Law and Grace

Creflo Dollar talks about this on the link below.

Law vs Grace

 FAITH...THE FAITH...FAITHFUL

Faith: The definiton of faith is  "The act of believing...of trusting in something.
In Christianity it means believing, trusting and relying upon God.

THE FAITH... This is the core of Christian BELIEF; what God has revealed to man. The Good News of Jesus Christ as our Savior. The Word of God produces THE FAITH.
Keeping the faith, to a Christian, means to stand strong and trust in God.
In 2 Timothy 4, Paul wrote the night before he was to be executed..., 6 "For I am already being poured out like a drink offering, and the time for my departure is near.
7 I have fought the good fight, I have finished the race, I have kept THE FAITH. 8 Now there is in store for me the crown of righteousness, which the Lord, the righteous Judge, will award to me on that day—and not only to me, but also to all who have longed for his appearing".

FAITHFUL: : having or showing true and constant support or loyalty:  something deserving trust : And keeping your promises or doing what you are supposed to do.

Paul’s letter to the Colossians is addressed to “the FAITHFUL brethren in Christ.”
Paul was chosen to tell the world of the New Covenant because he was faithful and said this in 1 Tim. 1: 12.(NIV)
12 I thank Christ Jesus our Lord, who has given me strength, that he considered me trustworthy, appointing me to his service.

FAITHFUL... is the result of the act of faith. God is faithful and trustworthy, and through being faithful...we become like the God we trust and put our faith in. God is THE FAITH and will remain forever FAITHFUL to us.
Psalm 100:5(NIV)
5 For the Lord is good and his love endures forever; his faithfulness continues through all generations.
So what does all this mean?
While researching all this, I found that the Hebrew and Greek words for faith floats between two meanings:
trustfulness,trustworthiness.

We have to ask ourselves a few questions.

Do we trust OUR faith...in THE faith... and believe enough in God's trustworthiness for us to be faithful to Him?

Do we trust the Bible and what it tells us?

How much trustworthiness is in Jesus Christ?

Faith is us BELIEVING all God has revealed about Himself to us.
It means we accept it as being true, ALL the things that God has written in his Word. The Bible.

Faith is an action. When the Holy Spirit convicts us of our sin of unbelief, a change takes place in us. A renewing of our minds.  We may or may not notice it right away, but a change has come over us. We find ourselves conducting ourselves differently. Some things are not appealing as they were.

Faith is also an attitude.
As a result of putting our faith in God and because of our commitment to him, we slowly turn our hearts and minds over to Him.

Day by day, we learn to live for Him. We want to become more like Him. And we have a Helper to accomplish this...the Holy Spirit
(Expound...HOLY SPIRIT guides our thoughts, actions, speech).

We begin to have new outlook on things. Our attitude is changing. We start looking to God for wisdom, guidance, and strength. We learn to trust and rely on Him And less upon ourselves.

This is the "REST" or "comfort" of faith, trusting God more and more and less, less in ourselves that is. We rest in God. We go to Him for comfort and He always welcomes us.

And it is this attitude of faith, this relying on Him, that God desires most from us. A relationship with His Child.

This is the plan God had when He created Adam and Eve; for us to depend on Him.

And we accomplish this with FAITH.. staying in THE FAITH... which leads to our FAITHFULNESS.
Our trust/faithfulness is in our Heavenly Father who loves His children UNCONDITIONALLY. No strings attached. And even when OUR faithfulness wavers or we backslide...God never does.
He is ALWAYS faithful and will forgive us and wait patiently for us to come back to Him.
I personally cannot understand why anyone, once they understand God's love, mercy and grace, would ever turn away.

Oh ye of little faith....
In Mark 4  PARAPHRASE.
 That day when evening came, he said to his disciples, “Let us go over to the other side.” Leaving the crowd behind, they took him along, just as he was, in the boat. There were also other boats with him. A big ol' storm came up, and the waves broke over the boat, and it was nearly swamped.  Jesus was in the stern, sleeping like a baby. The disciples woke him and said to him, “Teacher, don’t you care if we drown?”
 So Jesus got up, rebuked the wind and said to the waves, “Quiet! Be still!” Then the wind died down and it was completely calm.
He said to his disciples, “Why are you so afraid? Do you still have NO FAITH?”
They were flipped out and asked each other, “Who is this? Even the wind and the waves obey him!”
When Jesus calmed the storm and then rebuked the disciples for their lack of faith, he was actually saying, “Haven't you figured it out by now that I got your back and at least have a little bit of faith in me?”

