0:00 Good afternoon, NCCF church family. So good to see everyone today. I wanted to share today on the topic of having faith in God. And so if you could turn with me to Matthew chapter 9 and verse 29, we can start there. Matthew 9 and verse 0:19 29. In the context of this verse, we see two blind men following Jesus. And they keep following him and they cry out, "Have mercy on us, son of David." And then finally, when Jesus entered the house, these blind men came to him. 0:37 And then Jesus said to them, "Do you believe that I am able to do this?" And then these blind men said to Jesus, "Yes, Lord." And then here's the key verse in verse 29. He touched their eyes saying, "It shall be done to you according to 0:54 your faith." And that's a key verse that I wanted to speak about today. But Jesus noticed didn't ask him, "Do you want to get well?" Or "What do you want?" He says, "Do you believe? Do you believe that I'm able to do this for 1:08 you?" And if the blind men said, "No, Jesus, we don't believe," then they wouldn't have gotten anything. But because they said, "Yes," then they got according to the proportion of their faith. And that's the key point I want 1:19 to emphasize today, that what we receive from the Lord is in proportion to our faith in him. So I want to share a quick image of this. So now tech team, if it's okay, if you could pull up the the first image. And this is a little picture that I have 1:36 here that I I found really helpful. And so let's say it's raining outside. And I were to say everyone, "Hey, let's see who can collect the most rainwater." And so one person goes out and he takes a little cup and he says, "Hey, I'm going 1:49 to take this little cup and I'm going to fill up with rainwater." But then the next person says, "You know what? I got a bigger cup. So I'm going to take the red cup and put it out there." But then the third person says, 1:57 "You know what? I got a blue pail that's even bigger. I'm going to put that out there." And then lastly, the person says, "Hey, I got a big green bucket. I'm going to put it out there." Now, which of the people would you say 2:09 got the most rainwater? Well, we know the answer. It's the person that put out the green bucket. Now, is it unfair of the rain to say that the green bucket got the most water? No. It's really has to do with what the person had faith 2:22 for, how much of these buckets they had to put out. And so, my challenge is, well, in this picture we see there's four buckets. But can we imagine in our eyes is there even bigger bucket that we could put? Maybe someone decides to say, "Hey, I'm going 2:34 to put a bathtub out there to collect water." Or someone else says, "Hey, I'm going to take a swimming pool to put out there." And then the next person says, "I'm going to take an Olympic-size swimming pool to put out there." And you 2:43 can just keep on going and going. And then, you know what I think it's the the best image here of collecting water? If you look in the background for this, what is that? It's the ocean. It's the ocean. And for me, that's a picture of having 2:56 an unlimited faith in God. And that's what I really want to encourage myself and everyone in this church to have towards God, an unlimited faith towards God. Just like that ocean. It can collect as much rainwater as the 3:09 rain will will give. And may we all have that type of of faith in in the Lord. So, that's my encouragement today. So, I wanted to share a few things. The first is, what is faith? Where does faith come from? Just a little 3:20 background on that. And then secondly, I want to share about some key principles about faith. And then lastly, I want to share some key areas where we should have an unlimited faith towards God. Okay? So, those three things I want to 3:32 speak today. So, first of all, what is faith? So, if you could turn with me to Romans chapter 10 and verse 17. Let's start there. Romans chapter 10 and verse 17. Where does faith come from? 3:51 And here's the the answer. Romans 10:17 It says here that faith comes from hearing and hearing by the word of Christ. So, what faith really is saying is that I believe that what God says will be true. That's faith. Faith is believing 4:10 that what God has said will become true. But the key point is what has God said? That's the key point. What has God said? And let me use an earthly example uh just just to show an illustration. Let's say I don't know, Shawn, I'll pick on 4:23 you cuz you're back from from college. Let's say I say to Shawn and I say, "Shawn, I like you. And I have so much faith in you. And I have so much faith in you, Shawn, that tomorrow I believe you're going to give me the keys to a six-bedroom mansion and 4:35 a three three uh car garage, okay, tomorrow. I have that much faith in you." So, Shawn will look at me and says, "Well, I That's great. I'm glad you have so much faith in me about that, but I never said I was going to buy that 4:46 house for you, okay?" So, you see how kind of ridiculous that that scenario is. But in the same way, so many people in the world have that same attitude towards God. Where it says, "God Usually it's for some earthly thing, some 4:58 something very rich, something luxurious. Say, "Lord, I have faith for this. I have faith for that." But the question is, has God said that in his word or not? And if he has not said in our word, then it's not something we can 5:09 have faith for. So, that's the first