Keeping the Faith - Eric Troyer

Everyone here this morning. It's good to see the church

so well filled. And also want to welcome those of

you that are here for harvest. It's good to have

you here and look forward to having you with.

Us over the next few weeks.

I enjoyed the service so far this morning, and also

the songs as well, and thank you Kent for leading

that song Heavenly Sunlight. That is one of my favorite songs,

and this always blesses me to sing that song. The

trustees might want to take a look at that clock

at some point. It's stuck. Well. This morning I went

to I want to talk about a subject that is

very familiar. It's the subject that we all probably understand

at some level, a subject that we we have heard

teaching on before. And so I guess what I'm saying is,

I'm not bringing you anything new this morning, but hopefully

what I do have will be an encouragement. And I

will say that this subject is a very big subject,

and so I don't think I will do it justice

and we'll probably only scratch the surface here, but I

do want to take a look at some things I've

been thinking for the last while about faith.

What is faith?

And do I have faith and is my faith strong

or is my faith weak? The title of the message

is keeping the Faith?

So what is faith?

And I will I will say that I don't know

if I completely understand what faith is. Faith is one

of those words that it's a short word, and yet

it means so many different things, and it seems like

it has a lot of There's a lot of other

words that are used to describe faith, although they do

not describe faith in its entirety, things like belief and

trust and hope. But faith is a firm conviction. Faith

is a complete confidence or trust that what has been

promised is true, even if we can't see it. I

want to read a few verses out of Hebrews eleven.

We're not going to read We're not going to read

a lot of verses here, but I just want to

read a few Hebrews eleven, verses one through three. Will

start with Hebrews eleven, verses one through three. Now, faith

is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of

things not seen for by it. The elders obtained a

good report through faith. We understand that the worlds were

framed by the word of God, so that things which

are seen are not made of things which do appear.

Faith is the substance of things hoped for. Faith is

the assurance. It is the confidence of things that are

hoped for. Faith is the conviction of things not seen.

There are many things that we by faith accept and believe.

By faith, we believe that God is made up of

a trinity. There's the Father, and the Son and the

Holy Ghost. By faith, we believe that God spoke the

world into existence. He created the world. No one alive

today except for Gods, as of all the Bible, but

no one alive today was there at creation. But we

believe the accounts in the Bible that mentioned creation. There

are different places that mention that, and we believe those

people that recorded these things. By faith we believe that.

By faith, we believe that God raised Jesus up from

the dead. There again, no one here was there to

see it. But by faith we believe that, and that

he is now sitting at the right hand of God

interceding for us. By faith, we believe that one day

Jesus is going to return, and he's coming to destroy

the earth with fire and to take those that love

him home to be with him. And by faith. We

believe that if we are faithful, we will enter God's

heavenly city and is prepared for those who love him.

I want to jump down now to verse six of

Chapter eleven says, but without faith, it is impossible to

please him, for he that cometh to God must.

Believe that He is and that He is.

A rewarder of them that diligently seek him. Faith is

very foundational to us as Christians. If faith were removed

from what from what we believe and how we we

live out our Christian life. If faith were removed, we

would be left with nothing. There are our whole structure

or system of beliefs, whatever you want to call it,

would would implode on itself. It would not work without faith.

Faith is absolutely essential to our Christian life. Without steadfast

conviction and a complete confidence and trust in God and

that He is who he says he is, the Bible

says it is impossible to please him if we do

not faith, we do not have faith, It is impossible

to please him. But before we can believe, and before

we can have a relationship with God, it says, we

must believe that God exists. We must believe that there

is a divine, being a creator and someone who is

all powerful and in control. It also says that God

is the rewarder of those who diligently, or another word

you could put there is earnestly seek Him.

God will not.

Allow the efforts of those who are seeking Him.

To be fruitless.

If you are seeking God to the best of your

ability and with all your heart, God will reward that.

He will repay those actions, and they will not be

in vain. Faith is essential for the salvation of our

souls Ephesians two, verses.

Eight and nine.

For by grace are ye saved through faith, and that

not of yourselves. It is a gift of God, not

of works. Lest any man should boast this morning. You

and I are sinners saved by grace. We're sinners saved

by grace. We're saved by the abundant grace that is

available through Christ Jesus. And salvation is a gift. It's

nothing we deserve. It is given to us voluntarily with

no expected payment in return, and we cannot do anything

to earn our salvation.

Thank the Lord Ah.

As I thought of that, I was just I'm just

thankful for that that it is not anything we do.

If it were about works and what we do, our

salvation would all of a sudden become about us and

what we've done and how good we are.

