[Steve Myers] A number of years ago, a very faithful lady, wonderful senior citizen in one of our congregations, came down with cancer. She got diagnosed with cancer and it was a really difficult situation. She started some treatments, and it wasn't too long before it became pretty obvious it was not going to get better. Unless God intervened, it wasn't going to get any better. And it got worse. And I would visit her in this process as she slowly declined. And one time, I sat with her and we were talking about various things. And at this particular moment, she looked me straight in the eye and she said, "I don't think I'm going to make it. I don't think I'll be in the Kingdom." And it kind of took me back a little bit because this, this was a very faithful lady, someone that you wouldn't imagine saying something like that. So, my initial reaction was like, "Whoa, of course you're going to be there." And we talked about it a little bit, but it was one of those things that was just nagging at her, just was really nagging at her. And since she was obviously coming to the conclusion of her life, it was something that really bothered her.

And as I've thought about this over the years, it seems that question comes to all of our minds. Am I really going to make it? You know after all is said and done, is God really going to save me? Is He really going to follow through with what He said? Because sometimes we think, "Well, have I measured up to that minimum standard to kind of squeak into the family of God? You know will I really be there?" And it seems like no matter who we are, those thoughts can come every so often. Now for some, it's more than that. For some, it's a chronic thing. It's a persistent thing. It's something they just can't seem to escape in their thinking, and so it's persistent and it's prolonged, and it seems to be a constant kind of thing so that, you know, no matter how things go whether it's going well, it's something that's just bothering them. In the back of their mind, that is a thought that just seems to be there, and that you know, somehow at the end when, you know, tally things up, just not going to be in the family of God.

So, I thought we could talk about that for a little bit this afternoon because I'd like to dispel those thoughts and that kind of thinking through what God tells us in His word. Because with that wonderful lady, she needed more than just me saying, "Hey, it'll be okay." Needed more than that. And so, we began to talk about it more and more and begin to come up with a solution to help dispel those thoughts. And we all need help sometimes with those things. And so today, we're going to look at some encouraging, inspiring passages that God has included in His word to help guide our thinking. Especially when we fall into that pattern, that we don't have to have that way of thought, that constant worry in our minds that we're not going to make it.

So, as we think about that, to lead in to that, I'd like to talk about three areas that impact our faith. We could call them enemies to our faith. Three things that are serious. Three things that we need to dispel along with that concern about whether I'm going to make it or not in order to answer that question, in order to more fully answer that question, "Will I make it?" So, let's think about the enemies of faith. They're not that complicated. In fact, if you had to name three enemies of faith, you'd probably be able to come up with them without too much because it's my way of thinking isn't all that complicated.

One of the things, what do you think is a great enemy of faith? I put down first, worry. They're not in any necessarily most important type order. I put worry down in my notes as one of those things that undermine our faith. Oftentimes, if you have like the Old King James version of the Bible, instead of the word worry, they might have anxious care. Anxious care, and that word for anxious care or worry has an interesting background of where that word derives its meaning from. If you were to look in the old Anglo-Saxon word itself, do you know what its intent was as they originally used that word? It didn't mean anxious care or worry. It came from the meaning of "to be strangled." To be strangled or to choke. And when you think about worry, isn't that what it does to us? We could feel like we're choking. We're so concerned, we're so upset, we're so worried about things that it does seem to get a strangle hold on us that won't let go. And so, it seems worry can take a lot of different forms, but for today's purposes, let's think of it in terms of worrying about not measuring up spiritually.

And of course, when we read through God's word, there are a lot of dire warnings. There's a lot of concerns about punishment and justice, and the wicked will meet their justice, their “just deserts” you might say. But oftentimes when we read those passages, we feel like, "Well, maybe I'm in that group. Maybe I'm a part of that group and should I be more concerned about it? Should I worry about that very thing?" Well, let's think about that for a moment and look at what Christ said about it. He said something interesting in Matthew 6:25. Let's turn over there as we begin this afternoon. Matthew 6:25 is a very familiar section of scripture, but let's see how this ties in with worry as a great enemy of faith that can cause us to think, "I'm not going to make it. I won't be in the family of God."

Notice what Christ says here, Matthew 6:25. He starts this section by saying, "Therefore I say to you, do not worry about your life," Of course, if we stopped there, we go, "Yeah. Yeah. Easy for you to say, right?" Have you ever thought that? Well yeah, they could say that because well, look at their life. They're successful. They're strong spiritually. And we come up with all the reasons why they're better off than we are. But Christ says, "Don't worry about your life," and oftentimes, we focus more on the rest what he says here: “what you'll eat, what you drink; nor about your body, what you'll put on.” He's talking more about things than just the physical. It's not just physical things He's talking about. Don't worry about your life. Yeah, the physical things are a concern, but He says it shouldn't be an anxious care. It shouldn't be a stifling concern or an anxious worry that's choking us or strangling us. Don't let a get a stranglehold on you.

He says, "Isn't life more than food, and the body more than clothing?" He says, "Look at the birds of the air, they neither sow nor reap or gather into barns; yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not of more value than they?" I think we were kind of reminded of this in the last few days. I mean we had some amazing thunderstorms lately, haven't we? It's like, "Where do those birds go anyway?" I mean, it seemed like you'd kind of see 'em lying around dead because it was terrible storms, floods in certain locations around, around the city and yet, you know the next morning, they're singing and they're beautiful and they're protected. So, I think we can say yeah, God does take care of them. He does watch over them. So, can I take their example and look at my life and have more of that perspective, realizing, "He loves me a whole lot more than those birds. Is He going to watch over me?" Well, He says yes, they will. He will watch over you because He values your life more than them.

