Last sermon in the series of sermons on the ABC of faith

Yesterday afternoon I delivered the concluding sermon in the series of sermons on the ABC of faith. In this series, the focus was on how to live our faith. The reason for preaching this series, putting particular emphasis on living our faith, was that generally from a doctrinal point of view most church members are quite able to tell what we as churches stand for. We treasure our confessions. Often we have no difficulty either in quoting specific texts fitting the occasion, be it to comfort or to warn fellow members.
I don’t want to deny how important all this is. However, now to live it as well, practising what we say – often that’s much more difficult. This is a struggle for all of us on a daily basis. Well, this is why this series was preached with the aim to equip the saints in this daily battle, as a reminder of what God requires of us in living our faith to the glory of His Name and the well-being of our neighbour.

Throughout this series quite a number of active verbs had the attention, each time one verb being allocated to a specific letter of the alphabet, all active verbs, i.e. all do-words focusing on how to live our faith in the nitty gritty of everyday life. Twenty-four verbs had the attention. Twenty-four - since I started this series with focusing on a promise. Starting with the first letter of the alphabet, the letter ‘A,’ the focus was on the word ‘Amen’. The text was 2 Cor. 1, 20, where it reads that all God’s promises are ‘Yes’ and ‘Amen’ in Jesus Christ.

One may wonder, why first a promise and there after all active verbs. The reason for this was in living our faith we need God’s promises to hold on to, God’s ‘Yes’ to us in Jesus Christ as the sure foundation of our life. It is only on this sure foundation, knowing that daily we are sustained by God’s grace, only in this way we are able to live the life God wants us to live in active faith.

For this same reason, I also concluded this series with focusing on God’s promises. Looking back on all the active verbs that were dealt with, showing us how God wants us to live, one may wonder, “LORD, who am I to live up to this high standard. LORD, I’m weak.” Well, that's why concluding this series, I wanted to come back to where I had started started, namely that we can do this, yet only by daily being sustained by God, who Himself as the Alpha and the Omega, the Beginning and the End, will complete His work in us, by His zeal bringing it to final glory.

Thus dealing with the letter ‘Z’, the focus was on the zeal of Him who is not only the Alpha, the ‘A’ of everything, but also the Omega, the ‘Z’ of everything. Two text were chosen:

Isaiah 9 : 7b. where it reads that the zeal of the LORD of hosts will perform it

Rev. 22 : 13, where the glorified Christ reveals Himself as the Alpha and The Omega (The A and the Z)

How to receive strength in faith...

It is not within our power to create the wind or to change its direction, but we raise our sails to catch it when it comes.  We do not create electricity, yet we can tap into it with a wire that will conduct it, allowing it to work.

We do not control God's Spirit, but we can place ourselves before the Lord out of obedience to what He has called us to do, and we will come under the influence and power of His mighty breath.

From "Stream in the Desert", June 5