Tag: noah

What faith is: A Resource of Power

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  A Resource of Power

Noah’s power to live triumphantly among his unbelieving contemporaries was a triumph of grace and faith. No man could be expected to find in himself the resources to live as he lived. He had the power to take decisive action as his society drifted toward self – destruction. He exhibited the power to make incisive declarations to those who did not heed what he was saying. He kept on saying it nevertheless. He had the power to show an alternative attitude to that which prevailed among the people of his day. He walked a lonely road. Many years ago I saw a magnificent tapestry in a home for recovering alcoholics in Germany. It was a picture of a stream with a shoal of fish heading one way and a solitary fish swimming in the opposite direction. Underneath were the words: “Any dead fish can float downstream – it takes a live one to swim against it.” Noah through his faith had resources of strength to be a live one!

The Only Resource

It amazes me how Noah did not get distracted during his time of building the ark, 120 days of doing repetitive work would be insane, being mocked at everyday by the people would be enough for anyone to become unglued but Noah kept on, not letting anything or anyone get in his way, how, why? It was the will of God for Noah and His resource was God not within his own abilities. We may think sometimes that our lives of broadcasting Christ is repetitive, but that’s the way its supposed to be. When we get distracted by the cares of this world and ______________ (insert your distraction’s) can lead us into a place of solitary confinement within ourselves that blocks out the will of God. When we depend on our resource we become stagnated and brittle, breaking apart at every little distraction that comes our way unless we rely on His resource the Holy Spirit to keep us full of His power, His strength, in order to do the impossibilities.

 
 
In the beauty of His majesty,
 Who reminds me of His grace,
Has rescued me beyond my own capabilities.
My strength failed & so did my pride.
My ambitions, my views on life were crushed
My dignity & selfish ways were exposed for me to proclaim Him
As the only resource of my life. – Gary F.
 
 
“He is like a tree planted by water, that sends out its roots by the stream, and does not fear when heat comes, for its leaves remain green, and is not anxious in the year of drought, for it does not cease to bear fruit.” – Jeremiah 17:8 ESV
 
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What Faith is: A Readiness to Obey

what faith is

Noah’s faith: Part 3 of 7

1 Samuel 12:24 Only fear the LORD and serve him faithfully with all your heart. For consider what great things he has done for you.

Only fear the Lord . . . for consider what great things He has done for you: All of our service, all of our obedience, all of our love for God should be put in this context. We do it because of the great things He has done for us. We don’t serve God so as to persuade Him to do great things for us. He has done the great things, and asks us to receive them by faith. Then we serve Him because of the great things he has done for us.

– We can only keep perspective in our Christian lives if we keep focused on what great things He has done for us. And if we lose perspective, everything is distorted. Police in Seal Beach, California, got an urgent call from a resident looking through his new telescope: a pink Corvette was being ravaged in the surf, and the caller was afraid that someone might be trapped inside. Officers rushed to the scene, but couldn’t find the car. The man confirmed he could still see it, so officers came to his house to take a look. Through his telescope, they saw it too: a “Barbie-sized” toy car on the beach, highly magnified by the powerful lens. “Had he panned his telescope up a little from the ocean . . . he would’ve realized what he was looking at,” said police Sgt. Rick Ransdell. The cops recovered the toy, which was less than a foot long, he said. Many people tend to magnify their problems and lose sight of what great things He has done for you.

A Relationship to Obey

James reminds us that “faith by itself, if it does not have works, is dead” (James 2:17). By faith Noah set to work building a mammoth ark. He gathered “seven each of every clean animal, a male and his female; two each of animals that are unclean, a male and his female; also seven each of birds of the air, male and female, to keep the species alive on the face of the earth” (Genesis 7:2,3). If the flood was universal then the task of gathering animals from all parts of the globe is mind-boggling, not to mention feeding and cleaning up after them! One ancient writer solved this problem by asserting that they all hibernate so they only needed feeding once! If the flood was local then the task was not as great but was still immense. Neither was Noah overwhelmed with the responsibility thrust upon him. He took that in his stride of faith too. And he was clearly not at all deterred by the apparent incongruity of what he was doing. In other words, his faith worked!

Two by two they went into the ark to Noah: God never has a problem getting the animals to do what He
wants. Only man is more stupid than the animals. The ox knows its owner and the donkey its
master’s crib; but Israel does not know, My people do not consider. (Isaiah
1:3)

Most times the readiness to obey is cancelled out by not having faith, that’s what it is. We get scared, we move by feelings instead of the Spirit more than we should. To have the release of a blessing we must learn to walk in obedience. Remember, consider the great things that He has done for you.

