Hebrews 12:1-3

ABMF · Jul 20, 2013

“the author and finisher of our faith” Hebrews 12:1-3
Who is the Author of your faith? Is it God or the Flesh?
Do you trust Jesus Christ for your Finances according to Matthew 6:33 or The Finance Company and your ability to earn money through this world’s financial schemes and debts?
Do you trust Jesus Christ for your health or do you trust the Doctors and the medical system and health insurance?
Do you Trust Jesus Christ for your protection and the protection of your Items? Or do you carry insurance on them or on yourself?
Who is your Faith in? The medical system, the insurance company, the credit card, or the college education?
Where are you laying up your treasure of your investments and savings? Is it God and His Kingdom? Or is it the latest fad on the stock market and the best 401k and IRA?
Now many people will say “both” as an answer to many of these questions because they will not be honest with themselves and don’t want to fall into the category of “not trusting God.”
To digress for a moment to explain that a 401k, college education and saving your money are not signs of not trusting God in and of themselves, however it is the heart motive behind them that counts.
Going into debt to borrow money from the world finance systems, or getting health, wealth and life insurance or dependency on the medical system of this world do indicate the clear unscriptural placement and authorship of one’s faith. Many will fall into the area of not knowing any better of how to trust God alone in all these areas. Still others will know and have heard God’s word regarding the matters of trusting Him and gone on with doing it their own way. These two groups are both going to suffer loss of reward; just one is going to suffer worse than the other.
This is not written to those who already know, but to the ones who do not. Why? So that you can take heed that God and His word do have an opinion of how a life of faith looks and is to be lived. The Bible gives many clear principles on how to live a life of faith. If you do not live a life of faith according to the scriptures you cannot be pleasing to God. You are not given an assurance of God’s highest rewards in the life to come and are excluded from many categories of richness in Him apart from faith. It is not so much a question of salvation being lost, but who wants to be saved as if by fire? Or as some say “the skin of your teeth”? Seek to walk by faith totality, in complete discipleship and submission to God.

Bookends · Jul 20, 2013

Hey ABMF, don't put the Lord your God to the test.

ABMF · Jul 20, 2013

Bookends said:

Malachi 3:10
Bring all the tithes into the storehouse,
That there may be food in My house,
And try Me now in this,”
Says the Lord of hosts,
“If I will not open for you the windows of heaven
And pour out for you such blessing
That there will not be room enough to receive it.

I think you were trying to say do not tempt the Lord your God. Faith is not temptation of God but obedience.

Woe to those who call evil good, and good evil;
Who put darkness for light, and light for darkness;
Who put bitter for sweet, and sweet for bitter!
Or you could say those who call trust God alone for all your needs and life evil and trust the world and its systems good.

eternally-gratefull · Jul 20, 2013

ABMF said:

Malachi was written to Israel (a nation) where they had provisions to take care of the people in the time of need.

God gave us doctors, banks and everything your dissing.

Don't tempt God. He uses doctors all the time.

ABMF · Jul 20, 2013

eternally-gratefull said:

Well God gave doctors for the same reason He allowed divorce. If God does indeed use doctors then its because of His great mercy and love. He will bless what He did not start and use what He will not inhabit. Your warning to not tempt God is a good one. Don't tempt Him. However trusting Him and Him alone for your needs according to the principles of scripture are not tempting Him therefore is not an accurate phrase if your attempting to use it to rebut trusting God by faith.

eternally-gratefull · Jul 20, 2013

ABMF said:

Sorry, But when a loved one dies because you are "trusting God and not doctors" and thus do not seek medical treatment, And your loved one dies. You have tempted God and lost.

This is a dangerous slippery slope your treading on.

I agree with credit cards. I do not have any,, but some of the stuff is out of line.

ABMF · Jul 20, 2013

eternally-gratefull said:

Its never wrong to trust God and His word. Its never sin to obey Him. Each person will make their own choice. If you want to go to a doctor then go. However I remember a king once who took an oath to serve God, then He got sick in His feet and sought the physicians. I also remember where scripture says cursed is the man who trusts in man and who makes the arm of the flesh his strength.

