Devotionals

Faith Beleiving Without Controlling

by Robert [Bob] Schaetzle Sr. 
10/29/18
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                                            Faith: Believing Without Controlling
                                           By Robert Schaetzle

“Now faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen.  For by it the men of old received divine approval.” Hebrews 11:1-2 RSV

 Making our ‘public profession’ of faith, we begin a lifelong journey of growing and learning. Learning to recognize, and understand; living by faith in God is not upon human reasoning and self-determination.

Believing in Jesus is not controlling things we are responsible for, even when we’re accountable to others. Whether that might be a manager below us, or making up our own traffic rules. Too often we tend to manipulate the way we want them.

We do this, especially in prayer. It’s far greater learning to be a good listener to obey God’s Spiritual prompting, rather than plead and ‘bargin hunt’ with God.

To paraphrase something Paul shared to the Corinthian Church; ‘What we reflect to others is not ourselves, but Jesus Christ as Lord, with ourselves as your servants for Jesus’ sake.’ 2 Corinthians 4:5

We are all ‘outreach pastors’ to grow in Christlikeness by way of God’s ‘Great Commission.’ Reaching out to reflect His presence and share with others; what it means to live by faith ‘In Christ.’ Not self!

I say in Christ, because being a new creature; cf 2 Corinthians 5:17 we want to be learning to let go the old ways of ‘self,’ in order to become more like Christ in heart attitude, to those we are with every day. Whether family, classmates at school, colleagues we work with, neighbors next door.

Faith is integral honesty with ourselves, believing without wanting to control, and not always seeing the end result.

Robert lives in Sunnyvale, Ca serving in a ‘Sharing and caring Ministry’