Seeing by Faith

I. A People of Faith 00:00

We pray that you would encourage us, embolden us, and give us new eyes to see your goodness. In Jesus’ name, amen.

So, it was a really fascinating group of lessons today, as I was praying through what God wanted to speak to us. And I just wanted to start there: the things God’s been doing this summer, the thing that God’s been doing in our church for many years now. He wants to continue to build into us the type of faith that moves mountains. We need to remind ourselves of the things God has done. And a lot of the lessons center around that: Hebrews, the hall of faith, where the writer of Hebrews calls out all the people who came before us and all the things that they accomplished through faith in God.

And I think that’s a throughline that we need to have at Saint Michael’s. We’re called to be a people of faith. We’ve talked about how Saint Michael’s is kind of like the edge of the spear. We used to say it all the time: we’re right at the point of the spear of what God’s doing in the earth. And there’s a prophetic gifting and a calling. And there’s a reason why we’re called Saint Michael’s, because Saint Michael is the warrior angel, out fighting to establish the kingdom of God. And we want to get behind the mission of God’s vision on earth. But I wanted to pause before I started this morning and say that the way that this works is only by faith. I think God wants to do a special work in our lives that revolves around encouraging and building up our faith. And so we’re going to talk a little bit about what that is this morning, what that looks like.

But I think sometimes we get lost, because in the world… I mean, let’s talk about Jesus and his disciples. They’re literally on mission with Jesus. They’re watching him raise the dead, making blind men see, the lame walk, preaching the coming of the kingdom of God. And yet over and over again, they face a trial. They face a burden. They face something they don’t know how to deal with. And what is Jesus constantly asking them? “Where is your faith?” And so if we can understand what faith does to unlock the goodness of God, the purposes of God in our life, I think that you’re going to want this. You’re going to want to receive this word.

II. You Cannot Faith-Muscle Your Way Through 02:16

And the other thing you have to know about faith, as we start this, is that faith is a gift. A few years back, I was at a clergy retreat. It was actually here. And Bishop Chris Moran gave me a word, and it was that I was double-minded, distracted, that I needed to be focused. And the next morning I woke up, and I literally had double vision. And I had, I don’t know, I’m making up these numbers, but like 75% paralysis. I could hardly get out of bed. I was shuffling. I couldn’t move my limbs. Maybe I’m overstating 75%, because I could walk, but it didn’t feel very good. And I was limited for 10 days, and nobody knew what was going on. I could not do anything. I couldn’t work. I drive a truck. Imagine a truck driver who can’t move, who can’t see. It was a bad idea. So I was just literally at home, going, “God, what are you doing?” And I kept thinking and dwelling on that word that Bishop Moran had given me, about double-minded and double vision. I’m like, “Okay, obviously, God, you’re in this, but it doesn’t make any sense to me.”

And so, as I lived it out, I got these great words, and God gave me these encouraging moments of prayer. But there was this one moment where I was praying with Bishop Northwood in Maryland. He had heard about my condition, and he just called to encourage me and to pray with me. And I just shared with him. I said, “While you’re praying, this just popped into my mind: God is inviting me to stop trying to faith-muscle my way through the situation.” What in the world does that mean? It’s hard to imagine what those words mean. Except that I can tell you it’s a real thing, where you think, “If I just put all of my believing effort into this, it’ll all be okay.”

And what God wanted me to receive in that moment was that I was terrified inside. I didn’t know what to do. But because I knew the right answer is that you have to have faith, I was clutching on to faith: “I’m going to make it through this. They’re going to tell stories about this day.” I was trying to hype myself up, and God was like, “No, it’s my faith that matters, not yours.” It’s his faith and his gift. And within a few days, God told me to go to a chiropractor. So I went to a chiropractor, and I was like 90% better, because apparently there was a physical manifestation of what was going on in my life. My neck was out of alignment, and it was pushing on my spinal cord, and so I had an adjustment. And you think, could God be more on the nose than that? I was out of alignment. I was distracted. I was double-minded. And I had to lay some stuff down. I had to change what I was doing with my life because of that. But I want you to hear this today: you cannot faith-muscle your way through life. You can only rest on his faith. Okay, it will make sense as we keep going through here.