They had had plenty of evidence that Jesus was able and willing to protect them and provide their every need.
It should have been more than enough to bring them to a “little bit of faith.”
Jesus was trying  to lead the disciples to such a strong attitude of trust and faith so that anything they will come up against will and can be faced with calmness and without fear. God is looking for the same kind of faith from us today.

All through Jesus's ministry he looked at the hearts of men and women for their FAITH. And when he returns, He'll still be looking for that FAITH.

It says in Luke 18: 8, “But when the Son of Man returns, how many will he find on the earth who have faith?”

Faith is essential in the Christian life. It is not optional, it is not an app on our cell phones. It comes from within us. Without it there can be no relationship with God.

To those who believe, nothing is impossible. And to those who don't belive, everything is impossible.
(Expound. A little faith is enough to start. Faith is all God asks. faith grows...Mustard seed...tree...birds ...)

Faith is all Jesus asks: “John 14:1 (NIV) “Do not let your hearts be troubled. You believe in God; believe also in me..”

When the ruler of the synagogue was told that his daughter was dead, Jesus steadied his faith, in Luke 8:50, saying, "Fear not: believe only, and she shall be made whole". And Jesus made her whole.

And when the distraught father of the boy filled with demons cried out in despair in Mark 9, our Lord assured him that “all things are possible to him that believeth.” And Jesus cast out the demons.

It was about their FAITH. Without faith we can do nothing with God, and God can do nothing with us.

FAITH...THE FAITH...FAITHFUL

Abandoned

In the ghetto stands a run down house. Broken windows, shingles missing off the roof, front steps rotting in the weather. It has a sign on it. ABANDONED.

There is a little old lady sitting in her rocking chair in a nursing home on her birthday. No family singing happy birthday, no birthday cake, no candles to blow out. She’s been abandoned.

A small child is taken into an office by a social worker. As she looks around, confused and frightened, she hears the adults whisper “she was abandoned”.

A wife discovers emails sent by her husband to another woman.

A factory worker on the assembly line finds a pink slip in his pay envelope after 25 years on the job.

Abandoned by family.

Abandoned by a spouse.

Abandoned by big business.

But nothing compares to being abandoned by God.

My God, My God, why have You abandoned Me?

When Christ said those words, He had been on the cross six hours. At nine in the morning a soldier held one arm while they drove a nail thorough his hand, then the other, then thru both feet. When they lifted the cross, they unknowingly put Christ right where He belonged. Between mankind and God.

Jesus hardly spoke while on the cross. But when he does, He forgives His killers. He answers the prayers of a thief and asks soldier for a drink, and gets vinegar.

Matthew 27: 46-47 In the Amplified bible says:

And about the ninth hour (three o'clock) Jesus cried with a loud voice, Eli, Eli, lama sabachthani?--that is, My God, My God, why have You abandoned Me?

We have to ask; Why did God sacrifice his Son? Why not a murderer? Evildoers? The perverts and the people who cause pain. Abandon them…not your SON!! Why did God abandon the only sinless person that ever walked the earth?

Because at that moment, Jesus was anything but sinless. But His sins were not his own.

1 Peter 2:24 says

 “He himself bore our sins” in his body on the cross, so that we might die to sins and live for righteousness; “by his wounds you have been healed.”

Christ carried ALL OUR SINS in His body. Just for a moment let’s think about our pasts. Our times of anger, perhaps even rage. Our greed, thievery, lies, gossip, drugs, drunkenness and I’m sure some of us can add other things.

Suppose our pasts were made public? Suppose you stood on a stage while a video of your every secret thought and all your deeds was shown on a big screen behind you. And nobody could stop the video. Would you not want to hide somewhere? Drop thru a crack in the floor?

Then maybe you would become aware of a sin-hating God. Then maybe you would feel just a fraction of what Jesus felt on the cross.

Jesus was suffering a million time more as He hung there and screamed” why have you abandoned me? 

He carried ALL the SINS of mankind to the cross. Past, present and FUTURE. He carried YOUR sin to the cross.

So when you see Jesus on the cross, you are seeing a murderer hanging there. A bigot, a wife beater, a drug addict, a thief Adolf Hitler, Osama Bin Laden, Jeffery Dahmer.

You may think that I shouldn’t be lumping Christ with all those evil doers.

But I didn’t…HE DID! He put Himself in their place. And yours and my place.

Nailed to the cross, he asked God “to treat ME as you would treat THEM”! And God did.

And God gave all the people who ever lived, a gift. The Lamb of God who took away our sins.

MY GOD MY GOD…Why have you abandoned me?

Why did Christ scream those words?

So you will never have to!

Prayer