thing I want to to emphasize that where does faith come from? It has to come from the word of God. Has God said it? Yes or no? And if he said it, then we can have faith for it. But nevertheless, let's say we find 5:22 something in God's word. Let we say we find a promise in God's word. Why is it that some people seem to believe in God's word more deeply than others? For example, uh it's a promise like God causes all things to work for good 5:36 and for those who uh for love him. That promise, one person can say it, but they can say it with such conviction in their hearts as it's coming from their life. They I really believe God's going to cause all things to work for my good. 5:48 But another person could take that same promise and say it but more intellectually. He's like, "Ah, I know it in my head. It's a good memory verse for me to memorize, Romans 8:28." And it's more in their head. So, why is that 5:58 difference? It's the same promise, but why is one person seem to have a cup and the other one seems to have a swimming pool? What is the difference between those two people? And that's what I want to talk about today, some of the key 6:08 principles for why some people have more faith than others. And so, if you turn with me to John chapter 5 and verse 44, let's look at that. And one of the hindrances of faith that I want to call out is the approval of men. 6:22 So, John 5 and verse 44. John chapter 5 and verse 44. So, the context is Jesus is speaking and he's speaking to these uh Jews and after he's healed this man um at the pool called Bethesda. So, this man was sick for 38 years, Jesus did this amazing miracle 6:40 and healed him. And yet, these Jews, these Jewish leaders would not believe that Jesus had done a miracle. They just simply couldn't believe it. And the question is, why? Why? And Jesus gave that answer in John 5 verse 44. 6:56 John 5:44. Jesus said this, "How can you believe when you receive glory from one another and you do not seek the glory that is from the one and only God?" So, their desire for glory from one another, that is what was their 7:12 hindrance of faith to believe in in Jesus. And we see how this is true in the lives of the the Pharisees and these Jewish leaders. For example, the Pharisees, they loved the places of honor at the banquets, they loved these 7:25 respectful greetings in the marketplaces, they loved being called rabbi by men. And it's that desire for that approval from men, that was the hindrance to their faith. And I think about that for myself. Now, maybe we might not seek for honor in the world, 7:38 but even in the church, there's such a desire to seek for a glory in the church. Maybe we want to be known as a a special brother or a special sister. Or I want people to think I'm a really spiritual a person. I want to be known 7:51 as a leader. I want to be known as this and and that. And it's so easy even in the church for that desire for approval to to come in. And I'll share a very simple test that I I've found in myself. For example, we share a lot in this 8:04 church. Yeah, we have times of sharing. And so the question is how do you know that what you've shared is good? Okay, how do you know what you've shared is good? And if you were to ask me the questions, there would be times when 8:15 after I've shared and someone's like, "Hey One Hi, what you shared was a blessing." And then in my heart I'll be like, "Oh, that's great. God must be pleased cuz somebody said, you know, I did a I did a good job. It was a 8:23 blessing." But I would never even ask God I share with what I shared was actually good or not. So, I'm just showing a very simple example where even in something as simple as that, the sharing, that it's so easy for us to 8:35 take man's approval and not seek for for God's approval. And that's something I need to um I need to be mindful of because that can be a hindrance into my faith. And I believe that if we are diligent in getting rid of this seeking 8:49 for the approval of men, it can help our faith to increase quite a bit. And so, let me share a a quick example. If we think about the Christians of today, so let's say Christians that have lived in the past 200 years. Who is a 9:01 man of faith that you think of that a modern-day man of faith? Maybe in some of your Torchlighter series. Can someone name a name? Someone who's like a man of faith. Who would it be? >> George Müller. >> George Müller, yeah. George Müller. 9:14 First person I thought of as well. George Müller. All right, thank you, Jeremy. Exactly the same person I thought of as well, okay? And we think about what happened to George Müller. Well, I remember that famous story where 9:24 one time, I think he was having breakfast with the the children and there was no food. And then he he said, "Okay, guys, let's come and let's pray and thank God for our food." There's no food and he thanks God for the food. And 9:34 then the next minute, I think the baker comes and says, "Mr. Müller, I have I thinking about you all night. Here's the bread that I baked for you." And then I think the milk cart broke outside or something. So, then all the children all 9:44 of sudden have milk. Where did this man, George Mueller, get such tremendous faith from? And I believe it has to do with this verse because here's one of the famous quotes from George Mueller. Listen to this. It says, "There's a day when I died. 10:00 Utterly died. Died to George Mueller, his