On Mission 3: Walk in Faith (2 Timothy 1:1-7)

  The third in a series that unpacks our church's mission statement: Helping people walk with Jesus in faith, hope, and love to the glory of God.

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A theological understanding of faith: 

First, faith is the work of the Holy Spirit. 

...but we ought to thank God always for you, brothers and sisters loved by the Lord, because God chose you from the beginning for salvation through sanctification by the Spirit and [salvation through] faith in the truth.  (2 Thessalonians 4:13) 

...The fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faith, gentleness, and self-control. (Gal 5:22-23) 

Faith is the work of the Spirit in us.  

Second, faith is holistic. Not just something in your brain: “Yes, that's true. I accept that as fact.” Rather, faith is part of our whole being: 

So too, faith by itself, if it does not result in action, is dead. But someone will say, “you have faith and I have deeds.” Show me your faith without deeds, and I will show you my faith by my deeds. (James 2:17-18) 

Faith is holistic.  

Third, faith is necessary. Faith is a tool that we need in order to connect with God, to pursue God at all. We have to have some capacity for faith to begin with.  

Without faith it is impossible to please God, because anyone who approaches Him must believe that He exists and that He rewards those who earnestly seek Him. (Hebrews 11:6) 

Before you can even start pursuing a relationship with Him, you have to believe that he’s there. 

Faith is necessary for our journey with Jesus. 

Fourth, faith is a promise: one that God has given us, that we hear and receive.  

Now, faith is the substance of what we hope for and the certainty of what we do not see.... (Hebrews 11:1) 

The writer goes on to name a whole bunch of believers from previous generations. Abel, Enoch, Noah, Abraham, Sarah.  

All these people died in faith, without having received the things they were promised. However, they saw them and welcomed them from afar. (Hebrews 11:13) 

These people all had the faith to look down the road and to say, “God has made a promise. I welcome the day when that promise is fulfilled, even though in my lifetime I will not see it.” 

Faith is a promise.  

Finally, faith is perception. 

By faith we understand (perceive) that the universe was formed at God’s command... (Hebrews 11:13) 

We can't physically see that. We weren't there, but we perceive as fact that this didn't all come from nothing. We understand. Because faith is perception. 

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One commentator writes: “Faith apprehends (siezes, holds as real fact) what is not revealed to the senses. It rests on that real fact. It acts on that real fact. It is upheld by that real fact in the face of all that seems to contradict it. Faith is real seeing.” 

Faith is the work of the Spirit in us—with the choice we make, the action we live out—to see beyond the merely material... to the real. Faith sees the truth that underlies what we can touch and what we can measure.  

We can't touch and measure God. But God is true. And we can encounter God because He has given us the capacity for faith.  

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An everyday understanding of faith: 

What might faith have looked like in Timothy's life? I think it probably looked like Timothy.  

Sometimes when we think about faith, we think about the apostle Peter. Peter was a big guy. He was passionate, powerful, and bombastic. His capacity for the “real seeing” of faith helped him to make amazing statements like, “Jesus, you are the Christ. You are the son of God” (Matthew 16:16). “I would rather die than betray you” (Matt 26:35). Peter’s faith, on that dark night, in the storm-tossed boat, squinting over the gunwales, seeing somebody out there, allowed him to say, “Jesus, if it's you, tell me to come to you” (Matt 14:28). 

Sometimes that’s the faith we want: to be bold, and to make those amazing leaps and statements. 

But I think, looking at what we know about Timothy, that his faith was probably more quiet, consistent, and enduring.  

He discovered his faith in Christ as a youngster. He grew in his faith in his family. He became a leader in his local church. There are hints in the text that he struggled a bit with his leadership role, and he wasn't always entirely confident. He seems to have had some health challenges. Paul twice, in the two letters First Timothy and Second Timothy, urges Timothy not to neglect, but to fan into flame, the gift that he had been given. To tend it, feed it, keep it burning. To be aware of it. 

Our best understanding is that, after Paul was executed for his faith in Christ, Timothy kept walking with Jesus for another 30 years. I think that part of what helped Timothy walk in faith with Jesus was that he understood that the life of faith looks more like family than like jumping out of the boat. The life of faith is not something to be done alone. The life of faith is something that you do with the encouragement and the support of other believers. Learning from their experience and learning from their knowledge.  

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My sister is a scuba diver. She's studying marine biodiversity at university. She's been around the world—from Norway to Madagascar—scuba diving. She is very afraid of heights. 

I asked her, “What’s the difference between being up high in a tower 116 storeys above the ground, and up high in deep water 116 storeys above the ocean floor?”  

She said that there are two differences.  

The first is that when you go scuba diving, you're not stepping out into thin air. You are trusting yourself to the water. The water supports your whole body. It surrounds you. Holds you. Keeps you buoyant. And yeah, the ground is down there and it is far away. But the water doesn't let you fall.  

Second, she said, sometimes you do choose to dive down to the deep. “Because,” she said, “the drop-offs, the deep water... That's where the cool stuff is.” 

So sometimes in real life, walking in faith feels like stepping out towards the edge of a cliff, where there's nothing to catch you.  

But in real life, walking in faith with Jesus is more like trusting yourself to the water that will hold you. That will not let you fall. 

And sometimes in real life, walking in faith with Jesus looks like diving down into the deep water, to where the cool stuff is. 

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