A fresh look at faith III ...

Friday, Oct 9, 2015. What is faith about? We have started to phrase ten sentences which describe elements of Christian faith as given by the gospels and the letters of the New Testament.

10 elements of faith …

(6) God gives community. We are not alone. You are never alone, when you come to the eternal God! That is fantastic. God invites us to his very special community. It is the community of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit. God himself is community. God himself is three-fold, he is God the father, he is God the son Christ Jesus, and he is God the holy spirit. It is a challenge to understand this, it has been called the mystery of the trinity. But it is important, since community is established here, and we are taken into a community as believers, into the community of God himself, and the community of all who enter.

(7) God guides. God gives us his guidance and advice for our life. There are so many things where we can mess up or even destroy life. There are so many decisions and choices which lead us away from life. The law was given by Moses, grace and love by Christ, so it is written (John 1). But Christ confirmed the law, and the Christ himself provides his guidance to his disciples. We need his guidance, it is grace upon grace itself. We need clear words, and clear lines to point us to the land where truth and love live.

(8) God saves. Jesus has been called “the Saviour”. His death at the cross saves the world from sin, everyone who believes in him does not perish, but has eternal life. God saves our life as a whole! But he also saves us in countless situations. He saves us from bitterness, from frustration, from wrong steps. Let me give a very simple but very important example: sitting in a traffic jam between Calais and Ostende in France, I was about to be very frustrated and very upset. But somehow I realized that I was not alone, but the most precious being in the world was there as well: the eternal God. I started to pray, and spend one of the most fascinating 30 Minutes of my life in this stupid traffic jam with nearly no movement. God was speaking to me, he was there, and I was lucky! God saves, from bitterness and from frustration. In the end I arrived at home exactly as my navigation system had predicted before. Do not tell me God would not have everything in his hands.

God saves! …

(9) God enables and fills! God does not carry out his plans without his people. All who have come to him are taken into his mission of love and reconciliation. We become ambassadors of the Most High, ambassadors of forgiveness, of truth and of love. The holy spirit is promised to all, who believe. The apostles in the New Testament had their pentacostal experiences. And up to today, you can experience the Holy Spirit in your own life, when you trust your life into his hands and when you take him serious. The spirit can be calm and steady, but also full of energy and full of activity. It is fantastic, if we take his guidance serious and move ahead. Live your faith. Build your church. Be a blessing! God enables and fills.

(10) God gives joy and love. It is absolutely amazing: we are promised great joy when Christ Jesus is born. And this joy comes, it is real, it can be experienced. God is full of joy, and when we follow him, we find his joy, we find his love, we find a very wide space! It is not the circumstances, which change first. But God changes our heart and our mind - and when we change, everything changes. We can be full of his joy, where ever we are. We can be full of his love, even if others are not (yet).

Think about this great joy: God can be found. He answers prayer. He gives insight. He takes us serious to trust him. He brings forgiveness. He is community. He guides and helps. He saves! He enables and fulfills. And with all what he does and what he is he brings joy and love into your life. Halleluja! ... more texts