A Gift of Faith

THIS WEEK I had lunch with my dear friend Quinn. It was one of those really refreshing conversations that you wish you could have all the time. We sat at a picnic table and ate our salads and just talked for an hour and a half about how great God is. I told her about the yellow butterflies He seems to send my way so often, to remind me to be joyful. Three or four fluttered by while we sat there.

We talked about astronomy, the Holy Spirit, science, morality, weddings, oranges - pretty close to everything. I didn't want to leave. We couldn't stop talking about God. The conclusion I drew from everything was that God is so much bigger than we can know that the more we know Him the more He fascinates us. He is never boring, because we can't wrap our minds round Him. I like to think I know Him pretty well, but every now and then I learn something that gives me a glimpse of the bigger picture. If God is like a big oak tree, the best of us have only got, like, a leaf of Him.

Lately I learned a whole new reason to praise Him. Okay, so we think we understand faith, right? Faith is trusting what God says. Definitely. We are saved by grace through faith. Amazing. But it blows my mind to realize that faith is a gift from God in itself. It is a miracle, not a decision. Last week my community group watched a video of a message by John Piper from a recent retreat where he explained this concept. If we had faith because we decided to, we would be partially responsible for our salvation. If faith were a choice between good and evil, that would mean we aren't fallen people who tend toward evil. But we are.

It's funny to me how I failed to really notice this before. Jesus Himself explained it. In John 6:44-45 He says: "No one can come to Me unless the Father who sent Me draws him; and I will raise him up at the last day. It is written by the prophets, 'And they shall all be taught by God.' Therefore everyone who has heard and learned from the Father comes to Me."

Jesus is saying that if anybody come to be saved by grace through faith in Him, that faith is because of God too. Do you know what this means? Salvation is in every way an direct act of God. He supplies the amazing grace, and He enables us to have faith in His promise despite our sinful nature.

This is encouraging and humbling at the same time. It means we don't have a hand in saving ourselves, and it means other people's salvation doesn't depend on us. That's assuring because that seems like too much responsibility - I can't save all my classmates, but I can be a part of what God is doing. When our hearts break over the lost and be hope and pray for them to be saved, it can give us hope to know that God can give the gift of faith to anyone who looks. And He wants to.

This morning pastor Mike discussed how faith is something that involves neither irrationality nor complete certainty. God doesn't require us to ignore evidence, but He wants us to "taste and see that the Lord is good." And it's okay if we aren't always sure. That's a good thing, because I learn plenty of things in New Testament class that I don't know what think about. Faith is trusting God, who makes and keeps crazy promises.

My favorite example that the pastor used today really cleared something up for me. It was from Genesis 15, which I read just a couple weeks ago.

v.5-6 "Then He brought him outside and said, 'Look now toward heaven, and count the stars if you are able to number them.' And He said, '

Abraham makes sacrifices and lays them out in pieces, then falls asleep and has a vision. I couldn't figure out what it meant.

v. 17 "And it came to pass, when the sun went down and it was dark, that behold, there appeared a smoking oven and a burning torch that passed between those pieces."

In those days a covenant was made by chopping up animals and passing between the pieces. It was a way to say that if the promise was broken, may the same thing happen to the one who made the promise. So instead of letting Abraham pass through, God promised His faithfulness to His promise to bless his descendants. But Abraham's descendants weren't faithful like he was. So Jesus died to fulfill the vow.

It isn't hard to have faith in Jesus once you've met Him. I can't wait to see Him pour of a gift of faith on the people around me. And I can't wait to find out more about Him. We will keep learning about God, but we will never find an end to His faithfulness.