opinions, preferences, tastes, and will. Died to the world, its approval or censure. Died to the approval or blame even of my brethren and friends. And since then, I have studied only to show 10:15 myself approved to God." So, here is someone who died to the approval of even the brothers in in his church, even to his friends. And the only thing he wanted was to show himself approved to God. And I believe that's a living 10:28 example of someone who really took this verse seriously of John 5:44. And because he got rid of that approval of men, he had such tremendous this faith in God. So, that's the first thing I want to say that hindrance to faith it 10:40 one hindrance to faith is the approval of men. So, that's the first thing. Another reason why some people might have more faith than others also has to do with humility. So, I'll share an example from Luke chapter 7. You can turn there with me. Luke chapter 10:54 7. You know, when Jesus was on earth, there were two people whom Jesus said had tremendous faith. Luke chapter 7 and start with verse 1. And there were two people that Jesus said, "You have tremendous faith." One is the the mother of the daughter whom 11:12 he had healed. And then the other is the Roman Centurion. So, in the interest of time, I'll just look at the story of the Roman Centurion. So, if you look at Luke chapter 7, okay? And verse 9. This is what Jesus said about that Roman Centurion. 11:28 Verse 9. Now, when Jesus heard this, he marveled at him and turned to him and said to the crowd that was following him, "I say to you, not even in Israel have I found such great faith." So, what a wonderful compliment the Centurion got. That Jesus 11:44 said he had great faith because this Centurion said, "Jesus, you don't even have to come to my home. You just say the word and my my servant will be healed." But why was this Centurion, he's not even a Jew, why was he able to 11:55 get such great faith? And one of the things we see is that he had tremendous humility. And I'll just share three examples why he had such a humility. First of all, if you look at verse six, here's what the Centurion said. Second 12:10 half of verse six. He says, "Lord, do not trouble yourself further, for I am not worthy for you to come under my roof." So, think about who is saying that. This is a Roman Centurion. So, at that time and age, these were people who 12:23 had tremendous power. They had status. They had an army of of at least 100 soldiers that they could command. So, this was a man who had tremendous status in the world. But what does he say to Jesus? He says, "Jesus, I'm not worthy for you to come to my 12:38 under my roof." That's one mark of humility. Another mark of humility is look what it says in verse five about this Centurion. He says, "For he loves our nation and it was he who built our synagogue." Can you imagine that? 12:51 Building a a building building a church, building a synagogue for the Jewish people. He could have said, "Well, Jesus, I'm at least worthy for you to come because I did this great thing for you. I built the synagogue for 13:01 you." He doesn't say that. He says, "Lord, I'm not worthy for you to come under my my roof." And then lastly, if you look at uh verse seven. Okay, one thing we see about the Centurion is that he had a tremendous care for the people um in his in his 13:17 life. In this case, it was a slave. Now, this slave, if you look at verse seven, in the second half of this, says, "My servant will be healed." The last part of verse seven. And that word servant in my Bible, the margin says boy. So, this 13:29 actually might have been actually a like a child slave, a young young person, okay? And to think that at that time slaves were treated like property. So, if you lose one property, you could go get another property. And especially for 13:42 a young child who maybe didn't have as much value, you could you could speak. But yet, he has such a tremendous care for this this little boy slave of his. Again, another mark of his humility. So, what do we see that that great humility 13:56 of his caused him to have have great faith. And so, I go back to that picture that I was saying earlier, why is it that some people have bigger buckets? Why do some people have swimming pools and oceans and others don't? I believe 14:07 these are two of the key reasons that we can keep in mind. First is making sure that we don't have the approval of men in our lives. And then secondly, it's humility. We seek for those things that cleanse us of those things, then these 14:19 buckets will in our lives will will increase for faith. So, having said that, let's say we do have an ocean like a faith like an ocean towards the Lord. Well, what should we have faith in the Lord for? Okay? What should we have 14:33 faith in the Lord for? And there's three quick areas I want to share. The first is I want to encourage all of us to have an unlimited faith towards God in his love for us. So, the tech team, if you could bring up that picture for a second. 14:49 So, I want to ask everyone a question. So, here we have three smiley faces, okay? So, the question is this, when you wake up in the morning, okay? Which of these smiley faces represents how you think God looks at you? Okay, think about that for a second. 