ABMF · Jul 20, 2013

eternally-gratefull said:

Scare tactics to turn people away from trusting God by faith for their health is an age old one. But how many can you record that trusted the arm of the flesh (doctors and medicine) that didn't die? Many act like they are going to get out of this life alive. Its better to die in Faith, trusting God then to extend your life in doubt and unbelief. Death is a sure thing for most, however there are few who will get to skip it. Its better to walk live and die by faith then to cling to doubt and unbelief. I actually know of a few people who walked with God by faith who made it out alive and they are recorded. AND If true faith is present as recorded in God's word? Its better then the medical system!

unclefester · Jul 20, 2013

ABMF said:

Just thinking here as I'm reading this ... and hoping that your children, if you have any, get to make their own choice(s) regarding doctor visits or not. Over n' out.

ABMF · Jul 20, 2013

unclefester said:

Well you are not the first to have that sort of concern over children. I have heard of this fear and excuse not to believe God before. Infact its written of in the Bible.

God Rejected the people of israel for not believing and complaining.

Tell me, How many children die per year by the hands of the medical system? Lets take out abortion rates to be fair.

"But your little ones, whom you said would be victims, I will bring in, and they shall know the land which you have despised."

Despise God and His call to walk by faith and you may end up knowing His rejection. Walk by faith with God and you will be pleasing to Him.

eternally-gratefull · Jul 20, 2013

ABMF said:

Scare tactics to get people to think they are not trusting God and thus not seeking medical help should be called murder. Your a danger to the church and society!

It reminds of an old poem, although I may mess it up!

Once upon a time there was a man that lived by the river. He heard a radio report that the river was going to rush up and flood the town. The report said that the whole town should evacuate immediately. But the man said, " I trust God. God loves me. God will save me." But the waters began to rise. A man in a rowing boat came along and he shouted. 'Hey! Hey you! You up there. The town is flooding. I can take you to safety.' But the man shouted back: "I trust God, I pray. God loves me. God will save me." A helicopter came hovering overhead. A guy with a megaphone shouted. 'Hey! You there! The town is fully flooded. Let me drop down a ladder and I will help you to safety.' But the men shouted back that he trusted God, that he prayed, that God loved him and that God would take him to safety. The man then drowned. When he got to the pearly gates of St Peter, he demanded an audience with God. 'Lord,' he said, 'I Trusted you!, I prayed. I thought you loved me. Why did this happen?' God said, 'I sent you a radio report, a helicopter, and a guy in a rowing boat. What else did you expect me to do?'

ABMF · Jul 20, 2013

eternally-gratefull said:

ITs is never wrong to get people to examine God's word and what it has to say regarding total trust and faith in Him. You again try to paint Faith as something its not. Faith would see that the answer to prayer was the radio helicopter and boat. Faith is not stupid. However Faith is smart enough to know that its not natural to take poison to feel better(but worse in other ways(they call it side affects) get cut up and have to pay thousands of dollars for things that don't even cure you but just help you cope. Attempts at making faith seem stupid, but yet its smart to take pills get sliced and diced by people who kill more than a 747 plane load of people crashing every year and kill more people then guns do in america, and you should trust them is smart?

ABMF · Jul 21, 2013

eternally-gratefull said:

[h=3]Philippians 4:19 Ephesians 3:20, Romans 13:8, 1 Peter 2:24, Mark 11:24, Matthew 21:22 Psalm 103:3, 107:20,
Isaiah 53:4-5 (with its literal translation of sickness pains and diseases) [/h]

oldhermit · Jul 21, 2013

ABMF, I have some things I would like to share with you on this but the comments are rather long. They are simply my observations on this topic. If you would like I can send them to you P M or if you don't mind a couple of rather long posts I can place them on the thread. I hope they will help.

oldhermit · Jul 21, 2013

oldhermit said:

From the comments I have read from the other posters I think it may be something all need to hear. I will leave it up to you.

unclefester · Jul 21, 2013

ABMF said:

Well you are not the first to have that sort of concern over children. I have heard of this fear and excuse not to believe God before. Infact its written of in the Bible.

God Rejected the people of israel for not believing and complaining.

Tell me, How many children die per year by the hands of the medical system? Lets take out abortion rates to be fair.

"But your little ones, whom you said would be victims, I will bring in, and they shall know the land which you have despised."