III. Fear Not, Little Flock 04:59

We have this great Gospel lesson, one of the most famous of all time. And it starts with verse 32:

32 “Fear not, little flock, for it is your Father’s good pleasure to give you the kingdom. Luke 12.32

I love the beginning of this. The verse right before it actually says:

31 Instead, seek his kingdom, and these things will be added to you. Luke 12.31

It’s the end of another thought, but these things go together. Jesus had just been telling everyone, “Don’t be anxious about what you eat, what you’re going to wear,” whether you’re going to be able to walk and see again. “Don’t be anxious. Your Father knows you need these things. He knows you need these things. Instead, seek his kingdom, and these things will be added to you.” And then, just in case you were still anxious, he rolls into, “Fear not, little flock, for it is your Father’s good pleasure to give you the kingdom.”

What a promise. What a beacon that we can run after and go after and hold first and foremost. He actually wants to give you everything in your heart. Your desires, your deepest desires, the ones you may not even know are there, he has actually planned and is working to give to you. And we think we have to twist his arm to get what we need. Or we think we have to break our backs to get what we need. No. The invitation this morning is to rest on his will, his faith, his desire to give you the kingdom.

IV. Where Your Treasure Is 06:32

Now, he rolls right into this, and this is the part that becomes the most famous part of this whole passage. Verse 33, he says:

33 Sell your possessions, and give to the needy. Provide yourselves with moneybags that do not grow old, with a treasure in the heavens that does not fail, where no thief approaches and no moth destroys. 34 For where your treasure is, there will your heart be also. Luke 12.33–34

Now, maybe you’re thinking, in the context of all these faith passages (I mean, the passage in Genesis that we read is literally quoted in the passage in Hebrews, where it’s all about faith), Jesus doesn’t say the word “faith” once in this passage. Why did they pick this passage to put in the middle of the faith Sunday? Because the secret to faith is this: where your treasure is, there your heart will be also. That’s actually the secret to our faith. What you put your treasure in is what you believe in. There is no difference. Your heart is directed either towards God or towards destruction. There’s no other choice: life or death. We talked about that a few weeks ago. Where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.

In fact, what I needed when I was paralyzed and had double vision and didn’t know what to do… All I wanted was to be successful, to be strong, to be a great Christian that literally didn’t complain, that did all the right things. I fell into the pharisaical trap. And God was saying, “No, no, no, no. Treasure me, not the provision. Don’t treasure the healing. Treasure the person.” And he was moving things around in my heart. And I’m still learning this lesson. It’s not like I figured it all out.

But he was moving things around at the time. I was starting a podcast, and I was very excited about it. I had put a lot of money and a lot of time into this podcast. A lot of money I probably couldn’t afford, and time, my wife will tell you, I definitely couldn’t afford, into this podcast, trying to get something going that I felt like God had put on my heart. It’s in my desires. But it was the wrong time. I don’t like to talk about it, because it feels a little self-aggrandizing even as I say it. I was going to be so good at this podcast, you have no idea. I had it all planned out. I was already booking guests that you would have heard of. I knew some people. I had connections. I had the skills. It was really great. But God didn’t want me to do that. So it was nothing. It was just going to fall apart. It was not going to be there. I had put my treasure in the success that I had seen there, what I thought I could do to serve God. It was going to be all about teaching people about God. And I had these great conversations. You should look it up. It’s amazing.

No, but there was this part of it where I was truly trying to serve God with my life, my talents, my abilities, but I was putting my treasure in the wrong spot. And so what God was doing in that time was he was adjusting me. My faith was in my ability to achieve what I saw as God’s vision for my life. I was going to faith-muscle my way over there. And during that season it was so clear to me, from the minute Bishop Chris gave me the word, before I had the paralysis and the double vision. I even went to him. I said, “Do you think I have to give up my podcast?” He goes, “I don’t know. Ask God. I just told you what he told me.” And then the next day I get all that stuff, and I’m like, “I’ve got to give up the podcast.” And I knew, every day, I had to make that decision. I had to die to that. And I haven’t recorded an episode since, because it wasn’t what God wanted me to do right then.