Instead of looking to.

Jesus and what he has done for us. Romans ten,

verses eight through ten.

But what saith it?

The word is nigh thee even in thy mouth and

in thy heart. That is the word of faith, which

we preach, that if thou shalt confess with thy mouth

the Lord Jesus, and shalt believe in thine heart that

God hath raised him from the dead, thou shalt be saved.

For in the heart man believeth unto righteousness, and with

the mouth confession is made unto salvation. For the scripture saith,

whosoever believeth on him shall not be ashamed. And so,

as I mentioned earlier, part of faith is believing, and

here here it is mentioned that we must believe. We

must have faith and believe. To be saved. We must

have faith and believe that God raised Jesus from the dead,

and we must confess with our mouth that Jesus is Lord.

So how do we obtain this faith and how do

we grow in the faith?

Romans ten verse seventeen says, So, then faith cometh by hearing,

and hearing by the word of God.

Faith comes by hearing.

Faith comes by exposure to God's word and things relating

to God's word. It could be through through singing, through

the preaching of the gospel, through personal Bible reading and

Bible study.

It could be through prayer, and through.

Life listening to God's voice and the Spirit's direction in

your life. So why do these things bring faith or

how do they bring faith?

Well?

I believe it's because ultimately they point us to God.

They show us.

Things about God's character. They show us that God has

not changed, and God will not changed. He will be

the same tomorrow as he is today.

It shows us.

That God has made promises and He's kept those promises

and he will continue to keep them. It shows us

that God loves us deeply and he cares about each

one of us. And these things all point us to

Jesus and what He has done for us, and it

helps us to realize that our souls can be saved

if we believe on him Him. I want to talk

a little bit about faith and obedience. I believe that

faith and obedience are very intertwined. Although they are not

exactly the same thing, I believe that they go hand

in hand. James two says his very familiar verse says,

faith without works is dead. And I don't know if

you can completely just interchange the word works with obedience,

but I believe that they're very similar. Here.

A true living.

Faith is going to prompt obedience, and it's going to

prompt good works. It's impossible to have a saving, living

faith without being obedient to God and what he has

commanded us. As we have faith and as we grow

in faith, we should desire to be acceptable and well

pleasing to God. And I believe that part of being

well pleasing and acceptable in God's sight is obedience to God.

I hope this next point makes sense.

It made sense to.

Me when I wrote it, but forgive me if it doesn't.

Faith followed by obedience produces faith following the obedience. I

believe that as we have faith and as we obey,

it in turn produces more faith and our faith grows stronger.

There are many examples of faith and heroes of faith,

and Hebrews eleven is what we know is the faith chapter,

but there's many heroes of faith. That demonstrated this concept

of faith in obedience. The Bible says that by faith, Noah,

being warned of things not yet seen, moved with fear.

God came to know and told him there's going to

be a flood, and you're gonna need to build a

big boat, and you're gonna need to put a bunch

of animals in there and take enough food for the

time that you're on the boat.

And what did he do?

He believed God, He obeyed him, and he built the

ark exactly like God said. He used the right wood,

he made it the right dimensions. He waterproofed it just

like God told him to, inside and out. He got

all the animals into the ark, the two by twos

and the seven by sevens. And as a result, what

was the result of that? As a result, he and

he and his family were saved, while every one else perished.

Faith followed with obedience. But also think of Abraham. Want

to read some verses from Romans four, verses eighteen through

twenty two. Says, who against hope believed in hope that

he might become the father of many nations, according to

that which was spoken, so shall thy seed be, And

being not weak in faith. He considered not his own body,

now dead when he was about an hundred years old,

neither yet the deadness of Sarah's womb. He staggered not

at the promise of God through unbelief, but was strong

in faith, giving glory to God and being fully persuaded

that what he had promised he was able also to perform,

and therefore it was imputed to him for righteousness. And

we know how this story goes that once that promised

son arrived as a baby. And I don't know how

old Isaac was when God commanded Abraham to offer him

as a sacrifice, but we know that by faith, Abraham

meticulously obeyed what God commanded. He didn't wait around. It says,

he got up early in the morning and they set out.

He set out with Isaac.

For the land of Mariah and went up on a mountain.

There they left their animals at the bottom, and.

They went up on the mountain and they took the

fire in the wood, and Isaac asked Abraham, where's the sacrifice,

Where's the lamb?

And he said, God will provide a lamb.

And once he got up there built an altar, just

as God had asked. He laid the wood on it,

and he tied Isaac up and laid him on the altar.