In fact, verse 27 says, "Which of you by worrying can add one cubit to his stature?" You see some of us, if that were true, if worrying added to our stature, some of us would be bigger than Goliath, right? We'd really be big people. But He says, "No, it doesn't work that way." So, verse 28, “Why do you worry about clothing?” For example, “think about the lilies of the field, how they grow: they don't toil, they don't spin; and yet I say to you that even Solomon and all his glory was not arrayed like of these.” God paints a beautiful picture, doesn't He? He gives us beautiful plants, and trees, and flowers, and it is amazing what God does. Yet for us, He cares more. He cares more about us than birds, or flowers, or anything like that.

And so, He tries to help us to see that very fact. So, verse 30 says, "If God clothes the grass of the field, which today is, and tomorrow is thrown in the oven, will He not much more clothe you, O you of little faith?" And so, it's not just the clothing that we wear that He's talking about here, He's connecting it to faith. He's connecting it to spiritual clothing. Will God help us with our spiritual clothing? I think Christ is saying here, yes. Yes, He will. When we're committed to strive to follow after God and His way, He will help us not only with those physical things like food and drink and clothing, but spiritual clothing as well. He will help us spiritually.

So, He says, verse 31, "Don't worry about things, saying, ‘What shall we eat?’ ‘What shall we drink?’ ‘What shall we wear?’ All these things the Gentiles seek. Your heavenly Father knows that you need these things." But then He says like, like the song we listen to at special music. He said, "But seek first the Kingdom of God and His righteousness, and all these things shall be added to you." Yeah, something to eat, something to wear, something to drink. But the spiritual side of things will be added to you as well. And God talks a lot about this in His word that when that question of, “Should I be worried to the extent that I, my spiritual life is stifled because I don't know if I'm going to make it? I don't think God's going to follow through with His promises.” Christ says you shouldn't have to be worried. You don't have to be concerned about that in that regard. We can't let that get a stranglehold on us or it will hold us back. And so, don't be overly concerned. Don't be uneasy. Don't be fearful and don't be restless about that very fact. God says, "Don't allow that to happen." Now, it is a challenge because it seems like we sometimes have a natural tendency to think in that way.

There's an interesting survey that was done in Britain just a couple of years ago. It was called the "Every Man Campaign Survey." And so, they surveyed people about worry. That was one of the topics that they surveyed about. Now if you had to answer this question, how would you answer? "How many minutes a day do you worry?" How many minutes a day do you worry? So, think about that, okay, in terms of the average person. The average person in the world, how much do you think they worry? How many minutes a day do you that would be? Well according to this “Every Man Campaign Survey”, it came out to 36 minutes a day. So, I read that, and I'm like, well, that's not too bad, is it? Not too bad at all. Of course, then, you start adding it up. That's nine days a year, 24 hours a day. Nine days. You're going to waste nine days of your life per year worrying about things. How productive is that? How helpful is that? No wonder Christ said, "Don't let worry get a stranglehold on you. You're going to waste days of your life."

Of course, you add that up over your lifetime, now you're over a year and a half of your life spent on worrying. And of course, the difficult part is there's some of us, in fact the survey found 1 in 10, 10% spend more than two hours a day worrying. And so, we worry about you know, our life. We worry about money. We worry about our children. We worry about our parents. We're worried about getting fat. We're worried about not measuring up in life, not getting the most out. We worry about all those things. And what happens then? "Now I'm discouraged. Now I'm depressed. Now I'm down about things, and it affects my thinking." It affects my actions. Then it affects my relationships because it can't help but be brought in to the whole package of the way that we see life. And in fact, in this particular survey, they found that nearly half of us, half of those surveyed believed they were born worriers. There's no escaping it. They can't stop worrying because, you know, they're born that way. But that's something, then we add to it. I suppose, we make it even worse because we add, well, "I wonder if I'm going to make it or not or if God really cares about me that much."

But you know, Christ has an answer to this survey. He has an answer to that way of thinking. Verse 31 here, He says, "Don't worry... Therefore, do not worry." Now the great thing about this is this isn't just a one-time thing that Christ just happened to run across this subject in this particular passage and that's all He ever said about it. He talks about this over, and over, and over again throughout His word. And once you begin to see how often God addresses this concept of whether I'm going to make it or not, it begins to pop out at you everywhere. And if you turn over to John 14, here's a very familiar section of scripture but oftentimes we disassociate it with this concept of whether I'm going to be in that Kingdom or not. But that's exactly what He's addressing here.

John 14:1, notice how he adds to this concept of whether or not I should allow this worriedness into my frame of mind when it comes to thinking on a spiritual basis. Notice what John says, John 14:1, familiar section of scripture. He says, "Let not your heart be troubled; you believe in God, believe also in Me." So, we see this connection with belief, which is a different way of talking about faith. Having faith is believing, having confidence in God's word. So, He says, "Don't be troubled. You have faith in God. Believe in Christ. Believe in the Savior," because He goes to point out, "Here's another reason you can have faith. Here's another reason you should believe."

Verse two, "In my Father's house are many mansions; if it were not so, I would have told you." So, lots of dwelling places in God's household. And Christ says, "I go to prepare a place for you." Now He's not just preparing a place for somebody else or, you know, that great spiritual giant that you know of. No, He says, "I'm preparing a place for you." And then He says, "If I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again." And we know Christ is going to return. He will come back. The second coming will take place. We're closer than ever to that coming. So, is He just going to come back then and say, "Wow, sorry, you're out. Get out of here." No, He says here, "I will come again and receive you to Myself, that where I am, there you may be also." He's looking forward to being together in the family of God.