Despise God and His call to walk by faith and you may end up knowing His rejection. Walk by faith with God and you will be pleasing to Him.

Ya ever been to a dentist ?

RedTent · Jul 21, 2013

This thread is making me question my walk with the Lord and to think things through.

Do I go to the doctor because the Lord gave me that way of coping with keeping my body (my temple) or because I don't trust the Lord to care for me? If Christ broke his leg when he lived as a man, what would He do? I think God would choose to heal that body miraculously, but I think God would ask me to go get a cast put on so He can heal it.

If I say Lord, I have fear about my house. God would say to trust Him, but also that He gave insurance to help me, too.

When Christ was in the desert, just before His work as His Father had set Him to do, the devil told Him to jump off a cliff to prove His faith in His Father. Christ would not do it. Christ said we weren't to test Him.

My sister is disgusted with me because I lock my home so seldom. I put my things under the Lord's care. I have worked at training myself not to lose things for 83 years, I still lose keys. So I often leave it unlocked. I think that is wiser than the expense of a locksmith to get in. Trying to hide a key outside is dangerous, too. She says I am purposely putting myself in danger and it disgusts her.

OwenHeidenreich · Jul 21, 2013

ABMF said:

I like this, the differences between these lifestyles has been on my mind.

However, we can't expect those people who trust in doctors to just drop their doctor because Jesus. This type of faith has to be lived before they make commitments like that.

I really like this because many people think that they have to "build their own faith"

DOES AN APPLE TREE TRY TO BEAR APPLES? NO IT JUST DOES IT. IT JUST BEARS APPLES.

It's the same with us, we shouldnt try to build our faith on jesus by our own faith, because Jesus can build his faith in us.

Many people want to always remain in control of their life by the things that they see.

If somebody has to truly rely on actual faith, people start to lose their faith because we have been trained, as a church, to live by what we see instead of by what we believe.

ABMF · Jul 21, 2013

oldhermit said:

You are welcome to post them. Go for it.

oldhermit · Jul 21, 2013

ABMF said:

[FONT=Times New Roman, serif]Dyadic reasoning is reflexive, always folding back on itself. It is never able to extend across the horizon into the eternal. It can never be linked to biblical faith because it is played out on the assumption that natural process is the causative agency in the universe. Dyadic reasoning is representative of how people generally relate to their world. If God is considered at all, it is only at the nominal level or even as a benign factor. We often give lip service to God as the controller of the universe but we speak and act as if nothing can happen that does not fit within the pattern of natural processes. In times of drought, man invariably seeks an answer to the question of cause and effect within these parameters. We pray for rain and then check with the weatherman to see if there is a possibility of rain. If the [/FONT][FONT=Times New Roman, serif]El Niño [/FONT][FONT=Times New Roman, serif]pattern does not favor us then we simply resign ourselves to the perceived certainty of a season with little or no rainfall hoping that next year will be different. Instead of petitioning the Lord to overturn this statistical regularity, we engage in predictive discourse that disregards the power of God to intervene. We place our expectation not upon God but upon the “certainty” of weather patterns and then wonder why our prayers go unanswered.

[/FONT][FONT=Times New Roman, serif]Another characteristic of dyadic reasoning is man’s attempt to gain control of his circumstance by the exercise of human will and intelligence and the martialing of human resources. We expend a great deal of energy and effort trying to become causative agents for our own interests. We labor under the delusion that human effort is the only causative force upon which we can depend. One can find any number of examples of dyadic reasoning in scripture. One of the most glaring example would have to be that of Abraham and Sarah and their conspiracy to take maters in their own hands in order to produce an heir. Rather than relying upon God to overturn all physiological barriers, they choose to rely upon human reasoning to produce a son. They rationalize their biological conditions, utilize their resources (in this case Hagar) and Ishmael is the result. This dyadic approach to problem solving not only invited the disfavor of God, but it also had far reaching consequences in human history. The world is still confronted with the fallout from this act of faithlessness. Scripture is filled with example after example of this kind of reasoning and God always regards this as unfaithfulness. All Abraham and Sarah had to do was simply trust in the promise of the Lord without regard for the time element. Dyadic reasoning will not trust in something that is beyond one’s own power to manipulate. The idea that we are not in control of our own circumstances is somehow very distasteful to us.

