Thank you, our children worship team for leading us such a great singing worship to the Lord Jesus! Boys and girls, still remember what Director Sheen was talking to you about last Sunday? Yeah, “Walk in Love!” And before, you also have learned “Walk in Wisdom“ and “Walk in Truth!” Now today, Pastor is going to give you another one: “Walk in Faith.”
Well, the question is what is “Faith?” I would like to ask Joyce to read from Hebrews 11:1-3 for us:
“Now faith is confidence in what we hope for and assurance about what we do not see. 2 This is what the ancients were commended for. 3 By faith we understand that the universe was formed at God’s command, so that what is seen was not made out of what was visible.”
Faith is though you don’t see it but you have strong conviction and confidence that it is true for sure and you put a great hope on it. We didn’t see thar God created the whole world, but we are convinced that God did. We didn’t see Jesus in person and we have never seen He died on the cross for our sins and He was raised on the third day. But with our understanding of the Bible we believe it and trust in the Lord Jesus. This is “faith.” And we put our great hope on it that we will have eternal life in the Lord Jesus. The faith does not come by following blindly or believing without understanding, The faith we have is rooted on the truth of the Bible that we believe our living God is the creator of the universe, He loved us and sent His one and only Son Jesus to die on the cross for our sins. As long as we believe in Jesus, He died for our sins and He was raised from the dead, our sins are all washed away, we then become the children of God and we will have eternal life. Our faith motivates us to obey God’s commands which are revealed to us in the Bible. Pastor would like to give you from the Bible a good example of a person with very strong faith: what God said to him, he fully believed it and obeyed it without any doubt – Yeah! this is Noah who made an ark according to God’s commands. Let’s watch a video. <video play of Noah’s ark>
Waah, what a faithful person Noah was! Well, Joyce can you read from Hebrews 11:6-7 for us?
“6 And without faith it is impossible to please God, because anyone who comes to him must believe that he exists and that he rewards those who earnestly seek him. 7 By faith Noah, when warned about things not yet seen, in holy fear built an ark to save his family. By his faith he condemned the world and became heir of the righteousness that is in keeping with faith.”
Yeah, without faith, we are not going to please God. See Noah, no matter how difficult it was, and how long it took to build the ark, he just did it without any complaint or grumbling. He just fully trusted in God. Anyone know how many years Noah built the ark? – It took him 120 years to build this ark, can you have such faith for 120 years to build a strange boat which nobody knew what the purpose was? Noah did it throughout many teasing and mocking from the surrounding people. His holy fear and trust in God equipped Noah to act on his faith, God was happy for Noah, and bless him and his offsprings abundantly.
Now how to let God be happy for you in your daily life?“ Can you have the same faith as Noah did? Living by faith means trusting God’s promises and that he has a good plan even when things don’t seem to be going right. Jesus wants us to walk in His faith: follow His example of showing complete obedience to God as 2 Corinthians 5:7 says: “For we live by faith, not by sight.” – This will please our God and we will enjoy our lives through our obedience to God.
Alright, lastly, the very crucial thing is how can we walk in faith? Pastor have 3 points for you to learn:
- You have to believe in Jesus and be willing to let Him be your Lord (master) for your life. As we are saying to follow Jesus’ example to walk in faith, if we don’t believe in Him, how could we follow His example? Therefore, firstly, we have to believe and trust in Jesus, accept Him as our Savior and our Lord.
- You have to keep God’s commands in order to obey them. Where can we find God’s commands – form the Bible, right? Therefore, everyone of us will need to read Bible diligently, alright? In addition, you also need to attend the Sunday worship and Sunday school that your teachers and pastor will teach you understand God’s words. Boys and girls, can you promise to have daily Bible reading and attend Sunday worship and Sunday school consistently?
- You have to ask God to help you to keep a good faith – From time to time you may face difficulty to obey God’s commands or you may feel so weak and are so scared about your future that you are losing your faith. Don’t be afraid, God always sends the Holy Spirit to help us. And the Lord Jesus is willing to comfort us and strengthen us. What we need to do is to “Pray” to PUSH God. Yeah, pray to God until something happens!
P – Pray
U – Until
S – Something
H – Happens.
Yes, keep praying to God until something happens!
Let’s review the three points we need to have in order to “walk in faith:”
- You have to believe in Jesus and accept Him as your Lord for your life; 2. You have to read Bible regularly in order to obey God commands faithfully; 3. You have to pray consistently.
Let’s bow our head and pray: “Our heavenly father, thank you for that the Lord Jesus has shown to us the good example of the obedience to God, the Father! We can just follow our Lord Jesus to live a life of faith. Some of our children may have not believed in Jesus, Pastor would like to invite you to accept Jesus as your personal Savior and the Lord for your life, so that you can build your faith in Jesus under God’s promises. Holy Spirit, please help our children build a good habit of Bible reading, so that our children will know and obey God’s commands faithfully. Keep us under your protection and your guidance when we pray earnestly. Thank you, our heavenly Father and the Lord Jesus for your love and faithfulness, that we should courageously walk in faith. In the Lord Jesus’ name we pray, Amen!