In fact, if you read verse 3 in the New Living translation, it says, "When everything's ready, I will come and get you so that you will always be with Me where I am." And that's His intent. That's God's heart that He's expressing there. He's saying, "Therefore, do not worry. Don't let worry undermine your faith because that's going to lead you down a path God doesn't want you to go.” He wants our thinking to take us to the place when He returns, "I'm going to be there. I'm going to be there. I'm going to continue to strive and live God's way and His will in my life. And with that, I don't have to be troubled. I don't have to allow that stranglehold in my life." And so, and so, He says, “You can believe. You can have faith. You don't have to have that faith undermined by worry.”

And of course, if it's not worry, a second enemy to our faith is fear. And it's can kind of be like worry sometimes, but it's a little bit different. Fear seems to also lead, lead our thinking to the idea that something's bad going to happen, right? It's like the phone ringing after, you know, midnight, we know it's bad, right? It's always bad. Well, no, it's not always bad. Sometimes it might be a birth announcement. That's really good. So, He says, "Don't think this automatically." And oftentimes, fear can do that to us. That automatically, we're going to see the dark side of things. There's a great example of this over in Matthew 14:24. Matthew 14:24, another very familiar section of scripture. You'll recognize it right away.

This is that section of scripture where the disciples are out in a boat. Happens quite a few times to them. And in this particular one, one of them didn't stay in the boat, right? We know this story. Let's notice the story in Matthew 14:20... well, we can begin in verse 23. It says, "When He had sent the multitudes away, He went up on the mountain by Himself to pray. And evening came and He was alone there." But the disciples were out on this boat. Verse 24, "The boat was now in the middle of the sea, tossed by the waves, for the wind was contrary." In other words, it was really... it was like the other night when we were having all that rain and thunder and lightning. It was crazy, crazy, terrible storm.

So, verse 25, "In the fourth watch of the night Jesus went to them, walking on the sea." So, He didn't get in the boat. He just walked right out there. Verse 26, "When the disciples saw Him walking on the sea, they were troubled saying, 'It's a ghost!'" Right? They were shaking in their boots. They didn't get what was going on here so they were fearful. They were stymied by fear. And so, it says, "They cried out for fear. But immediately, Jesus spoke to them, saying, 'Be of good cheer! It is I; do not be afraid.'" It says that, but I don't get the feel like that's really the way it was said. It's like, "Hey, it's me. Calm down," right? I think Christ would probably be saying it like that, translated a little bit differently. "Don't be afraid guys, it's Me. It's Me." And they were a little apprehensive, still little fearful.

So, “Peter answered and said, ‘Lord, if it's You, command me to come to You on the water.’" And of course, as we know, Christ said come. So, Peter comes down out of the boat and he walked on the water to go to Jesus. How awesome is that? He starts walking on the water. So, if somebody ever asked you, who walked on the water? It's actually two people. Christ did and Peter did, too, at least for a little bit, didn't he? Says “he walked on the water to go to Jesus.” But notice what happens. We know what happens. "When he saw the wind was boisterous, he was afraid; and beginning to sink, he cried out, 'Lord, save me!'" Lord, save me. The fear of the storm, the fear of the waves caught his attention. And what happened with his eyesight? What happened with his focus? Instead of looking to Christ, he started looking down at the waves. He started looking around at the wind. When he walked out, all was good. But as soon as he saw the wind was boisterous, says he was afraid. Fear came back into his thinking and he began to sink.

Now, it's interesting what happens. He cried out, "Lord, save me." And we know the story. Christ said, "O you of little faith, get out of here. I guess you'll just have to drown. You couldn't walk all the way over here," right? Well no, that didn't happen. This is the great part. Look at verse 31. "Peter cries out, 'Lord, save me!'" And Christ had to think about it, "Well, I don't know. You know, you kind of messed up. You should've kept..." No, it says, "Immediately Jesus stretched out His hand and caught him." Immediately. Christ didn't have to think about it. He didn't have to condemn him. He didn't put him down at that but He saved him. He reached out and immediately... He didn't even have to think about it. He just did it. He saved him. Once He's saved, He says, "O you of little faith, why did you doubt?" You know, why did you let that fear come in? Why didn't you keep focused on Me? You shouldn't let the waves and the wind get in the way of seeing the ultimate goal of staying focused on Christ.

And I think it points out in the story how that fear can get a grip on our thinking, and it can overcome us, and it can destroy... he had the faith to get out of the boat. That's pretty amazing. He did it. And I think we can all be like that. We can be so spiritually solid. It is amazing that things that we can do. And then, we trip up. Then we miss, we fall, we stray. Well, what is Christ's reaction to that? How does the Father look at us when we cry out in repentance, "Save me"? Does he say, "Ah, you messed up too much this time." You see, He doesn't do that. He doesn't do that. He says, "Keep your eyes focused on Me. Keep fixed on Me and keep going. Keep going." And that is a challenge. I think it's a challenge for all of us. I mean we're not getting up out of the boat like Peter did, but just living life can be that way.

I was reminded of this in reading the story about The Flying Wallendas. You ever heard of The Flying Wallendas? They used to be a great, big circus act, especially way back. You go over to the '50s and '60s, they were a very famous act in Germany to begin with, then Ringling Brothers brought them over to America. They did some amazing feats. They were aerialists that get up on the high wire. And they became famous for a seven-man pyramid. So, they would walk across this wire, the tight rope, with a seven-man pyramid, all together walking across. And Karl Wallenda was the patriarch. He was the, the dad that kind of started it all and just amazing feats that they would do.

Back in the, I think it was the early '60s, they were doing the pyramid. And something went wrong and they fell. And there was no net. They did all of their acts without any net. And two of the Wallendas were killed, one was paralyzed, became a paraplegic. Karl, the dad, had several broken bones and one of the girls fell on him, which hurt him but saved her life. But the amazing part of the story is it didn't end there. Once they were healed, Flying Wallendas got back up on the wire again and they continued to perform. Well as time went on, in fact the Wallendas are still around today if you want to Google it and look at some YouTube thing, they continue to do some. Of course, this is the great grandson of Karl Wallenda that's doing some of these things even today.