And so what he was doing was replacing my ability to think about what I knew he wanted me to do with my ability to serve and believe in him. That’s what matters. Maybe I’ll have a podcast someday. Maybe it’ll be great. That’s not the point. I have to treasure him. I have to put my treasure with him. That’s why this passage is in the middle of the Sunday on faith: because faith is about where you put your treasure.

V. The Battle for Your Attention 11:13

Now, in this world there are distractions. Literally my next point. We have these glowing rectangles that are trying to get your attention, and they’re trying to get your treasure. $400 billion a year, and growing, is spent on advertising alone, because your attention is a commodity. And that doesn’t even include how every single app that you own, every device that you own, has been meticulously engineered to capture your attention, to be addictive. In fact, you can make billions of dollars by making the app 1% more addictive. There are stories of people who made one little change, the like button, one little thing that made their app more addictive. They made billions of dollars off that, because the most valuable thing in the world is your attention.

That’s why throughout the entire Bible God is telling his people, “Come to me. Worship me. Look at me. Give me your attention.” Because what you give your attention to will capture your heart. Think about this. There’s this advertisement you may have seen for this product (and they’re probably listening, but whatever; everyone’s going to see it now. No, I’m just kidding). There’s this product called LifeVac. And the idea is it’s going to save your choking child. That’s the advertisement: if you have this, then your choking child will not die. And all of a sudden, something in you, when you give your attention to that, is like, “I need a LifeVac,” because it has captured your heart. It has taken over that piece of devotion you have to your kids and says, “If you spend your money, this will save you.” We have a LifeVac in our house. It just happened. All that happened was a couple of advertisements.

But every one of us knows that that’s an extreme example: the health and safety of your kids. But there’s everything from that to the subscription of the TV service, because you’ve got to watch that show that everybody’s talking about. Everything is fighting for your attention. I’m not even saying the LifeVac is bad. I’m not saying the TV shows are bad. I am saying: where you put your treasure, that’s where your heart will be. It’s really insidious, and it’s what faith is all about.

VI. The Fog Rolls In 13:34

Okay, here’s a quick story. Once upon a time, July 4th, 1952, this woman named Florence Chadwick was very close to where we are right now. I think she left from like 20 minutes from here. And she swam to Catalina, or she tried. She was going to be the first woman to swim from mainland California to Catalina. It’s about 25-and-a-half-ish miles, wherever she was leaving from. And she had swum that distance multiple times. She swam in the open ocean. She was very well trained, an Olympic-level swimmer.

But on this morning, as she was swimming this distance (and sometimes it’s hard for us to imagine how long this would take), Olympic-level swimmer, she’s on hour 15. Hours of swimming. And this fog rolls in, and she’s swimming, swimming, swimming, but you can’t see anything. Up until then it was hard, but she was doing it. But then the fog came in, and she couldn’t see anymore. And so she swam and swam, but she was getting more and more discouraged, and about an hour later she called the boat. She said, “I can’t do it.” And they picked her up. Then the fog clears when she gets on the boat: she was less than a mile from shore. She was so upset. And when the interviewers asked her after, she goes, “I’m not excusing myself, but if I could have seen, I could have finished.”

So what happens in our life when we put our treasure in the wrong place? The fog rolls in. You can’t see. You start to get blinded by the stuff you’re focusing on. And that could be good things. It could be your family, your job, your money, your house, your car that keeps breaking down. Whatever it is, it captures your attention, and you lose sight of what God is doing. You lose sight of the goal of the kingdom. And so the fog rolls in, and you don’t even know that you’re right there.

What does faith do? Well, we’re told in Hebrews 11, verse 1 (I don’t think I put this on here; here we go):

1 Now faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen. Heb 11.1

She could have swum the distance, but she lost her faith. She knew the island was there, somewhere in her brain, but she lost faith that it was right there, because she couldn’t see. That’s what faith does: it allows us to see through, to pierce the fog. We’re told also that we see through a veil dimly (1 Cor 13.12). God puts things in front of you to hope for, to believe for. He gives us promises. But in the midst of the fog and the trials and the temptations (I mean, imagine you’ve been swimming for 15 hours; you think you’re going to die; it can be that intense in our life), faith tells us, “No, we can trust God, even when we can’t see.”

