A small congregation in the foothills of the Great Smokies built a new sanctuary on a piece of land willed to them by a church member. Ten days before the new church was to open, the local building inspector informed the pastor that the parking lot was inadequate for the size of the building. Until the church doubled the size of the parking lot, they would not be able to use the new sanctuary. Unfortunately, the church with its undersized lot had used every inch of their land except for the mountain against which it had been built.

In order to build more parking spaces, they would have to move the mountain out of the back yard. Undaunted, the pastor announced the next Sunday morning that he would meet that evening with all members who had "mountain moving faith." They would hold a prayer session asking God to remove the mountain from the back yard and to somehow provide enough money to have it paved and painted before the scheduled opening dedication service the following week.

At the appointed time, 24 of the congregation's 300 members assembled for prayer. They prayed for nearly three hours. At ten o'clock the pastor said the final "Amen". "We'll open next Sunday as scheduled," he assured everyone. "God has never let us down before, and I believe He will be faithful this time too." The next morning as he was working in his study there came a loud knock at his door. When he called "come in", a rough looking construction foreman appeared, removing his hard hat as he entered.

"Excuse me, Reverend. I'm from Acme Construction Company over in the next county. We're building a huge shopping mall. We need some fill dirt. Would you be willing to sell us a chunk of that mountain behind the church? We'll pay you for the dirt we remove and pave all the exposed area free of charge if we can have it right away. We can't do anything else until we get the dirt in and allow it to settle properly."

The little church was dedicated the next Sunday as originally planned and there were far more members with "mountain moving faith" on opening Sunday than there had been the previous week!

By 1989, baseball player Nolan Ryan reached an incredible 5,000 strike outs, and all those no hitters. Ryan is a phenomenal baseball player.

In his rookie year, 18 years earlier, Gil Hodges was the manager of the Mets, and was impatient with Ryan. Although Ryan could consistently throw the ball over ninety miles an hour, most of the time it didn't go over the plate. He was walking everybody, hitting a lot of people, too. Hodges told Ryan at the beginning of a particular game that he was to pitch better in that game or he would pull him out and trade him. He would be finished.

Ryan went into that game trying to do his best, determined that he was going to succeed. He was miserable. He walked something like seven or eight batters in four innings. Hodges took him out. Later that season he was traded to the Angels.

After the game Richard Reeves went down into the locker room to interview the players. He noticed Nolan Ryan was apart from the others, looking into a mirror, obviously having difficulty tying his tie. Reeves got closer to him and noticed that there were tears in his eyes. He was crying. He couldn't see to tie his tie.

Reeves remembered that incident on the occasion of celebrating Nolan Ryan as one of the immortals of baseball. He remembered that this legendary man, Nolan Ryan, began thinking he had failed. But he kept on working. He kept on practicing. He kept on doing his job.

Adapted from an Unknown Source

The great theologian Paul Tillich used to say, "Accept the fact that you're accepted." And we might add, "When you do, you will accept all others too and serve them. And no one will owe you anything." And you won't mind that at all.

When you drive east on I-40 through the mountains of Tennessee and North Carolina, you pass through two tunnels. Each is about ½ mile long, right through the side of mountains. I’m always awed by the brilliance of the engineers who designed those tunnels. How were they carved out of the solid rock? I’m sure that dynamite was the key. Sticks of dynamite were well placed and then ignited by some sort of fuse. The fuse was necessary but it was not the source of power. The power came from the nitroglycerin in that dynamite. The fuse just ignited it.

Similarly, God’s power is like that dynamite that moves mountains. Our faith is just the fuse that ignites it. The size of the fuse doesn’t matter. Neither is the size of our faith a critical factor. Even a tiny bit of faith that we act on is enough to activate God’s power.

I remember Paul Tillich, the great theologian, defined faith as courage. That is just wonderful. He said that is what faith will look like when you see it. It will look like courage. What faith is, is acting on your trust that God is faithful. Most of the time, if you are doing anything worthwhile, it is done on faith, and it takes courage.

Most people think the opposite of faith is doubt. They think, "I have some doubts, therefore I don't have faith." Well faith doesn't remove doubt. Faith is courage to go into an unknown future in spite of the doubts. Faith doesn't remove fear either. Faith is the courage to do the right thing even when your knees are trembling. Faith doesn't remove disappointments, or guarantee victory. Faith is the courage to keep on going even when you want to give up, but you keep on going.

That is what faith looks like. Madeleine L'Engel put it perfectly. "I don't have to have some special qualification to do what I have to do. All I have to do is have the courage to go on and do it."

Corrie ten Boom graphically illustrates in Tramp for the Lord how after the war she met a guard who had been her captor in the Ravensbruck concentration camp where her sister had died. He came forward after she spoke at a church in Munich, and (though he did not recognize her) said he had been one of her guards, and reached out his hand to her, asking for her forgiveness. For a moment, says Corrie, she hesitated, recalling his cruelty to her sister and those around her. Then, knowing God's warning to forgive or we cannot be forgiven (Mark 1 1:26) and yet still not feeling the ability to lift her hand towards him, she prayed silently: "Jesus help me!...I can lift my hand. I can do that much. You supply the feeling" (p. 55). And as she woodenly thrust out her hand the current: of God's healing warmth flowed through her and out to the former guard. "I forgive you, brother!" she cried. "With all my heart." Corrie says she never has known God's love so intensely as she did then. But she knew it was not her love, for she had tried and did not have the power. "But it was the power of the Holy Spirit as recorded in Romans 5:5:'...because the love of God is shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Ghost which is given us.

The size of faith doesn’t matter because God is the one doing the moving.

If it is my faith that moved the mountain, then the bigger the mountain, the more faith I would need to move it.

The bigger the obstacle, the more strength I’d need to climb it.

The more serious the illness, a faith even greater would be required to overcome it.

The more serious the sin, the more faith I would need in order to have it forgiven.

That kind of thinking kind of makes sense, but that’s not how faith works. In fact, faith doesn’t do the work at all. And thank God for that.

God is the one doing the work through faith. Think of faith as the key that opens the door to God acting in our lives. If I have a bigger key ring than you do, does it matter? The size of a key ring doesn’t matter. Key rings don’t open doors, but it’s that little key on the ring that opens doors. Even a little faith opens the door for God to move the mountains and trees and even our hearts.

One day my wife brought a jar and asked me to open it for her. I tried and tried to open that jar, but my hands just weren't strong enough to hold the jar tightly and turn the lid. It is a little embarrassing to a man when a woman asks him to open a jar and he can't do it, so I decided that I needed to increase the strength in my hands. I got a hand exerciser to help me. You have probably seen one of these. You just squeeze the two sides together, like this. If you don't have one of these, you can do the same type of exercise by squeezing a rubber ball. By exercising my hands every day, I know, they will get stronger and stronger. Then maybe I won't be embarrassed the next time my wife asks me to open a jar for her.

Faith is like a muscle. You have to exercise it every day to make it strong. Sometimes we say that we have faith in God. We say that we believe that He can do anything, but then we act as if everything depends on us. That isn't a very strong faith, is it?

Jesus told his disciples that if they had as much faith as a tiny mustard seed, they could tell a tree to move from one place to another, and the tree would obey them. Now, that is a strong faith, isn't it? I wish I had as much faith as a mustard seed. Maybe I will if I keep exercising it. I can exercise my faith by trusting in God each and every day. How strong is your faith? Does it need a little daily exercise?

It was said that the great Michelangelo attracted a crowd of spectators as he worked. One child in particular was fascinated by the sight of chips flying and the sound of mallet as the master shaped a large block of white marble. Unable to contain her curiosity, the little girl inquired, "What are you making?" Pausing, he replied, "There is an angel in there and I must set it free."

Faith is seeing a new reality and working to set it free. It is seeing the reality of God's kingdom and working with the Holy One to create a new heaven and earth.

Once a farmer sought to raise a single baby eagle which he had found in the wilderness. He raised it with his chickens, and it grew strong. But alas! This king of birds came to think of itself as a chicken rather than an eagle. Each day the farmer would throw it into the air hoping to see it fly, and each time, it would return to the earth to eat the chicken feed thrown on the ground. One day, however, something began to stir in the bird's memory when it was launched aloft; a strange and fearful excitement surged through its breast. It stretched its wings and soared, lifted by the rising currents of air. The farmer was ecstatic until the eagle, sensing its true nature, swooped down on the chickens in the barnyard, and devoured them.

Faith, in any amount - even as small as a mustard seed - has carnivorous capabilities. It grips the imagination and jump-starts new possibilities which can destroy the old. Yet, it is the hope of the world.

Ask any parent who gets up at 2:00 a.m. and then at 3:00 a.m. and then at 3:30 a.m. to answer the cry of a sick baby. Lovers never ask, "What’s the least I can do?"

Ask any man whose income is so limited that after he pays his rent and buys his groceries he has only pennies to spare. But his sweetheart has a birthday the next month and he has his eye on something that means he’ll have to go without lunch for three weeks. So he buys it.