But the reason this kind of fits with our story about fear is what happened to Karl. As he continued to age, he continued to entertain, continued to get up on the high wire, he was in his 70s and was going to do a promotional thing down in San Juan, Puerto Rico. He was going to walk across this big space between two buildings. And so, imagine doing that in your 70s, walking the high wire. Interesting story behind this is that as it led up to that time, his wife said the thing that was on Karl's mind the most was not falling. And as I read that story, it was like, "Well yeah, who wants to get up on a high wire and fall. I can imagine…” "Yeah, that's seems to be a reasonable thing to think about." But she said he kind of fixated on it and was really concerned about, "I can't fall," you know? And all the years that led up to this, he had a confidence that just didn't worry. In fact, there's some YouTube videos where he had a microphone on as he walked across some giant gorge and you can hear himself talking, narrating his walk as he goes through. And the confidence is just amazing. But for whatever reason, this one was different.

As he started to walk across, whether it was the wind, some people blame the wind. Others, a guide wire that wasn't connected properly. But for whatever reason, he started to lose his balance in the middle of that tight rope. And he tried with this balancing pole to catch his balance and adjust and all these things, but it was too much. And he fell. He fell and, and died trying to walk across that tight rope. 

And of course, then all the theories about why did he fall, and what happened, and what caused his demise, and all the things that came out on that, was it the guidewire? Was it, you know, the wind? Was it something else? He'd been in a lot stronger winds than that before. And so, a lot of arguing about this. Eventually, there was a book that was written that gave a name to what happened. You know what they called it? It was a guy named Warren Bennis and he wrote a book on "Becoming a Leader." And in that book, he called the reason was "The Wallenda Factor." The Wallenda Factor. Well, what was the Wallenda Factor?

Well, he went back to what his wife talked about, what happened before he went on this last tight rope, how he focused on not falling. She said, "Up until that walk, he always focused on walking across that wire. He didn't focus on falling." And she felt because of his energies that were put into not falling instead of walking the tight rope is what caused his death. The Wallenda Factor, it's kind of become known as that. And I think that's important for us. Do we put our energies into not failing, or do we put our energy into succeeding? You know, are we walking through life and rather than just walking that tight rope and yeah, life can... life can be a tight rope, right? We can have danger in all sides and we're up in the middle of the sky trying to make it across. And like Peter, he began to focus on the waves, the wind. And that was his demise. Karl Wallenda may have focused on walking and not falling instead of getting across.

And so, I think in so many ways, where we put our focus becomes our reality. Where we put our focus becomes our reality. For Karl, it led to his death because he focused on not falling, rather than successfully walking across that tight rope that he had done hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of times before. And so, I think it's a good reminder, should we be so afraid of failure, of not measuring up to God's standard and not making it into the Kingdom that we dwell on all those negativities, all those wrong thoughts. Or it could lead to our failure if we do that. And of course, we've got to be prudent. Of course, we've got to strive after God's way. We've heard, you know, hundreds of sermons about those things. Yeah, but we cannot let those careful thoughts paralyze us by fear. We can't allow that.

Someone once said that fear stands for, the F-E-A-R of fear stands for False Evidence Appearing Real. False Evidence Appearing Real. Yeah, we can fooled by our sight. Peter was fooled by his sight. "Christ was right there but I focused on the waves." Karl's widow would say he focused on not falling instead of making it across the wire. They were unrealistic thoughts in their head that became reality for them. So, we can't allow that. Christ keeps telling us, God tells us, "Don't allow that wrong way of thinking to bring you down." Don't let that cause your demise. That's not the way God wants us to think. In fact, He tells us exactly the opposite. And He tells us over, and over, and over again.

Take a look at what He said in Colossians 1:10. Colossians 1:10, here's the apostle Paul inspired to write about this. In fact, it kind of fits with the tightrope walk of life that we face sometimes. In Colossians 1:10, Paul's telling the Colossians, he's telling us, "Don't let that evidence that appears to be real get into your brain." That’s just an appearance, it's not reality. The reality is what God says. So, Colossians 1:10, he reminds us, "Walk worthy of the Lord." Yes, we have to strive after God's way. We have to have a repentant attitude. We have to put off saying, "Yes, we have to do all those things." He says fully pleasing him, being fruitful in every good work and increasing in the knowledge of God. But then he also says, verse 11, that we're “strengthened with all might, according to His glorious power, for all patience and longsuffering with joy." So where does our strength come from? It's not us. It's Christ living in us. It's through God's spirit. Well, what kind of power does God have?

Probably better to ask the other question. What kind of power doesn't God have, right? God is all powerful. He's omnipotent. He knows everything. We can be strengthened not with just a little bit of might. Not just a little of... He says strengthen with all might according to what God has to offer. And God has it all. God had in fact, he makes it very clear. Verse 12 is an amazing passage that just gives us so much encouragement. Verse 12 says, "Giving thanks to the Father who has qualified us to be partakers of the inheritance of the saints in the light." Is it dependent on me? Do I have to live a perfect life in order to make it into the Kingdom? I can't. That's what it comes down to. I cannot. In fact, the Bible tells us about what I earn, you know, what are the wages that I earn? “The wages of sin is death.” That's what I earn. But the gift of God is eternal life.

