People sometimes accuse me of teaching too much on faith. To my way of thinking that’s like the football player complaining because the football coach keeps making them lift weights, or the basketball player complaining because the basketball coach keeps making them run, or the karateca complaining because the sensei keeps making them do the same kata over and over and over again. Faith is the muscle of Christianity. Without faith Christianity becomes weak, powerless, and unable to do anything. Sound familiar? We’re so used to Christianity being weak, powerless and disabled that we think it’s normal.
The Bible teaches that Jesus came preaching the "Gospel of the
Kingdom of God." He said, "The time is fulfilled. The Kingdom of God
is at hand." The time is fulfilled means the time has arrived. It
means times up. It means it’s time. It doesn’t mean sometime thousands
of years from now it will be time. It means it’s time right now. Time
right now for what?
The Kingdom of God is a hand. The Kingdom of God is best understood
as opposed to the kingdom of Satan or the domination of Satan over the
lives of people. The apostle Peter after Jesus’ resurrection, when he
was preaching about Jesus, said that Jesus went about doing good and
healing all that were oppressed of the devil. The Kingdom of God is
healings and miracles and deliverances from the oppression of the
enemy. In the Gospel of John a man came to Jesus by night and said to
him, that he knew Jesus must be from God because of the miracles which
he did. Jesus responded that unless a man be born again he cannot see the
Kingdom of God. Jesus wasn’t changing the subject here. The Kingdom of
God is miracles. The Kingdom of God is God’s will being done on the
earth. Jesus came that God’s will might be done in the lives of people.
God’s will is healing not sickness therefore when Jesus sent his
disciples to heal he told them to tell the healed people, The Kingdom
of God has come unto you.
What’s this all have to do with faith? The Kingdom of God is
established through faith. One time Jesus had given his disciples power
and authority to heal, but a man came with a sick child and they were
unable to heal the child. When the disciples asked Jesus why, he said
it was because they lacked faith. Faith is the muscle of Christianity.
The reason Christianity is so weak and powerless and has to resort to
man made arguments is because of lack of faith. The apostle Paul put it
this way; The gospel is the power of God unto healing and deliverance
and protection and safety, to him that believeth.
Okay, now here’s the audio version from Sunday, October 30.
Audio: MP3 (about 45 Mins. and 44 MBs) Here’s a smaller version about 22 MBs.