Boys’ Town near Omaha once had poster showing a little guy toting a tyke nearly as big as he is, saying, "He’s not heavy; he’s my brother."

Are any of these lovers looking for a medal? No. They’re only doing their duty. And it’s only natural.

Our relationship to Christ is like that. For although Jesus may have been cracking a small joke when he portrayed how ludicrous it could have been if the master served the slave, yet that ridiculous reversal of roles is just what took place in the Upper Room when the Master served the disciples, washing their feet. It was symbolic of his entire ministry, including the cross.

Have you ever had a time when you were faced with an incredible obstacle or a heart wrenching burden and thought, "If only I had more faith!"

There was a young couple who went to a new church shortly after burying their eight year old son. The boy had suffered from a degenerative neurological disease for which there was no treatment. Parents and physicians alike could only watch as the disease slowly stole the boy's life. The heartbroken couple had been committed members of a church where people were taught that God would heal any illness if only those who prayed for healing had enough faith. During the wake one of the members of that church approached the mother, took her hand and said with what can only be called chastisement thinly disguised as sympathy, "If only you had been able to pray with enough faith, your son wouldn't have died."

As you might well imagine ex-members of this destructive fringe live with a horrendous sense of guilt. Can you imagine what it would be like to believe that your child died because you didn't have enough faith to save her or him? It took months for the father of that little boy to begin to hope that his son didn't die because of his lack of faith. The mother never did get free from her guilt. Their former church was "based on the bible" and how the pastor quoted over and over again:

"If you had faith the size of a mustard seed, you could say to this mulberry tree, 'be uprooted and planted in the sea,' and it would obey you." [Lk 17:6]

There are times when we do face mountains -- or deeply rooted issues in our lives we would dearly love to see removed.

Have you ever been in such a place in your life? The life issues are different for all of us, but the result is similar. When our prayers seem to be of no avail, it makes us feel as though we fall into the category Jesus aimed at when he said, "O ye of little faith!" At times like this, I join the disciples in today's scripture pleading with Jesus, "Increase my faith!"

Without forgiveness, we will be destroyed ourselves--we have a basic duty to forgive. Whatever you do, don't let those who have wronged you remake you in their image.

When three young men were brought to trial in a West Memphis, Arkansas, court for killing three eight-year-olds, the father of one of the victims suddenly rushed at the young man screaming, "I'll chase you all the way to hell!" We can understand the father's fierce anger, but there is something almost prophetic about his words. If we allow our hatred for those who have wronged us to go unchecked, it will eventually destroy us.  We will follow our bitterness "all the way to hell."

Born almost a decade ago in Yugoslavia, she responded to God's call on her life while still a teenager. A missionary's strong challenge to give her life to teaching in India resulted in her appointment to the city of Calcutta. Some months later she saw a sight which completely revolutionized her life, and would ultimately bring her worldwide fame as Good Housekeeping magazine's "Most-Admired-Woman" selection. What was the sight? A homeless, dying woman lying in the gutter, being eaten by rats. Compassion compelled her to beg an abandoned Hindu temple from the government, and convert it into a crude make-shift hospital for the dying. A comment of hers became her life's thrust: "If there is a God in heaven, and a Christ we love, nobody should die alone." This woman who established colonies for over 10,000 lepers in 28 cities was interviewed by Malcolm Muggeridge from the BBC News. "Mother Teresa, the thing I noticed about you and the hundreds of sisters who now form your team is that you all look so happy. Is that a put-on?" She replied, "Oh no, not at all. Nothing makes you happier than when you really reach out in mercy to someone who is badly hurt.”

Service is its own reward. True mercy begets genuine joy.

In the early days of the Southern Confederacy, General Robert E. Lee was severely criticized by General Whiting. It might have been expected that Lee would wait for a time when he could get even with Whiting. A day came when president Jefferson Davis asked General Lee to come for consultation. The President wanted to know what Lee thought of General Whiting. Without hesitation Lee commended Whiting in high terms and called him one of the ablest men in the confederate army. An officer present motioned Lee aside to suggest that he must not know what unkind things whiting had been saying about him. Lee answered: "I understood that the president desired to know my opinion of Whiting, not Whiting's opinion of me."

When I read in the scriptures of Bartimaeus regaining his sight, I celebrate the power of faith. One of the greatest poems in the English language was written by John Milton in 1652 as he dealt with the onset of his own blindness. John Milton’s contention with himself as he thought on his blindness was not simply a complaint or a chastening. Clearly he was in anguish not only at his loss of sight but at his inability to serve God as he thought he should. But, Milton found through his loss not only the resignation to abide it but turned his mind with a startling clarity of thought and vision to writing his most memorable work: Paradise Lost.

Listen to Milton's words in another poem about his experience of turning darkness into light. Here is Milton's "How My Light is Spent":

When I consider how my light is spent
Ere half my days in this dark world and wide,
  And that one talent which is death to hide
  Lodg'd with me useless, though my soul more bent
To serve therewith my Maker, and present
  My true account, lest he returning chide,
  "Doth God exact day-labour, light denied?"

I fondly ask. But Patience, to prevent
That murmur, soon replies: "God doth not need
  Either man's work or his own gifts: who best
  Bear his mild yoke, they serve him best. His state
Is kingly; thousands at his bidding speed
  And post o'er land and ocean without rest:
  They also serve who only stand and wait."

True faith has vision that goes beyond mere sight. Or as Jesus would say to blind Bartemaeus, as to all of us, "Do you want to see?"

Well-Known evangelist D.L. Moody was hosting a Bible Conference in Massachusetts in the late 1800s. Many of the participants came from Europe. Following the European custom of the time, they left their shoes outside their rooms to be cleaned by the hall servants overnight. They did not know that there were no hall servants in America. Walking down the dormitory halls that night, Moody noticed the shoes and determined not to embarrass his guests. He gathered up the shoes, went to his room, and began to clean and polish the shoes. Only the unexpected arrival of a friend in the midst of the work revealed the secret. The following morning the foreign visitors opened their doors and found their shoes shined. They did not know by whom. Moody told no one, but his friend told a few people, and during the rest of the conference, a different person volunteered to shine the shoes in secret each night.

This story is a good example of what we are asked to do in today's gospel: "So you also, when you have done all that is commanded you, say, 'We are unworthy servants; we have only done what was our duty'" (Luke 17:10).

Rabbi Harold Kushner tells a wonderful story about a bright young man, who was a sophomore Stanford pre-med student To reward him for having done so well in school, his parents gave him a trip to the Far East for the summer vacation before the start of his junior year. While there he met a guru who said to him, "Don't you see how you are poisoning your soul with this success oriented way of life? Your idea of happiness is to stay up all night studying for an exam so you can get a better grade than your best friend. Your idea of a good marriage is not to find the woman who will make you whole, but to win the girl that everyone else wants. That's not how people are supposed to live. Give it up; come join us in an atmosphere where we all share and love each other." The young man had completed four years at a competitive high school to get into Stanford, plus two years of pre-med courses at the university. He was ripe for this sort of approach. He called his parents from Tokyo and told them he would not be coming home. He was dropping out of school to live in an ashram (a spiritual retreat).

"Six months later, his parents got a letter from him: "Dear Mom and Dad, I know you weren't happy with the decision I made last summer, but I want to tell you how happy it has made me. For the first time in my life, I am at peace. Here there is no competing, no hustling, no trying to get ahead of anyone else. Here we are all equal, and we all share. This way of life is so much in harmony with the inner essence of my soul that in only six months I've become the number two disciple in the entire ashram, and I think I can be number one by June!"

They say that all good humor must have one crucial element: Truth. And how is this story. The young man's intentions are noble but he is not able to follow through. Before long he is competing in this "monastery" to be the star pupil.

Our leaders have been giving us good advice these past two weeks. They have been urging American to get back to work, to make this economy strong again, to invest in the market, to get back into the friendly skies, and get down in to the trenches of our jobs. I think all of us understand the implications if we do not return wholeheartedly to our daily task. We have all been wondering what we can do to help. We have been told our greatest contribution is returning to our normal routine.

As we have done so, I have noticed a renewed gratitude, an appreciation for the very jobs we hold. We see ourselves a little more clearly now. We are not people who have limitless rights. We are citizens who have a duty to serve. This is the lesson Jesus would have us learn. It is the meaning of this short parable and it is the standard for every Christian.

Note: Update and adapt the last two paragraphs as you see fit. We have left them in the present tense for historical record.

A young boy by the name of James had a desire to be the most famous manufacturer and salesman of cheese in the world. He planned on becoming rich and famous by making and selling cheese and began with a little buggy pulled by a pony named Paddy. After making his cheese, he would load his wagon and he and Paddy would drive down the streets of Chicago to sell the cheese. As the months passed, the young boy began to despair because he was not making any money, in spite of his long hours and hard work.