And so, he tells us very clearly, "I can't do anything to qualify for the Kingdom of God, but I have a Savior. And I have a Father who has qualified me to be in the Kingdom. Because if it depended on me, I couldn't make it. Now, that doesn't do away with the fact I have to obey God. I have to keep His commandments. I have to love Him. I have to keep the Sabbath. I have to do these things.” But God sees us through. In fact, he even says in verse 13, "He has delivered us from the power of darkness and conveyed us into the Kingdom of the Son of His love." You see with all the darkness that we live in in this world, this tightrope that we have to walk, we have a guide. We have assurity. We have a Father who loves us and a Savior who rescues us. We don't have to fear. We don't have to fear. God is with us. Don't allow that false evidence to appear real because it's not.

All right, that leads us to a third enemy of faith, and that is doubt. Doubt. They're all kind of interconnected in so many ways, but that doubt I think contributes to that nagging feeling that it's not going to be okay, it's not going to work out. “Somehow, these positive things that He says don't apply to me. Maybe that's for other people. Somehow, I'm not really sure that He's going to apply those scriptures to me.” And so, we have that, that doubt. And that negative thought enters our mind and sometimes that is so hard to get rid of. And yet, God says we should get rid of it.

Someone the other day sent me a little quip that was, maybe it was an attempt to improve my humor or something like that. But it was from the "Encyclopedia of Wit, Humor, and Wisdom." And I think it kind of contributes to this concept of faith and doubt, faith versus doubt, how doubt can interrupt our faith. And this little quote went something like this. “If a scientist tells us that there are 5 trillion 890 billion 273 thousand stars in the galaxy, we believe it.” Wow, that's amazing. “But if that park bench has a little sign on it that says, ‘Wet paint,’ we can't help but checking it out.” Right? And sometimes I think it is just like that. “I'm not sure if that really applies. Is that really the case?” And so, we have a tendency sometimes to fall into that trap.

But God doesn't want us to go there. He doesn't want our thinking to be overridden by that kind of way of thought. There's a good example to the contrary. In Mark 9:17, another story that you're familiar with. But let's see how it fits in as we combat this enemy of our faith, doubt. Mark 9:17, a little bit about healing. A little bit about the power of God. A little bit about the amazing perspective of our Savior Jesus Christ right here in Mark 9:17. It begins by someone bringing their son to Christ. "Teacher, I brought You my son, who has a mute spirit. Whenever it seizes him, it throws him down; he foams at the mouth, gnashes his teeth, becomes rigid." So, it almost sounds like epilepsy or something like that, but there's definitely something more here. There's some kind of spirit thing going on as well.

And so, the man says, "I spoke to your disciples, they… that they should cast it out, but” what happened? Says they couldn't do it, “they could not." So, Christ answers, verse 19, "O faithless generation, how long shall I be with you? How long shall I bear with you? Bring him to Me." So it almost sounds a little negative. "Oh great, I got to put up with you some more?" We have a tendency to think of it in those terms, but I don't think that's the way that it's intended. We have a tendency to have a lack of faith, don't we at times? We do. We're human beings. And we do tend to look at things like that at times. And so, it's interesting, well how long would He bear with them? Christ says, "Bring him to Me." He says, "Yeah, that's my purpose."

We could read back about why did Christ have to come. And you can read that section Isaiah or Luke. And we know He came. And He came not only to preach and teach, but He also came to heal and to heal the broken-hearted. To heal those who are lost in this world on a spiritual journey. And so here He's saying, "All right, this is part of My calling. Part of My mission." And so, He was going to bear with them. He's going to bear with us as well. And so, it's interesting, they brought him, brought the child to Him. And what happens? Verse 20, "When he saw Him, immediately the spirit convulsed him, he fell on the ground, wallowed, foaming at the mouth."

“So He asked His father,” Christ talks to the dad and says, "How long has this been happening to him?" The dad says, "From childhood." Says, "He's often been thrown him both into the fire and into the water to destroy him. But if you can do anything, have compassion on us and help us." Think of that comment. Maybe we've even thought like this. Have we ever thought like this? "Well, God if there's anything you can do, help me." What? Wait a second. Is there anything Christ could do? Well, of course, there is, of course. Yet he words it like... I don't know that he necessarily meant it that way, but that's the way it came out. "Well if there's anything you can do about it, help us." Well, of course, He's the Savior. He's the Messiah. He is the Rescuer. It's who He is. It is who He is. And of course, He can help.

And so, Christ says to him, "If you can believe, all things are possible to him who believes.” “You have faith? Have confidence. Not your confidence, but confidence in Me. Keep your focus on Me. See that I am your Savior. I will rescue you. I'm the author and finisher of your faith. I'm all those things, so believe." And of course, immediately, verse 24, “The father of the child cried out and said with tears, ‘Lord, I believe; help my unbelief!’" And we've been there. We've been there. But Christ wants us to call out to Him. Christ wants us to be focused on Him. Christ wants to save this child. He wants to save us.

And so, what does He do? End of verse 25, He says, "Deaf and dumb spirit, I command you, come out of him and enter into him no more." I love the way that's worded. It's like Christ is not about a quick temporary fix because he could've said, "Spirit, get out." No, he didn't just do that. He said, "Get out and don't come back." That's pretty cool, right? "I don't want you bugging this kid anymore. Get outta here." And that's what He says. So, Christ was concerned about his entire life. He didn't want him coming back and bothering him later, so He said, "Don't enter him anymore." And of course, the spirit convulsed and left. It looked like the child was dead, but he wasn't.

Verse 27, like Christ immediately grabbing Peter's hand, verse 27, "Christ took him by the hand, lifted him up, and he arose." He wasn't dead. And so, we see how He intervened. And if we continue to think those doubtful thoughts, if we're not more like this father who said, "Yeah, I've got my problems. Help me. Help me to have greater faith." Christ is willing and able and wanting to intervene and to help. He wants our faith to be built up and not eroded. And I think it's such a good reminder when we take our eyes off of God, we begin to lose sight. Kind of reminding of a little game we used to play as kids. You used to hold up a penny to your eyes like, "I can't even see the sun." It's this brilliant bright thing in the sky. But I hold up this teeny, little penny and I can't see it at all.

