Hebrews 11:6 part 2
Yesterday, we saw that the Christian pleases God, because the Christian believes that God is, and that He is generous. We please God, not because we deserve His favour, but through faith in Him.
But faith also turns everything that we do to serve and worship God into things that please Him. The whole of Hebrews 11 tells us about the things that the old testament heroes did, but the deeds by themselves didn’t please God. Rather it was the faith that enabled them to do these things that pleased God.
It is the same with us. This is how we live the Christian life. For example, this is how we pray. We pray because God exists. What would be the point of praying if He were not God?
We pray because we believe He is generous. He rewards those who seek Him. This is not a reward in the sense of repayment. We don’t earn the answers to prayer, but we come because we know He is generous. Faith sees who God is and so we come with confidence and the Lord is pleased with our faith.
Sometimes we turn our praying (or our witnessing to Jesus, or our giving) into a work to earn God’s answer. We think to ourselves, “if I pray enough, or I pray with the right words, or if I pray with enough passion, then God will be pleased and will answer me.” But it is faith that pleases God. Faith glorifies God because it trusts Him. We show that we need Him. It is not the prayers (or the witnessing or the giving) by themselves that please God, but the faith that enables us to pray (or witness or give).
So let’s search our hearts and make sure that we are not pursuing prayers or giving or serving by themselves, but that we are doing these things because we believe Him. Where our faith is shaky, let’s cultivate our faith by feeding it the truth, so that we are truly assured that God is and that He rewards those who seek Him.
The best is yet to come 