One day he pulled his pony to a stop and began to talk to him. He said, "Paddy, there is something wrong. We are not doing it right. I am afraid we have things turned around and our priorities are not where they ought to be. Maybe we ought to serve God and place him first in our lives." The boy drove home and made a covenant that for the rest of his life he would first serve God and then would work as God directed.

Many years after this, the young boy, now a man, stood as Sunday School Superintendent at North Shore Baptist Church in Chicago and said, "I would rather be a layman in the North Shore Baptist Church than to head the greatest corporation in America. My first job is serving Jesus."

So, every time you take a take a bite of Philadelphia Cream cheese, sip a cup of Maxwell House, mix a quart of Kool-Aid, slice up a DiGiorno Pizza, cook a pot of Macaroni & Cheese, spread some Grey Poupon, stir a bowl of Cream of Wheat, slurp down some Jell-O, eat the cream out of the middle of an Oreo cookie, or serve some Stove Top, remember a boy, his pony named Paddy, and the promise little James L. Kraft made to serve God and work as He directed.

One day the great Michelangelo attracted a crowd of spectators as he worked. One child in particular was fascinated by the sight of chips flying and the sound of mallet on chisel. The master was shaping a large block of white marble. Unable to contain her curiosity, the little girl inquired, "What are you making?" He replied, "There is an angel in there and I must set it free."

Every Christian at their confirmation or conversion is handed a large cold white marble block called religion. We must then take the mallet in hand and set to work. Religion is not our goal but we must first start there. Now there are many names for religion. At times we do call it religion but we often use other words and images to describe it. Sometimes we call it our faith. Jesus spoke in terms of the Kingdom of God. We say we are the Church, Christians, or Disciples. There are many names with varying nuances of meaning but in the end they all describe the same thing. We are a people of Faith, faith in Christ to be sure, but faith nonetheless.

We are not a business or institution. We do not sell or produce anything. We advocate no earthly cause. We serve no worldly authority. We come to a church building made by men. And to do what? Practice our faith. But we just as well could have met on a hillside or cave.

Our leader is not here, not so that I can show him to you or offer irrefutable evidence of his existence. That means faith is all we have. We are born through faith, live by faith, and die in faith. After my death, then and only then will I know in full, as the Apostle Paul says, when I see Jesus face to face. Until then I had better understand this religion thing. Now that sounds pretty daunting doesn’t it? Here’s the good News. It’s not all that difficult. Religion is a marble slab and we have to find, like Michelangelo, the angel inside.

Chisel with me a few minutes this morning and let the chips fly, and let’s find the faith that lives inside. Faith: it is the angel of our religion. Faith can set us free if we know how to live it. How do you practice your faith and not just religion? Jesus outlined faith in Luke 17. He explained there are three simple ways to exercise faith. Three small steps make up our journey of faith.

1. The First Step Is Learning to Forgive (4).
2. The Second Step Is Learning to Believe (6).
3. The Third Step Is Learning to Serve (10).

The story is told of Dr. Charles Mayo who, with his father and brother, founded the world-famous Mayo Clinic. A group of European medical experts was visiting the clinic and were staying as guests of Dr. Mayo at his home. In their own countries it was the custom of these gentlemen to place their shoes outside the bedroom doors for a servant to polish.

As Dr. Mayo was retiring he noticed shoes lined up outside the rooms of his guests, but it was too late to wake any of the servants. With a sigh he picked up all of the shoes, hauled them to the kitchen, and spent half of the night polishing them. Dr. Charles Mayo was secure enough to be humble himself like that.

Jesus was secure enough in his relationship with his Father to humble himself to wash his disciples' feet. He had no need to say to the world, "Look at me! I'm somebody great!" He had all of the approval he needed.

Note: A rather harmless story but we were not able to confirm the events. 

Can you picture this scene? We are sitting on bleachers under the big top having a wonderful time laughing at the clowns, watching lions and tigers jump at the crack of a whip, and gazing in awe as the acrobats perform. We are caught up in the excitement of the circus and join in with the crowd in thunderous applause after each act. The acrobats perform high above us in what seems to us as death-defying feats. Each feat seems greater than the previous one. "Ahhs" can be heard in unison after each act. Excitement is building as we continue to watch in anticipation of the next act.

A skilled high wire artist has accomplished so many marvelous feats that the audience has come to believe that he can do almost anything. The ringmaster addresses the crowd: "Ladies and gentlemen, how many of you believe that this daring man can ride safely over the high wire on his bicycle while carrying someone on his shoulders? If you believe he can do it, please raise your hand!" We raise our hands along with everybody else, a great silent chorus of belief. "Very well, then," says the ringmaster, seeing the almost unanimous vote of confidence, "now, who would like to be the first to volunteer to sit on his shoulders?"

The difference between belief and faith is a difference between staying in our seats and volunteering to climb the shoulders of the high wire artist.

John D. Rockefeller was one of the richest people who ever lived. There is probably nothing of material value in this world that John D. Rockefeller could not provide for his children. Did you know, however, that he had a daughter who became obsessed with the fear that she would die penniless? Her years were haunted with the fear that she would die destitute. Can you imagine such a thing a Rockefeller worried sick about money? Can you imagine a child of God worried sick that he or she will go to God’s well for spiritual resources in a time of need and find that well dry? God’s resources are inexhaustible. Did you know that there are even churches that never venture out to do great works for God because they fear that God may let them down? Unbelievable! Our faith is a gift from God. He gives us faith according to our needs the greater the need, the greater the faith.

This statement (Matt 12:32, par Mk. 3:29, Luke 12:10) has been the subject of much questioning. Obviously the reference here is not to the naming of the Holy Spirit in a blasphemous utterance, for in Matt. 12:32 even blasphemy against the Son of man can be forgiven. Among the many attempts at exegesis, the most convincing is the suggestion that the man who blasphemes against the Holy Spirit is he who has recognized that God is working through the Holy Spirit in the actions of Jesus, and who quite consciously "misrepresent faith in God as faith in the devil.  This saying is an extremely serious warning against the demonic and scarcely conceivable potential in man: To declare war on God.  This is not done in weakness and doubt, but by one who has been overcome by the Holy Spirit and who knows very well on whom he is declaring war" (E. Schweizer, The Good News according to Mark, 1971, 87; cf. H.W. Beyer, TDNT I:624; O.E. Evans, "The Unforgivable Sin", ExpT 68, 1956-57, 240-44). This is the blasphemer who does it deliberately, after encounter with the God of grace, as the context shows. For Jesus has just been accused of casting out demons by Beelzebul, the prince of demons. "Therefore he who blasphemes the Spirit is no longer speaking against a God who is distant, about whom he entertains mere foolish thoughts, but against the one who makes evident to him his gracious work, and confirms it with his manifest, divine seal. He is a man who ought to give thanks, not to blaspheme" (A. Schlatter, on Matt. 12:32).

W.L. Lane draws attention to Sifre on Deut. 32:38 (end): "The Holy One, blessed be he, pardons everything else, but on profanation of the Name [i.e. blasphemy] he takes vengeance immediately" (The Gospel of Mark, NLC, 1974, 145) Lane goes on to comment: "This is the danger to which the scribes exposed themselves when they attributed to the agency of Satan the redemption brought by Jesus. The expulsion of demons was a sign of the intrusion of the Kingdom of God. Yet the scribal accusations against Jesus amount to a denial of the power and greatness of the Spirit of God. By assigning the action of Jesus to a demonic origin the scribes betray a perversion of spirit which, in defiance of the truth, chooses to call light darkness. In this historical context, blasphemy against the Holy Spirit denotes the conscious and deliberate rejection of the saving power and grace of God released through Jesus' work and act" (ibid). Thus blasphemy here is much more serious than the taking of the divine name in vain which a believer may have done before coming to repentance and faith.

It may be said to those who have been tormented by fear that they have committed the unforgivable sin that their concern is itself a sign that they have not committed the sin envisaged in Jesus' teaching here. Lane's interpretation also helps to explain the distinction drawn between blasphemy against the Son of man and blasphemy against the Holy Spirit. The distinction suggests that "while an attack on Jesus' own person, as son of Man and therefore 'hidden', is pardonable, any speaking against the power by which he works (i.e. the divine endowment for his messianic ministry) will not be pardoned" (D. Hill, The Gospel of Matthew, New Century Bible, 1972, 318). For such an action would be deliberately to attribute to Satan the action of God himself. (NIDNTT, v. 3, pp. 343-344)

What is blasphemy against the Holy Spirit? Though many suggestions have been offered, I think the answer lies in the context here (Luke 12:7-12) and in the context of redemptive history. Remember that the Holy Spirit had not yet been poured out, and it is the Spirit who causes men to recognize who Jesus is. Hebrews 6 and 10 contain discussions of unforgivable sins, but the distinction between blasphemy against Christ and the Spirit has disappeared. Jesus seemed to be saying this: Because the Holy spirit has not yet been poured out in fullness, the Jews will be forgiven for blaspheming the Son of Man. They will be given a second chance to repent, as we see in the book of Acts. If, however, they continue to blaspheme after the Spirit has come, they will not be forgiven. But what is the sin, specifically? Since it is blasphemy, we must see it essentially as a verbal sin. In context it is the sin of saying that Jesus Christ is of the devil. Jesus was willing to excuse this blasphemy before Pentecost; but, in the new covenant era it is not longer excusable. If a person curses Jesus, but does not really know who Jesus is, that sin is forgivable. But if the Holy Spirit has borne witness to a person that Jesus is indeed the Son of God, and that person curses Him, it cannot be forgiven.