And our trials can be like that. You know our trials are like that penny. We hold it in front of our eyes, that's all we can see. We can't see the brilliant light of God and where He wants to take us. And we allow that trial to consume our thinking and our vision, and we have a tendency to block the power of God. But see, what did Christ say? Look at verse 23 again. "All things are possible to him who believes. All things are possible to him who believes." So maybe a different way of saying doubt your doubts before you doubt your faith. Doubt your doubts before you doubt your faith.

When I was thinking about this, I kind of went back to my childhood and a silly game we played as Cub Scouts. My mom was our den leader, our den... den mother they called it. And we used to play these different games. And she'd have songs and do all these kind of amazing things. Well, there is this one game, I remember playing it when we had some new Cubs kind of join the troop. And it was a game where you set up an obstacle course of chairs. And of course, she explained to the newcomers, "Here's your obstacle course. Your goal is to go from this side and maneuver your way through the chairs to get to the other side so you can be safe." But as Cub Scouts always do, there was a catch to the game. You had to do it blindfolded.

So, we set up all these chairs and put them there. We were very gracious and allowed the newcomers to kind of study the course before we put the blindfold on them. So, we got all chairs set up, put the blindfold on them. They got the directions and everything. And just before we said, "Go," we took all the chairs away. So, there wasn't a chair there at all. And then in, it's probably, I don't know, evil. We watched and laughed as they... no, that wasn't evil. It's just kind of dopey fun. You know, you can imagine what did you do? If you thought there were chairs there and you're blindfolded, it's like oh, you're kind of stumbling, trying not to run into something that isn't even there. It wasn't even there.

And as I thought about the dopey game, that's life sometimes. When we take our eyes off of God's plan and His purpose for our lives, we're stumbling along thinking there's this giant obstacle in front of us that isn't really there. God says, "Don't worry about that." And so, we spend our lives avoiding obstacles that we think are there, but God's removed them and they're not really there. They exist up here, but not in reality. And so, it was I think a reminder, don't avoid chairs that aren't there. Now, maybe sometimes you'll run smack into one in life. Just sit down for a minute then, right? Use it to your advantage. And I think if we could think of it is when we face these impossible seemingly impossible situations in life, don't think they're impossible to God. Don't put our human frailties upon God because He is omnipotent. He is all powerful. He is omniscient. He's all knowing. He's all encompassing. God, we don't want to limit God to human standards because we have a God of the impossible. God loves to be that kind of God because nothing is too difficult for Him. And He tells us that over and over and over again in such an amazing, encouraging way.

Look at 2 Corinthians 2:14. Have you noticed this passage before? Think about it in this context. When we think about those faith killers, He says doubt shouldn't be one of them. We cannot allow doubt to taint our faithful thinking and our faithful perspective. So, here's Paul writing to Corinth, and we know the challenges that Corinth had. The most corrective letter in all the Bible is written to Corinth. And we could even think because they were such lousy Christians. Well yeah, they didn't do very well. They did better once they were corrected and got back on track. Now the interesting thing is here's the second letter written to the Corinthians, written to us as well, that didn't put them down, didn't keep them in a box of sin, but gave them a whole different perspective.

Look at 2 Corinthians 2:14. Paul writes now, "Thanks be to God who... once in a while might have a feeling of trying to help us along the way..." Oh no, it doesn't say that. "Now thanks be to God who always leads us in triumph in Christ,” always leads us in triumph in Christ. Now that doesn't mean the next step is going to be a triumph. But at the end of that journey is triumph, and it's not to be doubted. It is fact, "Always leads us in triumph in Christ." And then not only that, because of that leading that God has given us and the direction that he gives us in our lives, we then can be an encouraging and inspiring example to others. And so, he says, “through us diffuses the fragrance of His knowledge in every place.” So, along the journey of life as we're walking this tightrope, we can be assured of the fact, we will get to the goal. We will make the destination. We will be led in triumph through our Savior, Jesus Christ. And along that path, we spread His word. We live His way. We are examples of what a real Christian is all about.

And so that's the perspective that God wants us to have. And that should begin to help us to reject that snare, that fear and worry and doubt can bring. And as we begin to live our lives, “Oh boy, here comes that feeling again. How can I overcome it?” Because so oftentimes, it's you know, Satan trying to weasel his way into our thinking because he is the prince of the power of the air, he wants to affect our attitudes and our frame of mind. And he tends to go around the backdoor to do that.

And there's no doubt, those things are there. Sometimes it's our own sin. "I feel guilty. I knew better. I shouldn't have done that." Sometimes it's, "Well, will God really forgive me? I mean I knew better. I shouldn't have been doing that." Or sometimes it's, "I did it again. Well maybe God forgave me the first time, but now, again?" And those thoughts then come into our mind. Well, when we've been repentant and we're striving to change, where should we direct our thoughts? What's the solution when those persistent, chronic thoughts won't leave us alone? We have to turn those thoughts to confidence in God, faith in God, trust in God. And when you begin to see how much God wants our thinking to be permeated with those positive approaches, it is amazing how much you begin to see.

This lady who had cancer, I knew I had to do better than just say, "Oh, it's okay." So, I began to put some passages of scripture together for her. So, I thought, "Well, maybe if she reads really what God says in his word, that would be helpful." So, I started to take passages and instead of just saying, you know, "God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him would not perish, but have eternal life," I'd put her name in there. "God so loved her." And oftentimes we'll think, "Well, God loves the world.” Yeah, no but He loves you. He loves me. And I started doing that with a number of passages and I, after not thinking about it very long, I had a page, a page of scriptures. And then thought about it a little more, now I had two pages. And then I had four pages. Then I had six pages. So that when I went to see her again, we sat down and we went through those, and we read them with her name in every one of them. To see how much God loves and cares about us.

