Facts on Faith

If you knew you didn’t have much more time on Earth and wanted to teach two or three life lessons to those you leave behind in order for them to be prepared for when you aren’t physically with them anymore, what would be the essential lessons?

That is the situation we saw Jesus in as we studied the Gospel of Luke in Truth Be Told Bible study this week at Firstfruits. Jesus and his beloved apostles are traveling to Jerusalem. A trip that will end in His crucifixion. He knows he doesn’t have much time and there are still some really important lessons he wants to be sure the apostles learn to prepare them for life without Him. He teaches these lessons through example and increasingly more dramatic healing miracles. Like raising a young girl from the dead.

Last week’s lesson was the importance of prayer to maintain and nurture the intimate relationship with God that is a gift to all disciples.

This week’s lesson is on the power in the saving response of faith. In the miraculous healings Jesus performed, it was the deep faith of those involved that facilitated the healing. Faith that has God at its center when all other options are gone. Faith that is the response to the absence of hope in anything or anybody else. Often, we reject God because there are too many other things or people to trust in or put our faith in. Things like wealth, status, power, or intellect. 

We need to get to a place of vulnerability and humility where we can admit our need: complete need for God and God only. Many times, we have to be brought to a place of desperation before we admit that. Jesus wants that to change.

I hope you will find the time to view the videos of my reflections on the Scripture readings from Truth Be Told for the next five weeks. In this week’s lesson we learn more about this faith Jesus wants not just the apostles to know about but us too. And the life-giving hope and disposition for gratitude that comes with it.

Grateful for you,
Joan

Truth Be Told Video – Session 2, Week 2

Truth Be Told
Session 2, Week 2
Faith and Gratitude
Bible References
Luke 8:40-56 Healing of Two Daughters
Luke 17:11-19 Healing of the 10 Lepers