I have frequently quoted Robert Capon's comments that the church is not in the morals business. The world does a pretty good job of that. What the world can't get right is the forgiveness business which is the church's proper job.

From a slightly different angle, he writes in Between Noon and Three: Morality, by its very nature, must be concerned with norms, with standards; whereas grace, by definition, is concerned with persons: it is a refusal to allow the standards to become the basis of their reconciliation or condemnation. Thus the conflict: morality tells you the standard you need to meet in order to be properly alive; grace tells you that all you ultimately need is to be dead – which is either the world's lowest standard or no standard at all.

Grace and morality, therefore, are two different kettles of fish. Morality deals with virtue and vice, with what is strengthening or weakening for human nature considered as an operational possibility. Grace, however, deals with sin, with a condition in which human nature has ceased to be an operational possibility and has ended up a lost cause. Grace is, to say it once again, about raising the dead. In the Bible the opposite of sin is not virtue; it is faith – faith in God who raises the dead.

All this talk about morality, therefore, is misleading. When we get far enough into it we begin to convince ourselves that the preaching of the moral law will, if done energetically enough, lead people to lead good lives and so make them more like what they ought to be. But that's not biblical. St. Paul says that the purpose of the law was not to do that at all, but to bring us to the awareness of sin. We sit here talking as if proper moral instruction to fifteen-year-olds will somehow keep them clear of sin. But St. Paul says that Scripture has concluded – locked up – all under sin, that the promise by faith of Jesus Christ might be given to them that believe. [pp. 157-8]

The goal of our preaching is not more moral behaviors, but forgiveness. I have often said that the primary purpose of sermons is absolution. While there may be instructions, and illustrations, and jokes, etc., if the forgiveness of sins through Jesus is not proclaimed in some way, I think that the sermon (and the church) has failed in its God-given purpose.

When I was in the hospital, I received many cards. Among them was one that had an actual mustard seed in a little container pasted on the front of it along with the words, "For if you had faith even as small as a tiny mustard seed you could say to this mountain, ‘Move!’ and it would go away. Nothing would be impossible." A mustard seed is really no big deal. But from this small seed grows a very large plant in a very short period of time.

Using a tiny mustard seed, Jesus suggests a very remarkable thing. He says that if our faith is only as large as this very small seed, we can do great things, as great as moving a mountain from one location to another. In fact, he says, "Nothing would be impossible for us." As Jesus talks to us about a mountain-moving faith, some of us possess a mountain of doubt.

It has been my experience that those who doubt more than they believe try to subject God to the limits of their own reason. They want God on their terms, according to their own rationale. They seem to say that if they were God, things would have been done differently. And right here, I believe, is the crux of the problem. They see themselves as God. For to be wiser than God is to be God.

If we really want to get to know God, it is better to begin with faith. What we really need is a faith that seeks understanding rather than an understanding that seeks faith. To put it another way, "In Doubt? Faith It!" No matter how little our faith might be - even if it is smaller than a mustard seed - God is saying to us today that there is great potential for its growth.

As I mentioned earlier, the faith teachers maintain that when Adam sinned, the world was turned over to Satan. The devil became the legal owner of the planet. The faith teacher's position accommodates the Gnostic view (particularly evident in Zoroastrianism, a Persian Gnostic religion), in which a good god rules the spiritual world and a bad god rules the physical realm. In such a philosophy the problem of evil is solved by blaming everything that goes wrong on the bad god (the devil); the good god is seen as no more than a counterbalance. One is left with the impression that the two gods each possess equal power both in quality and quantity. Everything that is wrong in the world is the fault of the bad god. And it's up to the initiate or believer to make sure the good god wins. Back when Jimmy Swaggart defied the orders of the Assemblies of God to refrain from preaching for one year, he assured the public that he was free of moral defect, for, he said, Oral Roberts had cast out the demons from his body over the phone. Oral Roberts confirmed Swaggart's report, insisting he had demons and their claws deeply embedded in Swaggart's flesh. Now that the rascals were gone, Swaggart and Roberts asserted, Swaggart could get on with preparing the way for Christ's return. Evidently, personal responsibility for sin can be dismissed by blaming it on an external force. Yet Flip Wilson's famous quip, "The devil made me do it" is hardly comedy when we're talking about the biblical view of sin.

For these metaphysical evangelists, even personal sins can be attributed to the bad god, since he is, after all, sovereign over this earthly realm as the good god is relatively in charge of the spiritual domain. Here again, then, is the echo of the Gnostics of old. When that heresy was revived toward the end of the medieval period, Calvin said, "They made the devil almost the equal of God." In this way, the problem of sin is replaced with the problem of Satan. It is facing Satan, not my own sin and rebelliousness, that becomes the great task of the Christian life. I'm not the problem the Devil is!

The cross best proclaims the indisputable fact that we worship a caring God. It is the most popular of all Christian symbols. There is no Christianity without the cross.

The cross shouts God’s words of love to each of us. It is his proclamation of possibility beyond the present. In it is hope for the hopeless, love for the loveless, encouragement for the depressed, and the pronouncement of life beyond death for those who grieve the loss of a friend or contemplate their own demise. Its importance to our faith cannot be over-emphasized, its proclamation must never be subdued. It trumpets, "God cares!" That’s music to our ears - the best news we could ever hear.

As I look at the cross, I cannot help but think of a movie I saw years ago. Few movies in my life have had the impact of Ben Hur. Many scenes made an indelible impression - the great sea battle, the exciting chariot race, the repugnant leprosy colony. Yet, none hit harder than the crucifixion of our Lord. The sound of hammer on nail rings through the air, the cross rises until it suddenly thumps into place. Slowly Jesus’ blood begins to flow - one drop, then another ... a puddle forms beneath the cross. It begins to rain. Water mixes with more blood, and together they begin to trickle down the hillside. The trickle becomes a stream as the blood washes over God’s creation. We are reminded that the blood of Jesus cleanses us from all sin.

At Calvary God was in Christ reconciling the world unto himself. The blood of Christ pouring down the cross restored our relationship with the Father. We cannot fully understand the mystery of God’s plan to recapture a creation gone astray. We only know that all who come to the cross in simple, trusting faith are cleansed by his blood and find peace with the Father.

By his death Jesus has unchained us. Unchained - there is no better word for it. He has set us free from the wages of our sins that only pay dividends in hell and has set us on the positive pathway of a life with God. Our eyes need no longer be downcast; our head has no reason to be between our knees. We are no longer oppressed with our weighty sins, for we have been touched by none other than God. He has cared not just a little but powerfully. His power encountered our sin, and it was no more. His incredible desire to rescue us in spite of everything dispels even the worst sin. But we must be wise enough to permit ourselves and our sins to be encountered by that desire.

Now, more than ever, we need to face the question, "Who is the real Jesus?" Is the Christ of faith the Jesus of history? What is the truth about Jesus? What can we believe? We turn to the Apostles' Creed which has given the church's answer for 2,000 years.

Different Positions

It is not strange that the most popular question of our time is, "Who is Jesus?" Was this question not answered in Matthew 16:16 when Peter said to Jesus at Caesarea Philippi: "You are the Messiah, the Son of the living God"? In Jesus' day, too, there were different opinions about Jesus. When on a retreat with his disciples, he asked them what people were saying about him. The public was divided: Jesus was considered to be John the Baptist, Elijah, Jeremiah, or one of the prophets. What more of an answer do we need than the answer of Peter? Jesus accepted his answer as the truth, for he said, "Blessed are you, Simon, son of Jonah! For flesh and blood has not revealed this to you, but my Father in heaven" (Matthew 16:17). Yet, after twenty centuries, we do not believe what Peter said about the identity of Jesus. According to a Gallup poll, 42 percent of Americans agreed with the statement: "Jesus is the Son of God." A recent report from Germany indicated that only one out of every four believe in Jesus Christ. Throughout Christian history down to the present, there are different views of Jesus. Now let us look at some of them.

1. The All-Human Jesus

Human

According to this position, Jesus is 100 percent human. It was held as early as the first centuries of Christianity by the Ebionites. They denied that Jesus was divine. He was only a teacher, prophet, miracle-man, and one with an outstanding character. But he was not divine, the Son of God. Today this view is held by many, including atheists, agnostics, Unitarians, Jews, Moslems, and other non-Christian religions.