[/FONT][FONT=Times New Roman, serif]From that time to this, dyadic reasoning has not lost its hold on the human mind. We continue to entrust the outcome of our circumstances to human wisdom. In any given situation, man takes all of the resources at his command and tries to bring them to bear upon his circumstances in an attempt to force an outcome that is favorable to him. We certainly do this with regard to economic security. One may spend an[/FONT] [FONT=Times New Roman, serif]entire lifetime planning for those long awaited retirement years. A man secures a good job with a promising future. He works and saves hoping to create a sense of security against the time when he is no longer able to work. He builds a retirement fund network of stocks, bonds, I.R.A’s, mutual investments and other similar forms of perceived
financial securities. He may also[/FONT] [FONT=Times New Roman, serif]invest in some form of insurance that he feels will provide adequate coverage against [/FONT][FONT=Times New Roman, serif]catastrophic illness, disability, or death. He takes every precaution conceivable to ensure[/FONT] [FONT=Times New Roman, serif]the future care of himself and his loved ones with the expectation of enjoying this time of leisure (only to become a statistic and die within six months after his retirement).

[/FONT][FONT=Times New Roman, serif]Now, I am not suggesting there is anything wrong with these preparations. One may even argue that they are prudent. The problem is not that one utilizes these resources, but that he relies upon them as though they are determinant for his future security. What man does not often consider is that all of these things can fail by reason of events that are completely beyond his ability to control. What then, where does one find security when all human antecedents fail? In Matthew 6:31-32 Jesus says, “[/FONT][FONT=Times New Roman, serif]Do not be anxious saying what shall we eat, or what shall we drink, or with what shall we cloth ourselves? The Father in heaven knows that
you have need of these things.[/FONT][FONT=Times New Roman, serif]” We are not sure that we can trust this type of language. Emotionally we accept it as truth because the Lord said it, but intellectually we do not trust it because it does not fit our picture of how things work in the “real” world. After all, I cannot simply sit at home and expect that the Lord will just dump a load of groceries at my doorstep. To surrender ourselves to this type of language is to place ourselves at risk of being naked, going hungry or being thirsty. We are more prone to believe that we cannot completely entrust these things to God and expect satisfaction. We somehow feel more secure entrusting these things to our own efforts and then giving lip service to God for them.

In the movie Shenandoah, there is a scene where the character Charlie Anderson (played by Jimmy Stuart) is gathered with his children around the table for their evening meal. He stands at the head of the table to “give thanks” for the food. In his prayer he says, “[/FONT][FONT=Times New Roman, serif]Lord, we cleared this land, we plowed it, sewed it, and harvested it. We cooked the harvest. It would not be here and we would not be eating it if we had not done it all ourselves. We worked dog bone hard for every crumb and morsel but we thank you just the same anyway Lord for this food we are about to eat, amen.[/FONT][FONT=Times New Roman, serif]” In this prayer, he accepts all the credit for what they have based on their own labors and efforts dismissing any divine involvement in the process. He then offers a non-committal “[/FONT][FONT=Times New Roman, serif]thank
you just the same anyway[/FONT][FONT=Times New Roman, serif].” What a vain and empty prayer! Most of us would never think of being so overt in speaking to God in this manor but we demonstrate this type of thinking in the way we deal with everyday issues of life. If the flowers of the field expend no effort or demonstrate anxiety over the things they need for their everyday existence, what makes us believe that any efforts of ours would have any more value to supply our daily needs? Are not we more precious to God than a bunch of flowers? Now, this does not relieve us from the responsibility to work. This is a mandate from the Lord. “[/FONT][FONT=Times New Roman, serif]If a man will not work, neither let him eat,[/FONT][FONT=Times New Roman, serif]” 2Thessalonians 3:10. What we must understand is that our labors are not causal they are incidental for [/FONT][FONT=Times New Roman, serif]“all good and perfect gifts come from the Lord.” [/FONT][FONT=Times New Roman, serif]James 1:17.[/FONT]
[FONT=Times New Roman, serif] [/FONT][FONT=Times New Roman, serif].[/FONT]

Hebrews 12:1-3

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