And I don't know what Abraham was feeling at this point,

but being a father and reading this story, it almost

brings tears to my eyes just reading it, imagining laying

your son on this altar. It says Abraham took his

knife and he raised it up and was ready to

slay Isaac, and the Angel of God stopped him, and

he said.

Abraham, hold on. This says just a test. This is

just a test. I know now that you have faith.

I know now that you believe.

And I don't think Abraham's faith wavered in the least.

Abraham knew that all he needed to do was to

have faith and obey and leave the rest up to God.

It was not his plans. He had faith and trust

in God's plans. Could also think of Moses. The many

examples of faith in the life of Moses says by faith,

Moses chose chose to not be called the son of

Pharaoh's daughter. He chose to leave royalty and to identify

with the enslaved people of God. Says he esteemed the

reproach of Christ than greater riches than the treasures in Egypt,

for he had respect unto the recompense of the reward,

and by faith he forsook Egypt. Through faith, he kept

the passover so that none of the first born would

be killed. By faith, Moses and the Israelites passed through

the Red Sea on dry land. Moses also had faith,

and he obeyed, and he chose to do what was right.

I thought also of King David.

And although at least from what I could find, it

does not appear like King David was following direct commands

from God to go and fight Goliath. I believe that

David had a faith, and that his faith was strong,

and that he was willing to be used of God.

And it was through that that God used him to

conquer Goliath and to deliver the Philistines and to give

them victory that day. He'd also think of Stephen, through

his faith and obedience, he paid the.

Ultimate price as a martyr for Christ.

And you know, as you look at the lives of

all these people, I think it would be fair to

say that.

They faced.

They faced trials of faith, of faith, they faced hard things.

It was not easy. One Peter one, I went to

read a few verses from there. First Peter.

One, verses six through.

Nine's talking here about the trial of our faith, wherein

you greatly rejoice, though now for season, if need be,

if need be, ye are in heaviness through manifold temptations,

that the trial of your faith, being much more precious

than of gold, that perisheth, though it be tried with fire,

might be found unto praise and honor and glory at

the appearing of Jesus Christ, whom, having not seen, ye love,

in whom though now ye see, though now ye see

him not yet believing, ye rejoice with joy unspeakable and

full of glory, receiving the end of your faith, even

the salvation of your souls, the trial of the trial

of your faith. Believe, the trial of our faith comes

in many different ways. And just as I said, if

you would look back at the heroes of faith that

we looked at, you could see that there's many different

and various forms of trials that they faced. Trials can

come in the form of temptations.

Maybe it's the death.

Of a loved one, maybe it's sickness or suffering. These

kind of things can shake our faith, and they can

make us wonder is God actually real? And does he

actually care? Is he actually watching? How do we respond

to these trials? It says, rejoice, And that's hard to do.

It's hard to rejoice when things are tough, things are

not going your way, things are uncomfortable, and it seems

like things are out of control. It says, rejoice. Count

it all joy. When your faith is tried. Says that

the trial of your faith is more precious.

Than how does it say? It here?

Much more precious than gold, even when it's tried in

the fire. It's more precious if you think about one

of these big container ships. The trial of your faith

is more precious than a big container ship load of

the purest gold.

You can find.

And that might be hard to believe because that would

be pretty precious. But why is the trying of your

faith precious? God allows our faith to be tried so

that it can be purified.

When our faith is purified.

Removes the impurities, it removes the dross, and through that

our faith is proven to be genuine, to be pure.

James One talks about this as well, Verses two through four.

My brethren, count it all joy when you fall into

divers or various temptations, knowing this that the trying of

your faith worketh patience. But let patients have our perfect work,

that you may be perfect or complete and entire, wanting nothing.

When we endure the trial of our faith with patience,

we are developing and pec and bringing to completion our

faith as God would have it. And in the end,

the pureness and the genuineness and the completeness of our

faith is what really matters. What are you doing to

keep your faith? I'm going to talk a little bit

about contending for the faith. To contend is to strive,

to strive or to buy, to strive for superiority in

defense for the faith, it's a struggle. It's a warfare.

It's a battle, and it's against a strong enemy. And

it's against an enemy that wants to see your faith

lose out. He wants to see you fall, he wants

to see you destroyed. Satan also wants us to doubt.

He wants us to doubt God, and through that our

trust is diverted to things besides God. Begin to trust

in earthly things. I'm going to continue reading here in

James One says, if any of you lack wisdom, Let

him ask of God that giveth to all men liberally,

and upbraideth not, and it shall be given him. But

let him ask in faith, nothing wavering or not doubting.

For he that wavereth is like a wave of the sea,

driven with the wind and tossed. For let not that

man think that he shall receive anything of the Lord.