2. The All-Divine Jesus

Divine

Opposite the Ebionites, Docetists held that Jesus was entirely divine. He was not at all human. This view was originally taught by Eutychus, a monk in a monastery near Constantinople. In the fourth century, Appolonarius, bishop of Laodicea, popularized the teaching. It was known as Docetism, from the Latin word docere meaning "to seem." It just seemed that Jesus was human. It was based on the idea that the physical and material were inherently evil. The human body therefore was sinful. Jesus therefore was not human, for God could not be identified with sin. Docetists held that Jesus' human nature was swallowed up by the divine. This denied the Incarnation, the biblical teaching that "the Word became flesh."

3. The Half And Half Jesus

Human/Divine

Nestorians took the view that Jesus was half human and half divine. It was taught by Nestorius, bishop of Constantinople, in the fifth century. To this day it is a very popular understanding of Jesus. When we see Jesus hungry, thirsty, and tired, we say it was because he was human. When he struggles in prayer and on the cross cries out, "My God, why ...?" we see the human Jesus. On the other hand, Jesus is God when he walks on water, feeds 5,000, raises the dead, heals lepers, and rises from the grave. The problem with this view is that we have a divided Jesus -- two persons in one body.

4. The Adopted Jesus

Divine

Human

This is known as adoptionism. According to this position, Jesus came into the world as a human. Because of his moral excellence, his perfect obedience to God, his wisdom, his compassion for people, and his willing sacrifice of himself on the cross, the Father adopted him as his son at his baptism. This adoption was confirmed by the resurrection and the ascension. Jesus then became a deified man.

5. The Both And Jesus

Human & Divine

The above different positions concerning Jesus caused great concern, for the gospel was at stake. If Jesus were only human, then he was just a martyr on the cross and not the Lamb that took away the sin of the world. If he were only human, the resurrection was a fairy tale. His promises of forgiveness and eternal life were meaningless. His claims to know God and to be one with God would then be the words of a religious fanatic who was deluded into thinking he was the Son of God.

On the other hand, if Jesus were only divine and not human, humanity would be the loser. Because he was human, he became one of us. As a human, he fulfilled the law for us. Through his humanity we could see the nature of God. Above all, he became sin for us so that sin, through him, could go out of the world. As a human Jesus knows our human condition. Like all of us he was tempted and he showed that by the power of God we can overcome temptation to sin.

Consequently, the church had to take a stand on the question of Jesus. Is he only human, only divine, or half and half? In 451 A.D. the church held a council at Chalcedon to decide the issue. The church decided that it was not a matter of Jesus being fully God or fully human, or half and half, but it was a matter of both, both fully human and fully divine. To this day the church holds to this truth stated at Chalcedon:

We confess one and the same Son, our Lord Jesus Christ, perfect in manhood, truly God and truly man, or a rational soul and a body, of one substance with the Father with respect to the Godhead, and of one substance with us in respect of the manhood, like us in everything but sin ...

This is to say that Jesus is fully God and fully man. These two natures are blended into one integrated personality. He is not a split personality, nor does he suffer from schizophrenia. It is like a blender in your kitchen. Suppose you put apples, peaches, and pears in it and pushed the "on" button for a minute. Now what do you have -- apples, peaches, and pears? Yes, you do, but can you tell which is which? They have become one fruit, one substance. Also, it is like homogenized milk. When the raw milk comes from the farm, a dairy runs it through a homogenizer. As the milk runs through the machine, pistons compact the milk so that the cream and skim milk are made one. As a result you cannot take cream off the milk. In the same way, the human and divine natures of Jesus are compacted into one integrated person.

This means that the Father and the Son are one. When Jesus prays, God also prays. When the human Jesus suffers and dies on a cross, God is in Jesus enduring the cross. "God was in Christ reconciling the world to himself" (2 Corinthians 5:19). When the human Jesus speaks, it is also God who speaks. When Jesus weeps, God weeps. This truth makes us realize the seriousness of the cross. It was not only a human on the cross, but God was there in Jesus. Good Friday is the day God died in Jesus. Indeed, the murderers did not know what they were doing; they did not know they were killing God! As the spiritual says, "Sometimes it causes me to tremble, tremble, tremble."

After the tomb was found empty and Jesus appeared to the early church on many occasions, doubt disappeared, and the early church had overwhelming confidence in the Lord. The church today must live and be about its ministry with the same Easter confidence. We say we rely on God’s mercy for our salvation; we need to give over all areas of our lives to God’s control. What aspects of ourselves are outside God’s control? Our temper? Our money? Our time? We need join the psalmist and say, "Create in me a clean heart, O God, and renew a right spirit within me." Our trust in the Lord must be complete. We are no longer defeated people but powerful Easter people. Little children in danger or in despair literally run and throw themselves into the arms of their mother. This is confident faith. When was the last time we ran and thrust ourselves onto the Lord? A cautious step in his direction is better than none at all, but believing with abandonment is called forth by an empty tomb. God wants us to fall head over heels in love with him so he can bring the greatest joy and purpose possible into our lives.

God also encourages us to hold fast to hope without wavering. Scripture says, "Where there is no hope, the people perish." Too many of us view too much of our lives and the world as hopeless. Without hope, no great strides will be made in the future; there is no venturesome faith without hope. Without hope we burrow into the ground and live the life of a mole instead of walking freely in God’s sunlight. In a difficult situation, a hopeful people find the challenge and opportunity to do something great with God.

Confident in our faith, with an unwavering hope, the Lord also encourages us to stir up one another to love and good works. We must do something. Faith and hope must move from the abstract to the particular.

Easter people are called upon to celebrate the Festival of the Resurrection each Sunday, for each Sunday is a little Easter. "... Not neglecting to meet together," is how it is written in Hebrews. To break fellowship with the worshiping community is to pursue a weakening faith. It is also a form of denial of all that Christ means. True faith, strong faith, is never faith in isolation but must always be faith shared and strengthened through regular worship. We must encourage one another to be regular in worship and strong in the faith.

The end is drawing near. The Lord will return soon to reclaim his fallen creation. When the Lord of the church comes again, how will he find us? Will we be acting like people who have been touched by the meaning of the cross and the empty tomb? Therefore, let us continue to draw near to the Lord with a true heart and a confident faith. We hold fast to the confession of our hope without wavering. We consider how to stir up one another to love and good works. We do not neglect to worship but encourage one another. In sum, we will all be Easter people.

When Christ came to Bethany, following the death of Lazarus, the body had been in the tomb long enough for decay to set in. For Christ to be expected to restore the body to life now took even more faith than it would if he had been present immediately after Lazarus’ death. But still Mary’s faith in Christ was unwavering. She told Christ that she knew that "even now" he could perform the miracle of restoring her brother from death.

We tend to limit our faith. We think that some things can be accomplished by prayer, or through Christ, but how much? We fail to comprehend how great God is, or to realize the limitless height and depth and width of Christ’s love. Your God Is Too Small is the catching title of a book. It could well be paraphrased to read, "Your Faith Is Too Small." It is never too late to expect miracles of Jesus. In old age as well as youth, no matter how late in the game, the addiction to dope or liquor or some mortal sin, "even now" Christ can come to the rescue if we put our faith in him.

Three men were walking on a wall,
Feeling, Faith, and Fact.
When Feeling got an awful fall,
Then Faith was taken back.

So close was Faith to Feeling,
That he stumbled and fell too.
But Fact remained and pulled Faith back,
And Faith brought Feeling too.

Tony Campolo in his book, Who Switched the Price Tags?, gives us a beautiful example of the kind of attitude that accompanies mustard seed faith. He tells of Lord Chesterton who suggested that God got a childlike excitement out of His work. "As a matter of fact, he contended that God may be the only one left in the universe who has childlike emotions about work, while all the rest of us have grown old and cynical because of sin. God never tires of what He does. He enjoys it.

If you take a five-year-old child, throw her into the air, catch her, bounce her off your knee, and then set her down on the floor, you can expect her to exclaim, "Do it again!" If you repeat the process a dozen times, the child will not tire of these antics.

Lord Chesterton believed that God may be that way about creating daisies. He asks us to imagine God creating the first daisy and enjoying it so much that something down inside Him exclaims, "Do it again!" And when he makes the second daisy, He is even more excited and shouts to Himself, "Do it again!" Imagine God continuing to create daisy after daisy, and after making the hundred-billionth daisy, being even more filled with excitement than when He began. Obviously, this is an exaggeration but it makes no difference. The principle is what is valid - God is a God who delights in what He does."

We are created in God's image. Mustard seed faith says that this is a marvelous world in which God has placed us. It is an exciting and wonderful thing to be alive. We are fortunate when we can get up each morning and go to our schools, offices, fields and factories and share in the abundance of God's creation.