15:04 Which of these three smiley faces, when you wake up in the morning, okay? Represents how you think God is looking at you? And the answer for that is a very telling answer, okay? Because if you were to ask me that question, 15:16 honestly I would say, "Look, I wouldn't be the mad smiley face on the left, okay? I'm not I'm not living in meaningful you know, disobedience to the law. So, I don't think the Lord is mad mad at me. So, I don't have to worry 15:26 about that one. But, I could say honestly between the smiley face and the the middle one, I'm kind of more like the the middle picture. Okay, maybe with a little bit of a frown there in that middle uh picture. So, God's not 15:37 completely happy with me, but he's just maybe in the middle. Just a little little sad, a little a little bit of frown there because I see in my life there's still things that I haven't done well enough. There's areas in my life 15:48 that I'm um I'm lacking in. But, what I have to remember is that by faith, what has Jesus done? He's forgiven me of my sins. He's made me a new person. He's helped me to be accepted before God. So, the right answer really should be the 16:00 one all the way to the right. Should be the smiley face. But, I can say in the morning when I wake up, my temptation is to go more towards that middle path. And I just want to say in faith that Lord, I believe I have an unlimited faith to 16:12 believe that Lord, you look at me with a smile when I wake up every morning. And I believe this is really important because unless we have that right smiley face picked, it hinders our ability to finish God's plan for us in our lives. 16:23 Okay, let me explain why. So, please turn with me to Matthew chapter 25. About this parable of the the talents. Matthew 25. Starting verse uh 14. And so, I think many of us have heard of this parable. This is the story where 16:40 the master goes away and he gives to these different uh slaves different amounts of talents. One's got five, one gets two, the other gets one. And the one who got the five and the two talents doubled it, and the person who 16:52 got one talent didn't get anything. Okay? But, the key thing is why did this servant who didn't do anything, why didn't he do anything? Okay, cuz that's a very key lesson for us. And if we look at Matthew 25 verse uh 25. 17:09 Let's start with actually verse 24. It says this. Master, this is the tal- the slave who got one talent. He says, "Master, I knew you to be a hard man, reaping where you did not sow, gathering where you scattered no seed. 17:22 And I was afraid and went away and hid your talent in the ground. See, you have what is yours." So, why did this slave not do anything? It's cuz he was afraid. He was afraid. He was scared of his master. But, if you think about it, did 17:35 he really have a reason to be to be scared? And think about what this slave had got. This slave received one talent from his master. One talent. That sounds small, but if you look at the definition of a talent, it says here that a talent 17:47 represents 15 years' salary. So, if a person earns, let's say $100,000 a year, a talent is worth $1.5 million. And I find it hard to believe that if someone trusts me with $1.5 million, that that person is a hard man. That 18:01 that person doesn't believe in me. So, even in this story, we see that this slave wasn't able to accomplish something even when he got $1.5 million. Why? Because he didn't have faith that God loved him. That's I believe is one 18:14 of the meanings of this. His His maybe smiley face was always that middle smiley face. He always thought there's a little bit of frown with the Lord. And because of that, he wasn't able to finish the the task that the Lord had given him to 18:25 him. So, that's one thing I want to encourage us all to have. Let's have an unlimited faith in the Lord towards his love for us so that we can finish the plans that he has for our lives. So, that's number one. The second thing I want to encourage us 18:37 to have is an unlimited faith in the Lord that he can help us to overcome sin and to give us rest in our lives. And I just want to share a a quote from uh Caleb in the book of Joshua. So, if you turn with me to the book of Joshua, 18:57 Joshua 14 and verse uh 12. Joshua 14 and verse 12. Um and the context of the story is that the Israelites had already crossed over into the the promised land and Caleb is now speaking to Joshua and says there's 19:15 more land that I I wanted to conquer. And so we know that in the Old Testament that the Israelites were told by God to go conquer physical land and conquer physical people. And in today's world, we don't conquer physical land or 19:28 people, but what we need to conquer is is sin. And then there's a rest that God has for our lives. And what I love here is that now Caleb, he's 85 years old. He's an old man now. But look at that spirit for which he's speaking in verse 19:40 12. And I'm going to read from the Living Bible uh here. And he says Caleb says, "So I'm asking that you give me the hill country." Another word for hill country is mountain, okay? "That you give me the mountain that the Lord has promised me. 19:52 You will remember that as spies we found the Anakim living in their great walled cities, but if the Lord is with me, I shall drive them out of the land." And what I love about this uh this paraphrase is the first thing. He says 20:05 that this is the promise that the Lord has promised me. So he made this personal. And I know that sometimes I when I see promises in the Bible like the Lord can help us overcome sin, I can see that I think, "Lord, this is a 20:17 