A double minded man is unstable in all his ways.

So we see here the picture of a man who doubts,

and I don't I don't think it's just a little

flicker of doubt here. And a man who doubts, who

deeply doubts God, deeply doubts his faith, and he begins

to put his trust in other things. He does not

have that complete.

Faith in God.

It says, he's he's an unstable man. He's like a

wave of the sea. I don't know if you've ever

been out fishing or been out on the ocean and

you see those big waves and they just they go

up and they go down, and they go sideways, and

they just they roll around. It's probably one of the

most unstable things there is. That's what a man who

doubts is like. It says, Let not that man think

that he shall receive anything.

Of the Lord when he asks.

God wants are complete faith. These verses brought to mind

a story from Matthew fourteen. This is right after Jesus

fed the five thousand, and after he fed the five thousand,

it says he straightway commanded his disciples to get in

a boat and to leave and to start to start rowing.

And the disciples were out there rowing away, and a

storm came up, and it was a bad storm. And

these disciples rowed and rowed and rowed, and it got

dark and they kept rowing, and I'm sure it was raining,

it was windy, the waves were big, possibly even water

coming in the side of the boat. Maybe they had

to bail water. I don't know, but it says they

rode all through the night, and it's no doubt that

they were exhausted, and I'm sure their nerves were on edge.

They were probably a little keyed up from this big storm.

And says in the fourth watch, which is sometime between

three and six am, I'm sure it was probably still dark,

likely dark. It says they saw something walking on the

water and they thought it was a ghost or a spirit.

I'm sure they thought their mind was playing tricks on them.

They'd just been rowing all night, they were deprived of sleep.

I'm sure they just thought we're seeing things. And it

says they were afraid. They cried out in fear, but

Jesus said, Hey, it's me. Don't worry, don't be afraid.

It's just me.

And Jesus came walking across the water. And I don't

know if you've ever wondered, I don't know what Peter

was thinking. I don't know if he was just needed

an extra level of confirmation or what. But he said, Lord,

if it's you, tell me, tell me to come to

you across the water. Bid me come. And Jesus said,

all right, come, And so Peter gets out of the

boat and he starts walking across the water.

But I don't know how far he went. But it

says Peter.

Saw the wind and he saw the waves, and his

faith begin to waver. He began to doubt, and when

that happened, he began to sink. He no longer had

the power.

To walk on water.

I think sometimes we are like Peter. Sometimes our faith

is strong and we can easily weather the storms, and

we can make it through the trials, and we come

out victorious. We walk on water, if you will. And

then sometimes our faith waivers and we look around and

we get distracted, we take our eyes off Jesus, and

we begin to doubt, and we begin to sink. But

if you ever find yourself in that situation, I encourage

you to do as Peter did.

He called out and he said, Lord save me, Lord

save me.

And Jesus reached out his hand and he was willing

to pull Peter up and to bring him to safety.

Jesus is the only one who can save us, and

Jesus is the only one who can get.

Us back on track. Help us restore our faith.

M No. The disciples in Luke, they asked Jesus. They said, Lord,

increase our faith. And I believe that's a good thing

to ask of God, to increase our faith. But I

don't think our faith increases when the sea is flat

and calm. That's not when our faith is increased. I

believe our faith is increases when we make it through

those trials.

We come out stronger.

We must strengthen the defenses of our faith and ask

God to help us stand strong, to never give up

or compromise or faith.

When trials come.

Ephesians six, verse sixteen says, above all taking the shield

of faith, wherewith you shall be able to quench all

the fiery darts of the wicked.

Take that shield of faith and use it.

And I recently heard the question asked of someone, and

this is just a blessing and an encouragement to me.

I recently heard the question ask of someone if God

could do anything for you today, if he could do

a miracle for you, what would that be?

And this man said.

If God could do anything for me, or if I

could ask anything of God and he would do it

for me, he said, I would ask that I would

never lose my faith. Is that how you feel about

your faith? Are you concerned about keeping the faith and

contending for the faith. As I mentioned, it's not going

to be easy, but it's worth it. Have a few

verses here in closing one. Timothy six, verse eleven and

twelve says, but thou, o man of God, flee these

things and follow after righteousness, godliness, faith, love, patience, meekness,

fight the good fight of faith, lay.

Hold on eternal life.

Whereunto thou art also called and hast professed a good

profess ession before many witnesses.

And my hope for myself.

And for you, that when we come to the end

of our lives, we can say, as the apostle Paul said,

I have fought a good fight. I have finished the course.

I have kept the faith. God bless