The primary emphasis of John's declaration is to say who Jesus is (the Lamb of God) and also to say what Jesus does (takes away the sin of the world). This is all well and good, but the old Adam in me gets nervous when I have an encounter with a "sin stealer." I want to be as graphic and as plain as I can be about this Jesus is the ultimate sin stealer, and that troubles me. You can certainly use language that describes this reality in different terms, like "Jesus removes our sins," or "Jesus washed my sins away," but Jesus "rips us off" as far as our corporate and personal sins are concerned. I am a witness to this, because I was reared by a sin stealer, my mother. Now Daddy was a "sin reactor and responder," and I was the not always grateful recipient of his reactions and responses, but Mama was the sin stealer, the one who had the spiritual discernment and psychology to see that I would live in the benefits of John's declaration and Jesus' action.

This sin stealing was shown most clearly on an early spring day long ago, when my mother had made my favorite lunch for school. It was a small container of chocolate milk, a peanut butter and jelly sandwich, and fresh-baked chocolate chip cookies. I went off to Public School 129, but a block and a half away, eager for the morning to pass so I could sink my teeth into one of those delicious cookies, but as I turned from Stuyvesant Ave on to Quincy Street I was face to face with Junebug, the bully of the block.

"Gimmie that lunch, punk!" he said.

"But, Junebug, that's my lunch."

"You better gimmie that lunch!"

"But it's mine. My Mom made it for me, and she made me my favorite ."

Junebug's right uppercut sent me and the lunch to the ground. He picked up the lunch and said, "That's what you get for not listening to me!" and went off to school. I also went off to school with no lunch and lots of anger.

At home that late afternoon I was very silent. Mama, knowing something was up, said, "What happened at school today?"

"I'm gonna kill him!"

"What?"

"I'm gonna kill him!"

"And who do you plan to kill?"

"Junebug. He beat me up, he stole my lunch, and I'm gonna kill him!"

Mama thought for awhile and then said, "Here, have some food. Don't start your homework right away there is something we need to do together, but you must do it as I say."

The next morning I saw Junebug in front of the school. He pointed to me and said, "Here is that punk who I stole cookies from yesterday!"

I walked up to him, handed him a bag and said, "Junebug, here are some cookies. They're for you. I and my mother made them."

"Whatta you mean, punk? Giving me cookies? I can take them from you anytime I want!"

"But we made them for you take them."

"Are they poison?"

"No, they're okay take them."

He took the bag from me and handed it to one of his buddies. "Hey, Bootsie, you try them."

"But they just may be poison," said Bootsie.

"Try them anyway, already! They just may be good!"

After one bite, and Bootsie still standing, Junebug passed out the cookies to his buddies, saying, "The punk has brought me, Junebug, some cookies! Isn't that great!"

The next day, I saw Junebug during recess. I walked up to him, gave him a bag and said, "Junebug, here are some more cookies. Take them, they're free."

"Are you messing with me, man? Are you messing with me? These are the ones that are poison! Yesterday was just to set me up!"

"Don't worry, Junebug. They're just fine." He took the bag and backed away from me with a terrified look on his face.

The following day, I saw Junebug in the cafeteria. I said, "Junebug, here are some more cookies. Enjoy them!"

"How can I enjoy cookies if you keep on giving them to me! Now cut it out, man! I didn't even finish yesterday's cookies! No more cookies! (He took the bag anyway.)

On the next day, I saw Junebug at the end of school. I walked up to him and said, "Junebug, here are...." He took one look at that bag of cookies and turned running and screaming all the way down Quincy Street. I haven't even had the notion of taking someone's life ever since. Because Jesus is a sin stealer, My mom stole my intention to sin.

The devout of this world perform their rituals without guarantee that anything good will ever come of it. Of course there are plenty of scriptures and plenty of priests who make plenty of promises as to what your good works will yield (or threats as to the punishments awaiting you if you lapse), but to even believe all this is an act of faith, because nobody amongst us is shown the endgame. Devotion is diligence without assurance. Faith is a way of saying, 'Yes, I pre-accept the terms of the universe and I embrace in advance what I am presently incapable of understanding.' There's a reason we refer to 'leaps of faith' because the decision to consent to any notion of divinity is a mighty jump from the rational over to the unknowable, and I don't care how diligently scholars of every religion will try to sit you down with their stacks of books and prove to you through scripture that their faith is indeed rational; it isn't. If faith were rational, it wouldn't be by definition faith. Faith is belief in what you cannot see or prove or touch. Faith is walking face-first and full-speed into the dark. If we truly know all the answers in advance to the meaning of life and the nature of God and the destiny of our souls, our belief would not be a leap of faith and it would not be a courageous act of humanity; it would just be . . . a prudent insurance policy.

Augustine said, "What is faith, unless it is to believe what you cannot see." This is the obvious description, but scripture has quite a bit to say about what exactly faith is: 

Definition of faith: Hebrews 11:1.
Faith is derived from the Word of God: Romans 10:17
Faith's demand: Hebrews 11:6
Faith's design: 2 Corinthians 5:7
The dualism of faith: Hebrews 4:2
Faith's duty: Romans 1:17 live by it.

If you do not use your right arm, it will eventually lose all its power to move. Its muscles must be exercised to stay alive. If you have faith, you must exercise this also. If you don't, it dies.

A widely known professor in a New England university started out as a practicing Christian, a man of faith. Over the years, however, this all changed. He became known as an agnostic, or an atheist even. He said, concerning that change, that he never consciously abandoned faith. He said, "It was as though I had just put it away in a drawer, and later when I looked for it, it wasn't there." Of course it wasn't; the man had let faith die for want of exercise.

If you have faith, keep it out and keep it active. Faith does not survive packed in an old trunk or kept in cold storage. Some fine musical instruments must be played to survive; leave them idle and they will no longer make music for you. Use the faith you've got, and it will grow stronger; fail to use it, and it will weaken and perish. Exercise your faith!

There are many ways of doing this: helping others, loving them; forgiving others, living nobly; firmly holding high ideals and going straight. But your faith is best exercised when you ask it to do the thing it alone has the power to do, when you ask it to lift up your soul for the touch of God. This you do when you truly worship him.

Leslie Weatherhead in his book, A Private House Of Prayer, suggests that the structure of the content of prayer be likened to a house of seven rooms. Each room is a division of prayer. There may be some duplication with ACTSS which we just discussed.

The first room is for the affirmation of God's presence. If prayer is a conversation with God, obviously it is necessary for him to be present. When we pray, are we aware of his presence or like Moses do we see only a burning bush? In a hymn Tersteegen sings, "God himself is present; let us now adore him and with awe appear before him." What applies to worship, applies also to prayer. When we pray, we are talking to a real person, not to an idea, or ideal, or ideology, or a theological concept. In prayer we are not talking to ourselves or to the ceiling. In spirit God is there to hear our prayer. We need to realize this and pray accordingly.

The next room is for the thanksgiving and praise. We have been blessed beyond measure and therefore to thank and praise God is in order. Before we begin our prayer, we need to review how good God has been to us. If we are bereft of blessings, our greatest gift is Jesus who loved us enough to die for us.

Go to the next room for the confession of sins. Sin separates us from God. Sin erects an impenetrable curtain which prevents us from seeing God. The separation prevents our hearing the voice of God. We come out of a dirty world with the dirt of sin clinging to us. Before we can be presentable to a holy God we need spiritual cleansing. Thus, in prayer we confess our sins and plead for his mercy.

The fourth room is labelled "Reception of God's grace." We have confessed our sins and begged for mercy. What is God's response? It is grace in terms of pardon and acceptance. At this time in our prayers we remember his promises to be with us always, to forgive us, and to bless us with the Holy Spirit.

Now it is time to go to the room of petition. We have the opportunity to tell God about our personal needs in our own lives, or in our family, or in our work. But, we have petitions not only for ourselves, but others want and need our prayers in their behalf. This takes us to the sixth room of prayer. When we pray for others, it is called intercessory prayer. When his co-worker, Melanchthon, was sick, Luther prayed for him: "I besought the Almighty with great vigor ... quoting from Scripture all the promises I could remember, that prayers should be granted and said that he must grant my prayer, if I was henceforth to put faith in his promises."

The effectiveness of a friend's prayer on our behalf depends on the relationship of the pray-er to God. James wrote, "The prayer of the righteous is powerful and effective" (James 5:16). That is why we want a godly mother or a pious pastor to pray for us. Roman Catholics ask the saints and the Virgin Mary to pray for them. On the eve of a historic boxing match, a friend was visiting the champ in his hotel suite. During the conversation a murmuring feminine voice was heard. "That's my wife," the champ explained. "She's praying for me to win." "Oh, and I suppose you pray, too?" The champ replied, "My wife is more devout than I am. If God won't do it for her, He certainly won't do it for me."

The seventh room in the house of prayer is meditation. Some do not understand what meditation is and consequently do not know how to meditate. It is the act of reflecting, of silence, and listening to God. It calls for thinking about God and our relationship to him. It is a time to review past dealings with God. Then we reflect on how good God has been in those past dealings. After that, we remember God's promises to us: promises of peace, protection, and provision. Meditation can be summed up in three R's: review, reflect, and remember.