In fact, one of those passages was Zephaniah 3:17. Of course this easy to find minor prophet here. If you go just before the New Testament, it's not Zechariah but Zephaniah. He's one of these little guys in the middle here. If you go to Daniel, that's too far, so you got to go back to after Joel, to after Habakkuk. But if you're there, you're getting close. Nope, it's before Haggai, so if you get between Haggai and Joel here, and after... let's see. What after, after Nahum, after Habakkuk. Let's find it here. Oh yeah, there's Zephaniah. Here's a prophet prophesied to Judah, but it's not just about Judah like we talked about the other day with Jeremiah. It's not just about Judah, Zephaniah talked so much about the day of the Lord. He's talking about the end times. He's talking about our time, as well as prophesying to Judah. And when you get to chapter 3 verse 17, among all the doom and gloom and bad things that are on the horizon, God inspired something amazing in Zephaniah 3:17. Have you noticed this before?

It says, "The Lord your God is in your midst," now, that's my God. That's your God. You can put your name in there. Steve's God is in your midst. It's in his midst. He's right here. “The Mighty One will save.” He doesn't say, "Well, I'll think about it," or, "I'll see if you measure up." He says He will save. And not only that, here's the great part, says, "He will rejoice over you with gladness, He'll quiet you with His love, He'll rejoice over you with singing." That's God's perspective. It's not just, "Okay, fine. You can be a part of the thing." He's painting the picture of a young mother with this little baby. How do you quiet a little baby that's fearful, or worried, or hungry, or screaming, or whatever it might be? Well you pick him up and you hold them tight. You hold them close. And if they still don't settle down, you might rock them a little bit. And then what do you beautiful mothers do to those little ones? You entertain them. You sing them a lullaby. And there's something about singing that can quiet you down and take away the worry, the fear, the doubt.

That's what God does to us... this world's going to be shaking at a terrible way coming up. You can't be focusing on the wind and the waves. This is where God has us. He's got us right there, held close in His arms, and He's happy about it. When a mom holds that little baby, there's nothing like that. That's the way God is holding us. He pictures Himself in that role, and it makes Him happy. “He will rejoice over you with singing.” That's the kind of God we have. And so, what an amazing Father that we have, that this mighty one will save us. He will. That's His intent. In fact, He said a similar thing as He inspired Paul to write to Timothy. This is in 2 Timothy 4:6, and I wonder if maybe Paul had this Zephaniah on his mind as he wrote to Timothy.

2 Timothy 4:6, as the aged apostle, coming to the conclusion of his life, he writes to this young minister helping inspire, and guide, direct Timothy. And notice the things that he says as Paul is facing the end of his life. In 2 Timothy 4:6, Paul says, "I'm already being poured out as a drink offering," and of course, the drink offering was totally poured out, totally poured out on the ground. So, his life was like that.

He says, "the time of my departure is at hand." He says, "I fought the good fight, I've finished the race, I've kept the faith." So, he persisted in striving to do what was right, but did he always? “Well, the apostle Paul, of course he's going to be there. He's the apostle Paul, he wrote most of the New Testament.” You know, sometimes we think like that, but wait a second. Here's what Paul says. He says, "Finally, there is laid up for me the crown of righteousness, which the Lord, the righteous Judge will give me on that day." So, we can say, "Yeah, Paul, of course, yeah, he's a big Bible dude. He's the ultimate apostle." But that's not where he stops.

Then he says, "and not to me only but also to all who live all who… live a perfect life." Oh no, it doesn't say it, "all who have loved His appearing." All who loved God. You see Paul says he was assured of the fact he would be in the family of God. He would make it. And not just Paul, he says, "All who look forward to the Kingdom of God. All who look forward to Christ's return. All who allow that vision to impact their life and change it, and strive to live according to God's way and His law and His love." Now, we have that vision? We have that perspective? We're told here, we will make it. We will make it. And of course, yeah, we have to be balanced. I'm not saying, "Well, once saved, always saved." We're not talking about all that sort of thing. But we're talking about what God's intent is for each and every one of us. In fact, His intent is for all mankind, isn't it? Didn't Peter write that? He doesn't wish any to perish, but for all to come to repentance, He wants all to be there.

And of course, when we look at the apostle Paul, look at Romans, Romans 8. Right at the very beginning of chapter 8, Paul says some interesting things here especially as he considered his own life. Chapter 7 is an amazing section of scripture as Paul addresses his own life. And that's where he says things like, "Wow, the one who wants to do good, there's evil right there at the door." And he says, "Why is it that this keeps happening to me? You know, why is it that when I want to do good, I do evil?" So that's where the apostle Paul was you know, "Why is it that I want to do good, but then I don't even do it? Why is it that I'm striving to do good, but then there's evil present with me?" He just got saying all these things. And he sees the solution. He says, "Who will deliver me?" Verse 24 of chapter 7, "Who'll deliver me from this body of death? I thank God through Jesus Christ." That's my Savior. I have a Savior. I can be justified. I can be forgiven. I can be made right in His eyesight.

And when that's the case, when I am in a repentant frame of mind, that's where chapter 8 verse 1 comes to play. "There is therefore now no condemnation to those who are in Christ Jesus, who don't walk according to the flesh, but according to the Spirit." And, of course, it doesn't say, "Those who walk perfectly..." According to the... no. Those that are striving to live that way and when they're out of line, they repent, and they change, and they get back on that tightrope and they keep walking. That's what Paul says here. Verse 2, he says, "The law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus has made me free from the law of sin and death." In other words, I don't have to face death. I have a Savior. I have a Savior when I sin. And when I repent and call on Him, He immediately reaches out and grabs me, and saves me.

