Growing in Faith

(What follows is adapted from a recent Wednesday night Prayer Meeting Bible Study) 

“Increase our faith!” - the disciples, to Jesus (Lk. 17:5-6)

I read something recently where a pastor made the case that while we can know and trust in the Lord with “little faith” (Matt. 6:30), we are, however, called to grow in our faith: “Your faith is growing abundantly” (2 Thes. 1:3). In the earlier text, Jesus says, quite clearly, that God cares for those even with little faith (praise God). But in the latter text, we find that this faith is to grow, and the Lord gives the growth.

Therefore, the New Testament everywhere calls faith a gift bestowed by God alone: 

-Phil. 1:29 “It has been granted you…to believe in him.” 

-Ac. 18:27 “He (Apollos) greatly helped those who through grace believed.” 

-Eph. 2:8-9 “…saved by grace through faith and this is not your own doing. It is the gift of God.” 

Hence Paul can say in the 2 Thessalonians text that he rejoices that the Lord has grown their faith and love, even as they endure afflictions. Further, this is the reason why the disciples can ask Jesus to increase their faith: While faith can be little (because saving faith doesn’t depend on the size of the faith but the size of the God in whom the faith is), God is effective at growing the faith of His people. 

The question is this: How does our faith grow? Or perhaps a more pertinent question is this: What can we do to increase our faith? A lot of data shows that in late modern times, it is becoming more and more difficult for people to believe in God because we depend so much on empirical data (that which relies on the senses) to determine what is real. Therefore many of us struggle with faith. How can we grow? 

1. Seek the Lord, and ask

The writer of Hebrews famously says that in order for one to believe in God, they must believe two things: First, that He is (in Greek, it is the third person form of “I Am”). That “He is” is not the same as saying, “He exists,” because the writer says that in order to believe in Him (that is, to believe in His existence and to truly know him), they must believe He is. The point is this: One must believe that He is the I-Am of the Old Testament. They must know His nature as Creator God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.

Secondly, they must believe that he rewards those who seek him. God is not a trickster or a prankster. If one asks, seeks, and knocks, the door will be opened (Lk. 11:9). God is not forcing you to learn some magic language before He allows blessing to be pried from his cold clenched hands. He rewards those who seek him. 

So if you ask him to help you believe, He will. How He’ll do this is up to him. But He will, nonetheless. 

2. Give glory to God 

In Romans 4:17-21, the apostle highlights Abraham’s faith to show that God has always saved by faith in His promises. Abe had been promised a son although he was himself about 100 years old, and therefore did not have much empirical security that it would be so (because who could easily believe such a promise?) But Abe, according to Paul under inspiration, “hoped against hope” (4:18), and “no unbelief made him waver concerning the promise of God” (4:20). This means there was unbelief present in Abraham, but he did not let it keep him from believing the promise. Instead, he “grew strong in his faith as he gave glory to God, fully convinced that God could do what he promised” (4:20). 

That is to say that Abraham doubted his doubts, of which he had to have some; otherwise Paul would have said, “He did not have unbelief.” Instead he said, “No unbelief made him waver,” implying he had some. But it did not win. Instead, he doubted himself and turned his attention to God’s faithfulness throughout his own life and the lives of his ancestors. 

Note also that Abraham had direct revelation from God, and yet he still had some unbelief. We have revelation given to us via Bibles passed down. Don’t be so hard on yourself if you have doubts. Jesus can handle that, and as you give glory to God, you’ll grow in your faith. 

3. Do your duty 

This takes us back to the original text from Luke 17. The disciples ask the Lord to increase their faith after He told them of their responsibility to forgive indefinitely. So it runs like this: “Forgive indefinitely.” “Lord, you’ll have to increase our faith if we’ll do so.” He then reminds them of the graciousness of their salvation by telling them a parable of servants who did not take extra glory for merely doing their duty (Lk. 17:7-10). Jesus’ point is that the doing of our duty—in this case, forgiving indefinitely—does not make us righteous before God. Instead, it shows our closeness to him. Hence, the effect of it will not be on Him but on us. In what way? It will increase our faith, thus showing that Jesus’ parable is in answer to their question. In effect, Jesus is saying, “If you forgive simply because I say you must, you will grow in your faith because you’re trusting me more than your own instincts.” 

This whole discussion reminds me of Bonhoeffer’s famous imagined conversation between a pastor and a parishioner. The parishioner comes to the pastor saying that he is struggling with doubts about his faith, and the pastor says, “Well you must believe the Word as it’s preached.” The parishioner says, “I try, but I can’t get anything out of it. I’m struggling with it.” The pastor then says, “Then you must not want to hear it,” to which the parishioner says, “No, I do.” Whereas the pastor usually keeps in his mind the truth that “Only those who believe can obey,” meaning that we only obey God when we believe in Him, this doesn’t speak to the present situation. The pastor is at a loss. They might break away from each other here. 