Luke is fond of telling stories of faith. In his stories Luke narrates scenes in which trust in the spoken word from God is the very essence of faith.

It all begins with an old priest named Zechariah. This is the first story that Luke tells us in his Gospel. One day, Luke writes, the lot fell to Zechariah to enter the temple of the Lord and burn incense. As he was about to perform this sacred task, however, an angel of the Lord appeared to him standing just to the right of the altar. Zechariah was troubled. Fear fell upon him. The angel spoke words of comfort to Zechariah. "Do not be afraid, Zechariah," the angel said, "for your prayer has been heard. Your wife Elizabeth will bear you a son, and you will name him John" (Luke 1:13). The angel Gabriel went on to announce to Zechariah that his son John would be filled with the Holy Spirit and would make the way ready for the Messiah to come. Zechariah had heard a word spoken to him from God. Zechariah had heard a word from Gabriel announcing new realities that were to come to pass.

Of such stuff is faith composed as Luke tells the story. Faith, or unfaith! Zechariah heard the word from God. He did not believe it! "How will I know that this is so?" Zechariah demanded of the angel (Luke 1:18). "I'm an old man and my wife is old too. How can this word be?" "I am Gabriel," the angel shot back. "How will I know?" said Zechariah. "I am Gabriel," came the reply. And the angel continued. "... because you did not believe my words, which will be fulfilled in their time, you will become mute, unable to speak, until the day these things occur" (Luke 1:20). "You did not believe my words." That is the heart of Zechariah's unbelief. Mary is next in line. Six months into Elizabeth's pregnancy Gabriel spoke words from God to Mary. "Hail, O favored one, the Lord is with you" (Luke 1:28).

That was Gabriel's greeting to Mary. Like Zechariah before her, Mary was troubled and afraid at the sound of the angel's voice. Gabriel spoke to her as he had spoken to Zechariah: "Do not be afraid, Mary, for you have found favor with God. And now, you will conceive in your womb and bear a son, and you will name him Jesus" (Luke 1:31). Mary, like Zechariah, heard a word spoken to her from God. Mary, too, is unsure. "How can this be," she protests, "since I am a virgin?" (Luke 1:34). Gabriel told Mary that it will be because the Holy Spirit will make it happen. Mary was satisfied. She spoke great words of faith. "Here I am," she said, "the servant of the Lord; let it be with me according to your word" (Luke 1:38). "You did not believe my words," said Gabriel to Zechariah. That is the heart of Zechariah's unfaith. "...let it be with me according to your word," were Mary's words to Gabriel. This is the heart of Mary's faith.

Faith is called into being by a word spoken from God. A centurion in Capernaum grasped this reality very well. "Only say the word ...," the centurion said. Luke presents this rather unlikely fellow, this centurion, this stranger to Israel, this foreigner as a model of faith. "Only say the word ...."

The first scripture selection relates the healing of a man "who was deaf and had an impediment in his speech." Although nothing is mentioned regarding the faith of the man who was healed, faith was yet an active ingredient in the healing as exhibited by those who resolutely brought the man to Jesus. In verse 34, the phrase "looking up to heaven," underscores the intimate relationship with God that Jesus brought to that moment. Similarly, I have read that when Francis of Assisi preached, he never looked at his hearers, but instead fixed his eyes upon the sky as if expecting Christ to appear before he had completed the next sentence. Jesus, "looking up to heaven," apparently sought to acknowledge and intensify the power of God in his life for this moment of healing.

In our second passage, faith again is important to the healing, but this time it is the faith of the person to be healed, Bartimaeus. By faith, Bartimaeus cried out to Jesus even after being rebuked by those around him: "but he cried out all the more, Son of David, have mercy on me" (v. 48). Although blind, he threw off his cloak and ran to where Jesus was standing. Jesus said, "What do you want me to do for you?" and by faith Bartimaeus replied, "Master, let me receive my sight" (v. 51). Jesus’ reply underscores the point; "Go your way; your FAITH has made you well" (v. 52).

A congregation I once served included a young man who had been deaf from birth. He was a big, robust, handsome fellow whose sweet spirit enabled him to smile easily. During worship, he stood for the hymns and responsive readings, and participated as best he could in the entire service. During the sermon, his eyes were steadily fixed upon my lips, and in those few times when he was unable to lip-read what I was saying, he would turn to the young lady beside him and "sign" for clarification. I remember the day that he and the young lady came to my study to make plans for their wedding. She asked such questions as necessary and signed to him at intervals. As I spoke, she continued to interpret, even though he seemed already to understand. During the wedding ceremony, they held written copies of the vows and signed their pledges to each other. Before I left that congregation to acccept another appointment, the young man underwent an operation which enabled him to hear his first sounds. That was the first step. By God’s grace, one day, perhaps even now, he will be able to listen to all those things which you and I have grown accustomed to. Although different than the deaf man who was brought to Jesus, it will be a genuine miracle of healing, and it will have been done for one who has cried out from the silence in faith.

We are far removed in time and space from ancient Jericho where our Scriptures relate two of our Lord’s healings. However, as a society and as individuals, we yet stand in need of the healing touch.

Charles H. Scott’s familiar hymn says it well; "Open my eyes that I may see, glimpses of truth Thou hast for me ... Open my ears that I may hear voices of truth Thou sendest clear." And then the all-important third verse concludes, "Open my mouth and let me bear gladly the warm truth everywhere."

Important lessons are given by this alternation of the two ideas of faith and unbelief, obedience and disobedience. Disobedience is the root of unbelief. Unbelief is the mother of further disobedience. Faith is voluntary submission within a person's own power. If faith is not exercised, the true cause lies deeper than all intellectual reasons. It lies in the moral aversion of human will and in the pride of independence, which says, "who is Lord over us? Why should we have to depend on Jesus Christ?" As faith is obedience and submission, so faith breeds obedience, but unbelief leads on to higher-handed rebellion. With dreadful reciprocity of influence, the less one trusts, the more he disobeys; the more he disobeys, the less he trusts.

You are because I am. I was there from the beginning. My Father, God, and I fashioned the world that you enjoy. We hung the stars in the sky, scooped out the lakes, formed the mountains. But our genius was no more evident than when we made you. You are so magnificent. Consider yourself - your ability to think and reason. Do you realize how special you are? We had such a great thing going in the garden.

Unfortunately, the devil talked your forebears into trying to be like God, and they both fell for it. My Father and I had no choice but to show them the exit from Eden. Because of their sin, we had to face the decision whether or not to save what we created or to destroy it all. Save it, we decided. Later, in response to a promise made to your father Abraham, I, the son of God, was implanted by the Holy Spirit in a young virgin’s womb. They called me Jesus, for I had come to save you and all humankind from the consequences of your sins.

The plan of salvation was not complicated, although it was generous perhaps to a fault. You had sinned and continue to sin. It is your nature from the time of the Fall. Therefore, you cannot save yourself. Although some of you sin less than others, none of you is perfect. My Father demands perfection - he will not stand for any imperfection in eternity. Fortunately for you, my Father is also compassionate, and his love goes beyond human love. He wanted to reclaim you as his own, therefore, he decided to be inflicted with suffering and death. To accomplish this, he sent me - part of himself - to become a person like you and to receive punishment and death in your place.

Some of you only see me as an Alka Seltzer for an occasional headache, rather than a Savior for a whole new life. You call upon me and my Father for help only when all else seems to fail. Voices we haven’t heard in years make their way heavenward in dying breaths. Others make a puzzle out of our plan for your salvation. You continue to believe that you must add some of your goodness and righteousness (which is really in short supply by heaven’s standards) to my sacrificial death on the cross. Friends, I paid the price - one hundred percent at Calvary.

Can you imagine how I feel as your God, having humbled myself by becoming a human being, giving up heaven for a stinking stable, being misunderstood, mocked, tortured, spit upon, and hung, all because of you and your wretched sinfulness ... and then to have you believe that this was not enough. To have you, in your pride, believe that some goodness of yours would need to be added in order for the Father to receive you into heaven angers and disappoints me. You can do nothing to save yourself; I did it all because I love you. Please get it into your head, once and for all, I am your only way out of the pits of hell. As I said while I was with you on earth, "I am the way, and the truth, and the life; no one comes to the Father, but by me!" May the Holy Spirit convince your hearts of my love, and may you understand that believing in me is the only way to be saved; sufficient in itself, needing absolutely no human works, no false pride, no human righteousness, nothing ... nothing ... nothing at all to be added to it. I died to purchase a place for you in heaven which I offer to you as a gift which you must receive totally and exclusively by faith.

What's a bad girl like you doing in a list like this? The author of the book of Hebrews tells of a great cloud of witnesses that surround us in our own faith walk. The usual biblical heroes and heroines are there. The biggest surprise in the list is Rahab. Rahab was not an Israelite after all. She was a harlot who plied her trade in pre-Israelite Jericho. Who is this woman anyway? And what is she doing in a list like this?