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What Faith is: A Relationship of Trust

what faith is

Noah’s Faith: Part 2 of 7

11 Now the earth was corrupt in God’s sight, and the earth was filled with violence. 12 And God saw the earth, and behold, it was corrupt, for all flesh had corrupted their way on the earth. 13 And God said to Noah, “I have determined to make an end of all flesh for the earth is filled with violence through them. Behold, I will destroy them with the earth. 14 Make yourself an ark of gopher wood. – Genesis 6:11-14

“all Noah knew was that God will judge the earth, and he was supposed to build a big barge. Since it had not rained yet on the earth, it is reasonable to suppose Noah didn’t know what God was meant yet”.

“But I will establish my covenant with you, and you shall come into the ark, you, your sons, your wife, and your sons’ wives with you. 19 And of every living thing of all flesh, you shall bring two of every sort into the ark to keep them alive with you. They shall be male and female.”

The judgment of God was announced and man failed to hear and to respond. Modern man either does not believe God exists or he believes that if He is such a nice guy that He would not be unkind enough to judge anybody or anything. This wishful thinking needs to be corrected by proper enunciation of who God really is and what He has already said and done in human history.

Even through God’s wrath we find his mercy, there was 120 days of the ark building that man could have responded to Noah’s preaching. There was room in the upper deck for those who God had anticipated their repentance but found none. God warns before he judges, He delays the promised wrath; His patience should never be abused; it should be cherished.

 Then the Lord said to Noah, “Go into the ark, you and all your household, for I have seen that you are righteous before me in this generation.”

When Noah took his big step of faith into the ark, “The Lord shut him in” suggesting that God was gently but firmly assuring Noah that he had done the right thing and that he was indeed secure. But Noah’s faith had already been in evidence for a considerable period while the ark was being constructed. And his faith had preserve during the year-long flood because strangely there is no record of God speaking to Noah during that period. He had to go on trusting through thick and thin, whether he could see and understand or not.

Faith: A Relationship of Trust 

TRUST – A five letter word that marriages, relationships, friendships are made by and can be ruined by. It’s the character of that person that either can be trusted or not be trusted. We have all been there in every circumstance of trusting an individual, a friend, a parent or anyone that we know for sure to carry out what you have asked them to do. With being a minister, people trust me in too many area’s of my life to count! From friends and people I barely know telling me about personal situations that I would not even be willing to tell my best friend. It’s a reputation that I have; God has given me that special gift in my life to use it, not abuse it. I take that need, request, of that person and intercede in their situation. Trusting God that He will come through in His timing.

Noah trusted God. From the time that God called Noah to build the ark, Noah had asked no question’s to why He would have him do such a thing, or complain of how long it would take or that he needed more help to carry out this task.  Remember God saying “Make yourself”? This means this was Noah’s project. He was not to simply contract it out to
someone else.

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Have you found that relationship of trust?

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What Faith is: A Response to Revelation

what faith is

Noah’s faith: Part 1 of 7

 The Lord was grieved with mankind. ” The Lord saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every intention of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually.  And the Lord regretted that he had made man on the earth, and it grieved him to his heart.  So the Lord said, “I will blot out man whom I have created from the face of the land, man and animals and creeping things and birds of the heavens, for I am sorry that I have made them.”  But Noah found favor in the eyes of the Lord.”

The human race from the very beginning after the instance of what Adam and Eve had partaken of in the garden, sin entered the human race, non erasable, non removable, never to be the perfect example of what God had intended to be. This shows the catastrophic results of how sin effects God, that He would “blot out man whom I have created.”

“God’s sorrow at man, and the grief in His heart, are striking. This does not
mean that creation was out of control, nor does it mean that God hoped for
something better but was unable to achieve it. God knew all along that this was
how things would turn out, but our text tells us loud and clear that as God sees
His plan for the ages unfold, it affects Him. God is not unfeeling in the face
of human sin and rebellion.” – enduringwordmedia.com

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“But Noah found favor in the eyes of the Lord”

“While God commanded all the earth to be cleansed of this pollution, He found one
man with whom to begin again: Noah, who found grace in
the eyes of the Lord.
Noah didn’t earn grace; he found it. No one earns grace, but we
can all find it.” – enduringwordmedia.com

Faith: A Response to Revelation

We know that “faith comes by hearing, and hearing by the word of God” (Rom.10:17), but there are few more striking examples of what that means than Noah, Out of the blue he was told about a cataclysmic flood and he believed God. He was informed that the end of all flesh was at hand, and he believed that, too. Told to build an ark the length of one and a half football fields and to fill it with animals because all the animals would be destroyed, he believed it! And when he was invited by the Lord to “Come into the ark, you and all your household, because I have seen that you are righteous before Me in this generation” (Gen 7:1) he took what must have been a very difficult step out of all that was a familiar and understandable into a situation which was incomprehensible except to the eye of faith.

def. Revelation – a surprising and previously unknown fact; the making known of a secret or the unknown.

God in all of His glorious wonder has the unknown that we look ahead in our lives and try to figure out already figured out, He has the blueprints, all we have to do is follow and obey what seems to be difficult tasks that He has set out before us, but His word will never return void neither will He leave you forsake you, He will surely see you through.

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