VII. What You Believe Is What You See 17:03

I want to put another little spin on it. Faith actually enables us, in a supernatural way, to actually see. So what do I mean by that? I mean that what you believe in determines what you see in this world. Have you ever heard somebody say this? “This always happens to me. Everything always goes wrong. I knew this was going to happen.” Where is their faith? Their faith is in their bad luck, or their inability to achieve, or how the world is against them. So that’s what they see everywhere.

There was an amusing story about a black lady, a prominent politician. Somebody got in front of her in line at an ice cream shop. She was waiting in line, somebody cut in front, and she goes, “Racism.” Do you see? Racism. Because where is her faith? It’s in the racism. Who knows why that person cut in line? Maybe they were just really hungry. Maybe they didn’t see her. Maybe whatever. It doesn’t matter. But what she can see is determined by what she believes. That’s not even a judgment on whether racism exists, or whether that person was being racist. What you believe is what you see. If you believe that God loves you, that he is for you, that he’s going to prosper you, that he has put you right here where you’re at for a purpose, then you will see the purposes of God in your life.

I know people… I’ve done it. This is a temptation when you’re driving a truck. You are so good. You have your plan: “I’m going to go to this job site. I’m going to drop off this material, and I’m going to get to this place by this time.” Well, you’ve already messed up, because you’ve put a plan in place when you have no control over the outcome. And then you get delayed here, and then you get delayed there, and then you run out of DEF, and then you have to stop again. And then you run into traffic, and then all of a sudden you’re like, “I’m 3 hours late. What in the world? This always happens to me.” Well, what do I have faith in? I have faith in some cosmic order that’s against me. That’s not what we’re told. Every Sunday you’re told that God, the Creator of the universe, loves you and is on your side and is making a way for you, that he has actually planned the steps of your feet to lead you into goodness. So instead of that, you throw on some worship music. You start praising God in traffic. I tell you, it takes some faith to do that. It takes a mindset shift. It takes the ability to see what is not seen.

VIII. Strangers and Pilgrims 19:06

Okay, this is a really brilliant example that we see in stories around the world. We tell ourselves these stories because we know at heart that this is truly what’s going on. And so I’m going to put up a picture of The Pilgrim’s Progress. This is an illustration from a book, and you may have read it once upon a time. It may be hard to see, but at the very top there’s a shining city, and there are all the paths and all the stops along the way that the pilgrim takes to get to heaven. That’s the whole idea: the pilgrim is on his way to heaven. In fact, that word “pilgrim” comes from this particular reading that we just read, that they knew they were strangers and pilgrims in a foreign land.

This is an illustration of our life. And the pilgrim faces a heck of a lot of challenges. Every day, all the time, something is trying to lead him off the path, whether that’s by fear or intimidation or pain or difficulty, or the worst temptation of all: a false hope, a fake city, something for him to put his faith in that is not what he has been called to. A city of comfort, of leisure, of pleasure, a city that feels kind of like it could be heaven, but is hollow and leads to destruction. When you look at these stories we tell, it’s because it’s the same life we all live. We’ve all taken a left turn at the city of temptation before, because that was going to make us feel better. That was going to solve our problems. That was going to give us the control we sorely desired but lacked.

When you try and faith-muscle your way through life, you’re going to take those turns. When you rest on his ability, he gives you the strength to resist. It’s not because you’re so stinking strong. In fact, when you look at the journey of the pilgrim, he starts out pretty darn awful, and he grows and grows as he learns to trust and to see by faith that which he cannot see with his own eyes. When you talk about the hall of faith, he calls out all of these different people, Abraham, Moses, Jacob, David, all of these people who by faith saw, and they decided to trust, and it was counted to them as righteousness.

The most poignant aspect of this Scripture comes in verse 13 of Hebrews 11, when it says:

13 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 the earth. 14 For people who speak thus make it clear that they are seeking a homeland. Heb 11.13–14

I love those verses, because it calls to us. You actually don’t belong here. It’s not yet finished for you. Jesus has accomplished everything. You are seated with him in heavenly places (Ephes 2.6). But he also is taking you from where you’re at to where you belong, every day.