Rahab's story is told in the Old Testament book of Joshua. In the story we hear that Jericho was next on Joshua's list of cities to be conquered. Joshua sent two spies into Jericho to size up the task of triumphing over this great city. After sneaking into the city they were made welcome in the house of a harlot. That's how Rahab entered Israel's story.

The king of Jericho had spies of his own, of course. They informed him that Rahab was housing two spies of the people of Israel. The king of Jericho, therefore, sent a message to Rahab calling upon her to take a great patriotic action and give up the spies. But the king's message had come to late. Rahab had already hidden the spies on her roof. She told the king's messengers that two unknown men had come to her house but that they had left the city before the gate was closed the night before. "You can probably catch them if you hurry," she told them.

Then Rahab went to the Israelite spies on her roof. The intent of her mission is astounding. She confesses to them her faith in the God who has brought them here! "I know that the Lord has given you the land," she said to them, "and that dread of you has fallen on us, and that all the inhabitants of the land melt in fear before you. For we have heard how the Lord dried up the water of the Red Sea before you when you came out of Egypt .... The Lord your God is indeed God in heaven above and on earth below" (Joshua 2:9-11). The author of Hebrews has it right. Rahab is a woman of faith. She has heard the stories of the Lord's deliverance and she has believed. In Rahab we meet a harlot who believes; a sinner who is a saint.

Now Rahab had a request for the spies sent by Joshua. "Give me a sign of good faith," she says to them, "that you will spare my father and mother, my brother and sisters and all who belong to them and deliver our lives from death" (Joshua 2:12-13). The spies agreed. "Our life for yours!" they promise her.

Rahab then let the men down a rope from her window that they might escape the city. She gave them complete escape instructions. The spies promised again that they would remember their oath to protect Rahab and her family. They gave Rahab a scarlet cord and told her to let it hang from the window of their escape. This would be a sign of protection for Rahab and her family would all be spared because of the sign. "According to your words, so be it," Rahab declared (Joshua 2:21). How nearly do Mary's words in response to the angel's promise match those of Rahab! Mary said, "... let it be with me according to your word" (Luke 1:38). Was Rahab Mary's teacher in faith?

Joshua and the army of Israel soon conquered the city of Jericho. The sign of faith, the scarlet cord, hung from Rahab's window. Rahab and her family were saved by her faith. Faith bloomed in a powerful way in this person we would least expect. That's what Rahab is doing in a list like this."

In the opera Faust, there is a fight to the finish between Satan and the young man Valentine. During the course of the fight, Satan breaks Valentine's sword and he stands poised to slay him. But the young boy takes the two pieces of his sword and fashions them into a cross. Confronted with this symbol of faith, Satan becomes immobilized and Valentine is saved.

It is an interesting concept: A dramatic demonstration of faith. Unfortunately such resolution of faith does not always save you. In fact, it might be your deathbed. It was John's. Take a look at the story with me. John has been arrested by King Herod. And why? Because John kept reminding Herod that even the king is not above the law. He said, "It is not lawful for you to have your brother's wife."

So this was the king's egregious sin. He had stolen his brother's wife, Herodias. Now, it would be understandable if this were where the story ended. The king didn't like a desert preacher calling him a sinner so he had him beheaded. Simple enough. But life is not always simple. There is usually more to a story than meets the eye. And in this case we learn that Herod actually liked to listen to John, thought he was a holy man, and protected him. Perhaps, in Herod's mind, putting him under lock and key was a way of removing him from harms way.

So if the king was offended by John's outbursts, it was not enough to warrant death. The king feared the prophet and dared not harm him. But life has a funny way of pressuring us to do things we would not normally do. This is a story about a man who caved due to social pressures. Let me ask you: How do life's pressures affect your judgment? What can we learn form this deplorable moment in the life of this king, this moment when the king caved? We learn that...

1. Puzzling problems require conscientious decisions
2. Promises made in haste create great waste
3. Pressures in life can affect good judgment

Somewhere recently I read this statement:  “Most of the 500 wealthiest Americans got their money the old-fashioned way -- they inherited it!” 

That may be the case with money, but it is not true with the most important things of life.  It’s not true of character.  Of course, we are influenced in character by our parents, but our own character is our own doing, by our own choices, the way we choose to live.

We may inherit money, but we do not inherit faith.  Someone put it in a catchy line: “God has no grandchildren.” 

Faith must be first-hand, personal, appropriated by each person.  Too many of us are seeking to live on borrowed faith.  The 500 wealthiest Americans may have gotten their wealth the old-fashioned way -- by inheriting it -- but we don’t get character and faith that way.  They’re not inherited, they’re claimed, personally, and cultivated.

Why would Christians choose to sin rather than choose what they know God wants them to do? Four answers are commonly given today.

1. Some would point to Romans 8:16 and explain that Christians who willfully sin have forgotten their true identity as "children of God." While it is true that Christians can forget who they are and sin as a result, Christians can also be well aware of who they are and sin anyway.

2. Some say Christians choose to sin because they have lost sight of what God has done for them. 2 Peter 1:9 indicates that Christians can be "blind or short-sighted, having forgotten [their] purification from [their] former sins."

3. Some wisely state that Christians consciously choose to sin because they have forgotten that God will severely discipline disobedient believers.

4. Some have said that Christians who consciously sin have lost their focus on the future. These Christians have forgotten that God will reward in heaven only those who have lived faithfully for Him here on earth (1 Cor 9:24). Christians who fail to keep eternity in mind often sin in the here and now.

Last night a friend of mine was talking about his father: he spoke of how, for many years, his father binged out, how his father was a drunkard - a man who when sober was kind and gentle - and when drunk - well he was something else again. He had no control over himself. And this kind and gentle man brought pain and suffering upon others, or at least the force within him did so - the family had to move - to change homes and communities - almost every year - landlords were cheated, employers disappointed, children neglected, friends abandoned - or embarrassed or betrayed.

And this continued on until one day, after taking his children to Sunday School for a period of time, after witnessing the faith of others and what it did for them, he accepted Jesus into his life. He asked God to take control, to guide his actions and save him from his sins and from the power of sin.  And then things changed; debts still had to be paid, amends still had to be made, mistakes still occurred. But the inner man - the man that God made - was set free to grow and mature. No more booze, a lot more prayer. And the love and kindness of the man that could be glimpsed before - in the moments of sobriety - became apparent to all - for days, weeks, and finally years on end. The children who were still living at home stopped fearing what would happen next - they began to look forward to being with their father - they began to develop their own faith in God - a faith that still guides them to this day.  This man, this father, this husband, experience a change in control - he went from being in the control of the devil to being in the control of God, and the result was the renewal of his inner nature, and in the end, when his earthly tent was destroyed, the result was a building from God - a house not made with hands - eternal in the heavens.

Augustine thought that original sin was transmitted to the child through the sexual act, but the idea that it has such a genetic character is difficult for us to make sense of today. (It also lacks scriptural basis, unless one forces Psalm 51:6.) It may be more helpful to use an ecological metaphor. We cannot fully understand living organisms without their environment, and we cannot fully understand a human being except as part of the whole human community. This is true even -- or perhaps especially -- before birth. And the problem is that we are conceived and born in a human environment in which sin is unavoidable. We participate from the start in an ecology of sin.

What about the idea that death was caused by the first sin? The existence of sin, of separation from God, casts a different light on death, including death that took place before there was sin. Now it is seen as something more than, something worse than, the stopping of biological machinery. The meaning of death has been changed by sin.

John Tennant, a contemporary of Jonathan Edwards, and who died faithfully preaching the gospel when he was twenty-five, identified eleven evidences of the regenerating work of the Spirit. I will adapt these for our attention [edits in brackets].

The understanding is renewed…a light from on high shines into it, whereby its natural darkness is in some measure dissipated, so that it [has] new apprehension of things.

He has a new assent, his understanding being enlightened to perceive the precious truths of Christ; he assents to them with a kind of [full certainty], in a lively, sensible manner.

His judgment is changed.

His estimate of things is changed.

His purposes are changed, he has vastly different designs from those he was [accustomed] to entertain and indulge before his new birth…In short, his purposes were for sin and self, but now they are for God and his soul, now he strives as much daily to get his heart and affections deadened to the world, as he did before to secure and advance his interest in it.

His reasonings are changed.

The will is changed. It has got a new bias and centre of its actings…He aims at God's glory in all his actions universally, and singly, the inclinations of his will bend toward God freely from an inward and powerful principle of life…Furthermore, his will has new enjoyments.

The affections of the soul are changed.

The conscience is changed…now, when the soul feels the regenerating influences of the Holy Spirit, what a tender sense fills the renewed conscience! For what small things it will smite, rebuke and check the sinner! How strongly will it bind to duty, and bar against sin!

The memory; now is more apt to embrace and retain divine things than formerly.

Their conversation is changed. They were [accustomed] to be like moles groveling in the earth, now their mind and conversation are in heaven [Tennant, 275-285].