Der Samuel's June 25th, 2023 Sermon
Beloved faithful, today we will review faith, the third gift of the Holy Spirit.
According to the apostle Paul, faith is assurance for things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen (Hb 11:1). This means that we have to believe in whatever we are hoping for, and we as Christians are hoping that God will resurrect us from the dead as He resurrected our Savior and Lord Jesus Christ. In other words, our faith is based on the reality of the resurrection, which is why we vary our faith from other religions. Also, we believe that God who is invisible, is existing and is doing miracles every single day in our lives, although we don’t feel it sometimes, God works in a miraculous way in our lives.
Faith is something that directs our behavior, in other words, we live our lives based on what we believe in. For example, if some people believe that lying is not a sin, but it’s a perfect way to protect their life and keep their privacy, they will live their entire life believing in this concept, or if some people believe that stealing is not a sin, but it’s a way to survive, they will keep doing that, believing that they are on the right path. Thereby, we draw our life path based on our faith, because when we believe in something, we will be convinced about that in our minds, and in our hearts we will feel that whatever we are doing is the right thing, and then we will bring it to action with a full conviction and assurance that whatever we are doing is the right thing, and thus we will come with great success with that thing.
Beloved faithful, the Gift of faith which is given us by the Holy Spirit has a little difference, because the faith that comes from the Spirit also gives us the confidence and the assurance to accept God as «Our Father». Also, the faith which is given to us by the Holy Spirit directs us to make true decisions in our lives, because we believe that God is our Father, thereby He will guide us to be his perfect children. In addition to these, the gift of the Holy Spirit will drive us to seek the good not only in our lives but also in the lives of our fellow men.
Dear sisters and brothers, in order to keep our faith in God, we have to make His will done, and to make His will done we have to work tirelessly towards that because unfortunately the world is not accepting those who are on the right path and it’s not welcoming those who want to invite people to be on the right path. It was like this 2000 years ago and it is like this until this very day. But we as Christians believe that God will protect us and strengthen us to do His will and become His perfect children.
Thereby Beloved faithful, stay firm on your truthful faith, and let us teach it to the next generation so we can protect them from the storms of lies and fiction. Let us teach them what to believe, so they can draw their path and walk through it without fear but only believing that God our Heavenly Father will bless and protect us.