Faith

July 9, 2013

So, about how i'm miserably failing this test. I've been presented to it multiple times and yet my failure keeps bringing me down making it hard to get back up. What test? Oh the greatest test of all! The Faith Test.

You know, the test when you totally confess your belief and your faith and then when you are presented in a situation when you have to rely on it and use it...you totally fail and wonder what happened. Yea...kinda what I'm going through right now.

You see, I have drawn a lot closer to Jesus this summer, not because I really chose to, because ever since I went to college I firmly felt that my faith took a turn for the better, and that was AWESOME. But this summer, I think God thought I needed to draw closer to Him, so He lightly pulled on the strings of my heart.

I learned quite a bit about faith this summer.

 Faith: total trust in something or someone. So, that's kinda like you telling your sister, I have total faith that you aren't going to eat this candy bar, and then when you come back you find it gone and you immediately blame her, when it was actually your dog... Okay maybe that's a bad example, BUT you get the point. Faith isn't something you just say, but then when you are given the opportunity to act on it you just throw it in the air.

Faith is powerful. In the Bible there are SO many instances when faith was the sole thing that carried so many believers. It caused miracles to happen. Miracles of healing, making the blind see, making the deaf hear, making the paralyzed walk! Jesus says over and over again, your faith has made you whole. Dang, that's some faith huh? There's this verse in the Bible that I have come to ADORE. It's Mark 11:24, it says, "Therefore I tell you, whatever you pray for, if you believe you have received it, it is yours." That's it. Simple...right?  Do you know the story of the women, who touched the hem of Jesus' robe? So for those of you who don't know the story, it's one of my favorite. So there's this women who has had this terrible illness for YEARS, today it would be something related to severe bleeding due to a problem in her uterus or ovaries or something of that nature. So in my Bible (I love my Bible because of this, and because of course it's my BIBLE!) it said that this women was basically  shunned from her town and family and friends because at that time, when a women was in "that-time-of-month" she is considered unclean, and since this women was constantly bleeding she was just unclean. That's it. So, when she hears that Jesus is in town she realizes that this is her chance to finally be healed. She knows that her chances of actually meeting him face to face is nearly impossible with, first the crowd of people, and second of basically what people would think of her and how they would treat her if they found her touching Him, making Him unclean too. Though she has all these thoughts, she goes anyway, I always play this scene over and over again in my head. So this women, walking, bumping into crowds of people that want to see Him too, and then finally she gets pushed down, and while she's on the ground sweaty, and out of breath, just about to lose the desire to move on and get back up, she catches a glimpse of Jesus' robe in front of her. She quickly crawls forward reaches her hands through the feet of others until she touches it. It's done.


She's healed. In the Bible it says, "she sensed in her body that she was cured of her affliction."-Mark 5:29. She felt the power of Jesus flow into her and stop her bleeding. She FELT it. Then the story continues when Jesus stops and asks who touched Him. The disciples look at each other and let out a laugh and ask Jesus, you've got to be kidding! Don't you see all these people around you? But Jesus ignores them and says, no no, I felt my POWER release. "At once Jesus realized in Himself that power had gone out from Him."-Mark 5:30. Then the woman feeling totally guilty and scared for her life that if Jesus found out it was her, an unworthy and unclean person touched Him, He would most definitely shun her too. But she ends up telling Him anyway and when she does, the love that He casts form His eyes, and the kindness in His voice when he says, " 'Daughter,' He said to her, 'your faith has made you well. Go in peace and be free from your affliction,' " never would she or anyone imagine that Jesus would say that and show that affection, publicly to a women such as her. THAT ladies and gentlemen is not only the power of faith but it is the love of our Savior. 

This summer, I had my faith tested. The verse that I just talked about, "Therefore I tell you, whatever you pray for, if you believe you have received it, it is yours," when my mom found this verse, I just stared at it for a while.  I took a bite of it and then slowly chewed it and then swallowed and then BAM, I felt the power of it just surging through me. The power that the women who was bleeding felt. If I have faith, then I can do this. I can do anything that God wants me to do. The only problem was when it became time to test my faith, I failed. Miserably. So then, God being so gentle and patient helps me pick up the pieces, picks me up from the ground, makes me stand and starts my training again.

 I notice in myself that my faith of course needs work, but I can withstand medium amount of trials, but when it becomes hard, the time when I really only have faith to rely on that I become Peter  walking on the water to Jesus. I see Jesus, and I have enough faith to get me out of the boat, but it's when I'm walking on the water that I start to look around me and wonder, what am I doing? I lose sight of WHO got me out of the boat and WHO can save me from drowning, and in WHO my faith lies. And when I lose sight of that I end up sinking, but Jesus always extends His nail pierced hand out to me, and pulls me back up into His loving arms and says," Hey sweetie, it's okay. We'll try this again. "

Faith is powerful. It's hard, but when you get it, it's amazing. God hands it to us like a gift all wrapped up, at first we don't see the difficulty of it, but when we are truly made to use it, we say, "Oh, I see how this works." Faith can move mountains, make us get out of boats onto water, makes us see, and stops our bleeding, all because Jesus gave it to us. We just have to hold onto it, especially when it's all we have.

 The important thing also about faith that we must not forget is, WHERE this faith lies, or I should say in WHO. We can't have faith in ourselves, because we are humans. Humans fail. We can't put our faith in material things because they are just...stuff, stuff can't do anything. We can't put our faith in science because what happens when you get to the point when no one knows. We must put our faith in Jesus, the only one who can make our faith reality, who never gives up even when our faith is sooo tiny almost invisible. He will carry us through, even if we fail. 

Keep smiling people for we have a Savior who we can have faith in, because He first had faith in us!