He says in verse 3, "For what the law could not do in that it was weak through the flesh, God did by sending His own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh on account of sin: and He condemned sin in the flesh," So, no amount of Sabbath keeping can save me. No amount of law keeping makes me right with God. He says, "That Savior, Christ." He says, "He fulfilled that righteous requirement of the law in us who do not walk according to the flesh, but according to the Spirit.” So, Paul says, "Boy, I am less than perfect. I don't measure up. I have sinned, and I continue to sin, and I continue to fall short of the standard of Jesus Christ." But when I repent, He shows Christ fills the gap. He fills that gap. And as we strive to live that way, He's in us and lives through us. And we can be justified by His sacrifice. So, our belief, our faith, our trust that His sacrifice does cover our sin. So that when I sin, I repent and I go before God. And I tell Him, "I don't want to live this way. Save me." And He says, "You're forgiven. You're justified. You're declared righteous."

And repentance, and of course it starts with baptism, begins that path. And of course, it doesn't instantly make us righteous. We know that. I have to remain justified by living a righteous life, by putting on godly character. I have to behave in a righteous way from then on after I repent. That's my goal. And when I don't, I go before God again and He forgives us. He justifies us. And I strive to put on that character of Christ. And that's coming close to God. In fact, Romans 8:35, he paints that picture even more thoroughly as we get to the end of the chapter. If you look down at verse 35, this is an amazing verse, isn't it? Says, "Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword?" We could say, or sin. Yeah, sin separates us from God, but when we repent, God couldn't hold us any closer. And He's singing over us.

So, he says, “As is written: ‘For Your sake we are killed all day long; we're accounted as sheep for the slaughter.’” Yeah, sin kills us. It takes life from us. It can steal our faith. Yet, the focus on God and true repentance, verse 37, he says, "Yet in all of these things we are more than conquerors through Him who loved us." And so, Paul says, "I'm persuaded neither death nor life, or angels nor principalities nor powers, things present or things to come, nor height or depth, nor any other created thing, shall separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord." Nobody's going to pry us out of God's arms. Nobody's going to make Him quit singing over us. No one's going to steal us away. Of course, we could say, "Yeah, forget it God. I don't want to do that," yeah, we could. But God's not that way. He won't allow that to happen. He wants us in His family.

In fact, he powerfully says that very thing in Philippians 1:3. When those nagging thoughts of doubt and fear and worry come into our minds and we can't shake it, maybe we should think of Philippians 1:3 because it's certainly a reminder of God's perspective. When we strive to follow His way, here's what God thinks about us. Philippians 1:3, Paul says, "I thank God upon every remembrance of you, always in every prayer of mine making requests for you with all joy," thinking of the Philippians, they treated Paul in an amazing manner. But he also says that in verse 5, "for your fellowship in the gospel from the first day until now," Paul was very thankful about their wonderful trait of helping, and serving, and giving. And he reminds them, verse 6, "being confident of this very thing, that He who has begun a good work in you will complete it until the day of Jesus Christ."

At baptism, we made a commitment to God. We could say we… I mean that was the starting point, we might say. Yeah, we know the calling came before that but if that's the starting point of baptism, what's going to happen next? Will I make it? Does God really care? Well, He says He began a good work in you. And what's His intention? God doesn't like half-finished buildings. He says, "I will complete it. I will complete it." And He says those types of things over and over and over again. The apostle John is one who oftentimes referred to the amazing character of God in His insight and perspective on us. Look at John 10:28. John 10:28, another one of those passages when we have those overriding thoughts of guilt, those overriding thoughts of doubt, those overriding thoughts of discouragement.

John 10:28 is one we can put our name right in here, and it is fact. Notice what God tells us and reminds us. Christ tells us, "I give them eternal life, and they shall never perish; neither shall anyone snatch them out of My hand." You see, we're not up for grabs. When we focus on God, Satan doesn't have a chance. There isn't a chance of that. Sin doesn't have power over us. No one can snatch us out of God's hands. He loves us and He gives us eternal life, so we can look forward to that. In fact, John was inspired to continue to write about that in his epistles. If you go to 1 John 2:25, let's notice just a couple of other encouraging passages here. 1 John 2:25, when doubt and discouragement and worry come to us, maybe we could think of 1 John. There's several passages here that are amazing promises, 1 John 2:25 is one of them.

Here's what God inspired John to write. He wrote, "And this is the promise that He has promised us—" What's the promise? “Eternal life.” Eternal life. It's not, "Well, I'll think about it." This is a promise of God. He has promised. Does God have to swear by anybody? Does He have to put His hand on the Bible? No. God said it. That's it. He's promised it. In fact, if you go over a page, well at least my Bible, chapter 3 verse 1, 1 John 3:1, "Behold what manner of love the Father has bestowed on us,” on you, “that we should be called children of God!" He already sees it as a done deal. We are His children. How much does God love? Don't short God's love. It's an amazing love that He pours out on us. In fact, 1 John 5:13 is such an encouraging reminder. Let's notice what John says here as he nears the end of this first epistle.

1 John 5:13, he says, "These things I have written to you who believe in the name of the Son of God, that you may know that you have eternal life." We've already been given the down payment of God's Holy Spirit. He wants us to know that we have eternal life. And, then he goes on, "that you may continue to believe in the name of the Son of God," you see, God wants us to have that perspective. Our Rescue, our Savior is right there. His sacrifice is our rescue, and our faith and our trust in that that frames our life. And so, John says we should go forward in faith. We should have a confidence in our belief for with faith, we have that trust in His sacrifice, that it does cover our sin, and that He will justify us, and He will qualify us. And when we keep all of these passages in mind, there is no doubt, we can say with confidence, “I will make it. There's no doubt.”