Will He Find Faith?

Before going into this week's theme, I want to let you know that I've decided to continue on with writing these little devotional thoughts for awhile more; if/when we switch back to reviewing books, I'll give you sufficient time to be able to order whatever the next book is.

Luke 18:8b - "...when the Son of Man comes, will he find faith on earth?" This was asked by Jesus Himself in the context of teaching His disciples about the end of the age and emphasizing the need of persevering, unceasing prayer in the face of all that will be happening then. As we are approaching the end of the age, it's really important that we know what Jesus says to those who will be living then; so this question about His finding faith on the earth is critical for us.

As with all of these simple devotional topics, this topic is massive and it's tempting to want to go deeply into the topic. However, I will treat it simply and trust the Holy Spirit to take you wherever He wants to take you with the little that I share. The following are some implications to Jesus' question in Luke 18:

• First of all, the mere question that Jesus asks implies that faith is of utmost importance to the Lord and is what He will look for when He returns. I don't believe this refers to the faith of a past initial experience by which I was united to the Lord Jesus through the work of the cross and the Holy Spirit. I believe it is speaking of present, living faith. As one of my spiritual leaders says, "What a believer does is believe..." We are to be believing God all the time and as we do, we are built up in the faith and prepared to be faith-full at the end of the age when our faith is tested as never before.
• What is faith? One way of seeing it is that faith is wholeheartedly agreeing with God; in other words, it's an embracing of Him and His truth to the point of actually taking the risk of living as though it is true! It's an expression of trust in Who He is and what He does. It is choosing to live as though He and His Word are correct even when everything around me screams that He is not true. It is expressed in our decisions and in our talk.
• How do we get faith? Faith can't be cranked up somehow by some kind of spiritual gymnastics. Romans 10 tells us that faith comes by hearing the word of Christ; in other words, we must get to know Him intimately so that we trust Him and His words; the Scripture is where we discover what He is like and what He has done and promises to do, so we must be in the Scriptures regularly with an attitude of submission to the Holy Spirit (prayer and fasting are important if we want to get living understanding of the Word, of Jesus). I believe that another way that faith grows in us is to lean strongly on the reality that Jesus Himself is praying that our faith will not fail when the test comes. What a boost to faith when we stop long enough to enjoy this truth and take the time to let it seep deeply into our inner heart and mind.

The reason it matters that I grow in faith is that when I slip into unbelief and fear, I am not in harmony with God's ways and resort to all kinds of fleshly solutions, bringing about destructive consequences rather than the life of Jesus. I've observed this in myself and am asking the Holy Spirit to alert me to when fear and unbelief are pushing me towards the flesh. We have plenty of evidence in Scripture and in our own lives of where the flesh takes us and what it produces in pain and difficulty.

We get this short life now to grow in love and faith in God and to learn to live as though we truly believe Him; no promise of His comes into being without faith, and I love it that it's not primarily about how I feel in a given moment or a given situation but about the hard core decisions that I make in alignment with His character and His works because I trust that what He says is more true than all the circumstances and feelings that swirl about me.

The testings we go through now are to prepare us for that which is yet to come to test our faith at the end of the age. When He comes, He will be looking for those with living, persevering faith who have stayed true to Him without offense.

So Lord, come and "kiss" our hearts with Your Word as we look into it. Give us ears to hear what the Spirit is saying to us in these critical days; give us a spirit of prayer as we approach Your Word so that it penetrates deeply and does its good work of creating faith within us. Thank You for Your Word and for the power of Your Spirit to interpret it to us and to make Jesus known to us.