general promise that you've given for your church as a whole." But what I like about Caleb's spirit here says, "This is something the Lord has promised me." Now this promise you've given of overcoming sin, of entering into a life of rest, is 20:30 something you've given to me. So he made it personal. That's one thing. And the other thing I like about that is that he wasn't satisfied. You know, as someone who's 85 years old, I'm sure he could have just taken a break and relaxed, but 20:41 he wasn't satisfied. There were still areas he felt that he wanted to to conquer and he went ahead and he went for it. And the reason I apply this and the way I apply this to myself is sometimes I notice in my life, "Lord, 20:52 maybe there's areas in my life where you've helped me to do better in, okay? You maybe conquered some giants. But then there's other areas where there's still need a lot of work to be done." And I've noticed in my life there can be 21:02 a complacency to say, "Lord, you've already done enough. I'm happy with my current status as it is, so to speak. Um but I what I learned from Caleb's example here is that he wasn't satisfied and he kept on going. And so that's 21:14 something I want to remind myself, Lord, I want to have an unlimited faith in you that even when these giants seem so big, they're living in these great walled cities, that Lord, you will help me to overcome. Whether it's impatience, 21:26 whether it's anger, whatever it is, Lord, you will help me to overcome. I have faith in that. So that's the second thing I want to encourage us to have an unlimited faith towards God that we can overcome sin and that he will give 21:37 us rest. And then lastly, let me say that I want us all to also have an unlimited faith towards God in believing that he is silently planning for us in love because there's so many things that we face, so many trials and challenges. 21:52 Lord, do you care? Do you love us? And I hope that all of us can say, "Absolutely, Lord, you care for us deeply." So I want to share a quick story from Genesis chapter 21 and verse 19. Genesis 21 and verse 19. And this is the story of of Hagar. So 22:11 Hagar was an Egyptian that Abraham used to to bear a son, an Ishmael. And in this scene here, Sarah, Abraham's wife, is chasing Hagar away. And it's a it's a pretty sad story. So she chases her away, they have a bag of water, but the water runs out 22:30 and and now Hagar thinks that his his son is going to her son's going to die. So it's actually a pretty sad story. But I love what happens in verse 19. It says here, "Then God opened her eyes and she saw a well of water. And she went and filled 22:44 the skin with water and gave the lad a drink." And so while this poor lady was wandering around in the desert, what was God doing? Sovereignly, he was guiding her to some place that was close to water, even though she didn't see it at 22:58 all. And remember, this is an Egyptian. She's not an Israelite, she's not a child of God. It's a It's an Egyptian. And yet God sovereignly guided her paths and so that she ended up in a place where there was water nearby. And it was 23:10 an encouragement for me to see that sometimes when we don't see the Lord working in our lives, there's things he's doing in the background, planning silently for love for us in love that we might not realize. But may we have faith 23:21 to believe that Lord, you are doing something here even though nothing else seems like it's working out. My personal story for this is when I was was single, I was I was praying with the brothers here for a wife for for a number of 23:32 years. And after I met Crystal, I asked Crystal like, "Hey, when did you move to the the Bay Area?" cuz she she came from China like me. And she's like, "Oh, I came here around like 2000, you know, 9, 2010, something like that." And it made 23:43 me realize that before I even started praying for a wife, God had already moved Crystal into the Bay Area. She actually lived like maybe 10 minutes drive away from me. But it was just funny looking back to say, "Lord, if I doubted you, if I had 23:54 doubted you when I was single and say, 'Lord, you're not doing anything for me.' I'd be completely ashamed in heaven one day when I look back and say, "Lord, you brought her right into the same town as me. What more could I ask for?" So, I 24:05 just want to share that in faith and may we not doubt the Lord even when situations don't look like it's going well cuz he's planning silently for us in love. >> [gasps] >> Um so, tech team, if you could put that picture of the buckets up one last time 24:16 in closing. And one thing I'm very thankful for in this church is that I feel like I've got a privilege to meet people who have these buckets of uh faith, oceans of of faith. I remember talking to one brother recently and he was saying how there's a 24:30 difficult situation in life, but he kept saying, "You know, God is good. I can't complain. God is good. I can't complain." But when he was saying that to me, it's it's different from someone just speaking it from theory. It's someone 24:41 speaking from life and I'm so thankful to have people like that in this church who can inspire me to have bigger faith in God. So, that's my encouragement to everyone that may we all have this unlimited faith towards God and may we 24:54 also inspire each other in this church to have that heart towards the Lord. So, thank you for letting me share today.
