent people, but they were convinced it was what God wanted. By faith they made contact with the natives who would eventually murder each one of them. But because of their faithfulness, “Shockwaves from the tragedy traveled around the globe. … The places of service vacated by those men were filled many times over by young men and women motivated by their selfless sacrifice.” (Foxe Voices of the Martyrs)

We must never forget the powerful impact an individual’s choice to be faithful might have on others.

Encourages the godly

And as faithfulness inspires godliness, it also encourages the godly.

In 1 Thessalonians, Paul wrote a letter to the people of the Church in Thessalonica and he began the letter like this:

6 And you became imitators of us and of the Lord, for you received the word in much affliction, with the joy of the Holy Spirit, 7 so that you became an example to all the believers in Macedonia and in Achaia. 8 For not only has the word of the Lord sounded forth from you in Macedonia and Achaia, but your faith in God has gone forth everywhere, so that we need not say anything.

Whatever the Thessalonian Christians did, we know that Paul and all the believers in Macedonia and Achaia were encouraged by their faith. Their faith in God had gone forth everywhere!

There can be no doubt of the importance of walking by faith.

Conclusion:

In 21st century America, we have become an individualist people, thinking primarily of our selves and judging the world around us from our own perspectives. We have made faith in Jesus something that’s personal only between me and Jesus; we don’t want anyone else interfering in our own little world of faith. But perhaps we have forgotten about the transforming power of faith within the individual and within the greater community of believers.

God in part transforms the individual with the greater transformation of a community in mind. You an in individual are not the end all be all…I am not the pinnacle of God’s plan of salvation. God’s ultimate plan is for all of those chosen before the foundation of time to be transformed and made into the completed and perfected Bride of Christ. We are in this race together. When one part of the body falters, the rest feel it, so let’s commit to encouraging one another in our faith.

There are times when the faith of some in our congregation will falter. Instead of condemning them because they are weak, let’s rally around them and encourage them because we are one body and one family and God has given each one of us to each other for the purpose of spurring one another on to good work of faith got together we are being transformed through our faith in Jesus.