IX. Planting a Flag for the Kingdom 23:11

Now, we can realize some of that. You belong in Saint Michael’s, right here, right now, in this moment. That’s real. That is true. But there’s a deeper sense in which we are now bringing the kingdom to earth, and it’s not done. But unlike all of these people, Noah, Abraham, David, you actually get to realize the promise in your life today. How incredible is that? Yes, we are strangers in a foreign land. But what Jesus did is he is making the world our home. Okay, let me explain. What I mean by that is he is transforming the heaven and earth into the new heaven and the new earth. And everything we do is planting a flag and saying, “This is now the kingdom of our God.”

You’ve been given the authority to do that. That’s why, when you move into a new place, we have a house blessing. We come over there, and we declare, “This is the kingdom of God. This is the place where you belong. This is the place that Jesus bought with his blood.” He bought the whole earth. In fact, that’s the reason we have a building here today. Did you know that? Because back in the day, they were giving money to a place where they were renting their space. And they said, “This is wrong. The world is the Lord’s. We’re called to take dominion.” And so they came together, and they said, “We believe God is calling us to buy a property and consecrate it to our God.” So every single workday, when we come here and we improve this place, you are participating in the dominion of the kingdom of God on earth. Because we live in a fallen world, things break. But you know what? God has given us the ability to make it new, like him. Jesus is always making all things new. And so every day we have an opportunity to continue to take dominion, to continue to see the things that are unseen, to have faith and to build the kingdom of God here and now.

One great example that we’re living right now is Mark House over here. A couple of years ago, we had Katie and Hannah leading worship at Saint Michael’s. And we love Katie and Hannah leading worship at Saint Michael’s. But we believed and prayed and walked out by faith that there would be more people to play worship with them. And they had like 10 people up here. Okay, I’m exaggerating a little: one, two, three, four, five. I mean, they had more than doubled their numbers in the past few years, because by faith they were faithful. I remember sitting here and watching them sing and going, “God, where are you going to bring up these musicians?” And Mark House was here, and God raised them up. And how awesome is it that we get to benefit from what God has done? Nobody could have seen it back then. I couldn’t have looked at the congregation and said, “Mark House is going to be up there singing.” I didn’t have the faith for that. But look at how awesome he is.

This is how we live by faith. We see by faith. In fact, like I keep saying, you only see by faith. Even the idea that the sun will rise tomorrow is a faith claim. Okay, I’m not going to go down that route. I could get very philosophical here. But the only way you ever see is through belief. What you believe shapes what you see. So if you believe that Jesus, the Creator of the universe, loves you, has called you according to his purposes, and is building his kingdom in and through you, then that’s what you will see in your life.

And the tool of the devil is the fog, like that swimmer encountered on the way to Catalina. She was doing everything she was supposed to do. She had been prepared. The way was set out before her. But the fog… she lost her faith. Now, the next year, or a few months later, she did the same swim. There was no fog. It was not easy, but she did it just fine. I’m inviting you, by faith, to live as one who can see through the fog. It doesn’t mean you’ll know what’s happening. I’m not creating a bunch of Nostradamuses. It’s not about predicting the future. It’s about trusting God. We might not even know what’s on the other side of the fog, but we know, because we believe God, that it will be good, that it will be right, and that he will make us children and heirs of God.

X. So Great a Cloud of Witnesses 27:45

That’s the journey we’re on, by faith. So as we wrap up today, I want to read this last little bit that Paul says. Well, we don’t know who wrote Hebrews. I suspect Paul. But the writer of Hebrews writes this after he talks about all the faith, all the heroes, the people that they grew up listening to, the people that you grew up listening to in Sunday school: Abraham, Noah, David. How did they do these things? All by faith. And in Hebrews 12, this is literally just following. Actually, I’m going to go back a couple of verses. Just read this here, Hebrews 11:39:

39 And all these, though commended through their faith, did not receive what was promised, 40 since God had provided something better for us, that apart from us (that’s you and me) they should not be made perfect. Heb 11.39–40

What is the writer of Hebrews saying? That although they couldn’t receive the promise, we received the promise. So keep that in mind as he says:

1 Therefore, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us also lay aside every weight, and sin which clings so closely, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us, 2 looking to Jesus, the founder and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is seated at the right hand of the throne of God. Heb 12.1–2

Amen. Run the race with endurance, by faith, looking to Jesus.