JUN 30, MORNING

Hebrews 11:6
Memorise Matthew 17:20
“without faith it is impossible to please Him”

Hebrews 11:1 speaks of how faith is “the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen”. It then cites examples of Old Testament saints such as Abel, Enoch, Abraham and Moses who exercised faith even though there was no concrete and visible evidence of what they believed in at that time. For example, Noah built the ark in faith even though no one had even experienced rain at that time. He just obeyed God’s instructions and acted in faith. Hebrews 11:6 says that “without faith it is impossible to please Him”. Without faith, we would not even seek for God and would not “believe that He is”. God is pleased when we believe in Him as He is glorified as Creator and Almighty God. He is magnified when we place our faith in His providence and trust in Him to provide our every need. When we do not exercise faith in Him, it is as if we are proclaiming that He as God is not strong enough to help us. A lack of faith is unbelief in God’s sovereignty, power and wisdom. It undermines His name, nature as well as His Word when we do not believe what He says. Therefore, it is not enough to just know God’s Word but we need to sincerely believe what it says. This type of faith in spiritual things can only come from God Himself.

When we serve God in whatever avenue that God has placed us in, we need faith. Faith means that we are trusting in God to enable us to serve Him, instead of relying on our own strength. All we need is “faith as a grain of mustard seed”, the least of all seeds (Matthew 17:20). For this, we need a humble spirit that acknowledges our need for God. We need to ask Him to help us even in areas of service which we may think are easy and can be handled on our own. For example, we may think handing out bulletins for worship service is easy and does not require God’s help. However, without God’s help, we may grow tired of coming early to serve and slowly lose our enthusiasm for greeting people. We may also fail to recognise newcomers and miss the opportunity to welcome them. Eventually we may even just give up this area of service. God does not want us to just serve for the sake of serving. He also does not need us to do His work. Instead, He chooses to use us to do His work so that we may exercise faith in Him and grow closer in our relationship with Him. Is that what you desire too, dear Teen?

Thought: Are you exercising faith in your service to God?
Prayer: Dear Lord, grant me more faith to trust Thee in all things.