But, as Bonhoeffer says, it is at this point that the pastor should reverse the statement: Only those who obey can believe. We only grow in our faith if we’re willing to obey the Lord even if we struggle in our faith. Is there an area of sin in your life that you are keeping back from Christ? Maybe you’re not obeying him there, and thus you cannot hear him. Or maybe he’s silenced his voice to get you to treasure hearing it even more. In any event, you must obey Him now, if you want to believe again.** Keep seeking him, availing yourself of the means of grace, and don't give up. He will reward.

In other words, if you go by his word (like Abraham did), you will find your faith growing. But wait until your faith grows and you might not ever obey. 

**Bonhoeffer, The Cost of Discipleship (New York: Simon and Schuster edition, 1995; orig 1959 SCM Press Ltd), 69.

Can I Forget What Lies Behind?

“One thing I do: Forgetting what lies behind and straining forward to what lies ahead” (Philippians 3:13b) 

If you’re a human being, there is a chance that you’re dogged by bad memories of past traumas.  Either things done to you or things that you’ve done. If you’re a Christian, you cling to the promise that if you come to Jesus, your sins are forgiven; and you also are aware of your need to forgive others their wrongs against you. Jesus even—perhaps surprisingly—makes forgiveness of others a prerequisite for forgiveness with God (Mt. 6:14-15; though this statement has to be contextualized with the parable of the forgiving steward in Mt. 18:23-35, where the steward should have forgiven because he had been forgiven). In any event, our Lord has kept short accounts of our sins, and requires us to keep short accounts with others, regardless of how painful those sins might be. 

A cursory reading of the Apostle Paul’s life experience as recorded in the New Testament shows that he has both types of past traumas: He did a lot that would be hard to forgive, such as harshly persecuting Christians and trying to destroy the Christian faith; he also, after becoming a Christian, had a lot done to him that might be hard for him to forgive (see, for instance, the list in 2 Cor. 11:23-28, or the events of Ac. 14:19). If anyone had a reason to despair of God’s grace over himself, it’d be Paul; but on the other hand, if anyone had reason to be bitter toward others, it’d be Paul. 

But our passage above shows us how Paul was able to deal with those past traumas. Simply, he lets the past be the past, and sets his hope on future grace. Reading this passage the other day I was struck that Paul would say that forgetting what lies behind is something that he does. Forgetting does not happen actively, but passively. We don’t purpose to forget; it just happens. 

But the greek gives us a little further light into Paul’s point. The word for “forget” is epilanthano, which is a compound of lanthano, which means to escape notice, and the prefix epi, which means “over” or “above” (think about how epi-dermis means “the skin above.”) So the idea here is that Paul takes hold of what is in the past, and puts it where it belongs: In the past. In essence, he neglects the past. Whether talking about what people have done to him or what he’s done to people, it doesn’t matter. The past is the past. Paul lets it live there, and doesn’t drag it into the present unless it will serve the gospel.

And further, he “strains forward to what lies ahead.” Again, in greek, it is epikteinomenos, which means to “reach forward.” But the “epi” prefix seems to suggest the reaching happens from above, so that, as in being above the memories, so the reaching forward happens from above the present. Indeed, the presence of the future, the Kingdom of God, dominates the present for Paul. 

So how did Paul deal with his past sins and past sins against him? By letting the past be the past, and by focusing his attention on Christ’s future coming. If Jesus bore my past sins at the cross, then I don’t need to bring guilt upon myself for those sins again (and if I fall into sin again, he promises that I can simply bring those sins to him and he’ll forgive me, 1 Jn. 1:9). But if Jesus called on God’s grace for the forgiveness of those who crucified him, then I know that walking with him and living like him requires a sameness of aversion to condemnation. And since, if I believe in Jesus, I must “walk in the same way in which he walked” (1 Jn. 2:6), I have a responsibility to show grace as He did and does.

This might seem like a cross-centered framework for life, and in one sense, it is. “I’ve been crucified to the world, and the world to me,” says Paul (Gal. 6:14). But it is worked out from beyond the tomb under the presence of new life in the resurrection. The reason why Paul can forget what lies behind is because the cross happened, but that was not the end of the story. Paul can let the past be the past because Friday gave way to Sunday, and those in Christ live in the shadow of Sunday. Now, God is doing a new thing (Is. 43:19), so that all who are in Christ are themselves identified with what is new (2 Cor. 5:17). So the neglect of the past is possible because I’m alive in the present with the risen Christ living in and with me. Thus the verse before our text has Paul’s confidence that Christ has made him his own (Phil. 3:12). If I belong to Jesus and he belongs to me, then my past sins are no longer mine, nor is whatever it is that others took from me when they hurt me. 

I guess it comes down to one question: Do you believe that Jesus is alive and you’re alive in Him? You might believe it, but Jesus needs to be, like a radio volume knob, turned up louder than your doubts and/or hurts. That happens over time as your faith in him grows. For now, your job is to recognize the need to let the past go, bring your hurt to the Lord (who cares for you, 1 Pet. 5:7), and believe that He will lead you into all that He has for you. You might feel like such an endeavor is impossible. “I can’t, Scott.” That’s okay - neither can I. But Jesus can. “With God all things are possible if you believe” (Mk. 9:23).