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Through one of my favorite blogs I found a link to a post from Ed Stetzer about the missional church vs. the simple church vs. the purpose-driven, seeker sensitive style church. Very interesting and thought-provoking. Take a peek here:

http://blogs.lifeway.com/blog/edstetzer/2008/10/simpy-missional-in-neue.html

When we are facing adversity, many times we just keep pushing through it hoping we can overcome it. It’s our nature to do so. It’s rooted in pride and being self-centered. Sometimes we get through the problem and praise ourselves for finding a way to deal with the problem, but is that the way God intended for it to be done? Remember what is written in James 4:6:

“he opposes the proud, but gives grace to the humble.”

Maybe, just maybe, you’ll make it through okay on your own, but you’ll definitely make it through if you just call upon the Lord to overcome your circumstances. It could be that you need a job or your house is getting foreclosed on and you have no where to go. It may be that some things are going wrong in your church or ministry. How about trying to deal with an addiction on your own? Maybe you were viewing some pornography right before you read this and you try to stop, but you just can’t. For some of you it may be some physical illness or even something terminal like cancer. Don’t try and hang onto it and hope that it gets better through your ways. Just invite God to take over and commit to trust in him and wait on his timing. It’s called prayer and it’s something we should force ourselves to go to first in any situation. Prayer is unbelievably powerful.

James 5:13-16:

13Is any one of you in trouble? He should pray. Is anyone happy? Let him sing songs of praise. 14Is any one of you sick? He should call the elders of the church to pray over him and anoint him with oil in the name of the Lord. 15And the prayer offered in faith will make the sick person well; the Lord will raise him up. If he has sinned, he will be forgiven. 16Therefore confess your sins to each other and pray for each other so that you may be healed. The prayer of a righteous man is powerful and effective.

In each of the 4 verses above, we see the answer is prayer. In trouble, or sick, or stuck in sin? Pray, pray, pray, pray!

Of all things to reference, I was up late last week and I came across an infomercial. A guy is selling some program to help people live a life of faith. I caught it at the exact moment he was telling a story:

A businessman was at home when he got the call that his wife was headed to the hospital to have a baby. As a businessman, he had a personal car and a company car in his driveway. His instinct was to take the personal car since it was personal business he was on. However, something caused him to stop and pray about it. So, he asked God and God responded to take the company car. The businessman didn’t understand the reasoning, but heeded God and took the company car. While he was traveling down the freeway on the way to the hospital, a car slams into him from behind. As they both pull over, the businessman wants to get out and go see how the other driving is doing. He’s concerned as any of us would be. However, something causes him to stop and pray again. He asks the Lord if he should go check on the other driver. God tells him no! So, the businessman stays in his car and waits for the police and ambulance to arrive.

Why was prayer so important during those two times? Well, it turns out that the other driver was a convicted murderer that was out on parole and could have potentially been a threat to the businessman had he confronted him at this car. As for taking the company car instead of the personal car? After being injured severely in the accident and the other driver not having insurance, the businessman received $1 million in coverage from his insurance company because his company car had a high level of insurance. This allowed him to get medical treatment and to cover expenses as he could not work any longer. His personal car only had basic liability coverage of $25,000.

When we pray, we must not only listen for God to respond, but we must be faithful to follow what he asks of us. We must put our trust in God and not in ourselves. May we purposefully humble ourselves before God in all things so that we may seek his hand and carry out his will, giving him all the glory.

In John 5 Jesus gives us an example of his healing power. However, there is more to the story if we look closely:

John 5:2-9:

2Now there is in Jerusalem near the Sheep Gate a pool, which in Aramaic is called Bethesda and which is surrounded by five covered colonnades. 3Here a great number of disabled people used to lie—the blind, the lame, the paralyzed.[b] 5One who was there had been an invalid for thirty-eight years. 6When Jesus saw him lying there and learned that he had been in this condition for a long time, he asked him, “Do you want to get well?”

7″Sir,” the invalid replied, “I have no one to help me into the pool when the water is stirred. While I am trying to get in, someone else goes down ahead of me.”

8Then Jesus said to him, “Get up! Pick up your mat and walk.” 9At once the man was cured; he picked up his mat and walked.

Here is a guy that has been sitting next to this same exact pool, in the same exact place for 38 years. It takes a lot of faith to keep coming back for 38 years in order to receive a healing doesn’t it? Or does it? Notice what Jesus said to the man in verse 6? He asks the invalid, “Do you want to get well?” What a question! To us, it seems the answer must be obvious. Many of us may even commend the man for his faith to keep coming back 38 years and hoping for a miracle.

It turns out that there were people that would camp out at the pool and beg for money. They didn’t want to go into the pool and be healed as they were pretty comfortable earning a living by begging. What purpose would be served if Jesus had healed someone like that? They may actually get kinda mad at Jesus for taking away their livelihood! Others were there because they just wanted to feel sorry for themselves. They weren’t believing in being healed as they would never enter the pool, choosing instead to sit on the sidelines and complain about how bad life was and how they couldn’t even get help into the pool as no one cares about them. Again, what purpose would it serve if they were healed by Jesus? None, as they would just wander off somewhere and find something else to cause them to feel burdened upon and sorry for themselves.

Now, ask yourself a question. Which one of these describes you? As much as we try to portray ourselves as strong and above it all, we each have experienced our own pity party at some point. We each have been in a situation where we have made excuses for things not happening as a way to just not keep going. A lot of us just keep doing the same old thing regardless of whether it works or not because we are such creatures of habit!

What if Jesus is asking you right now if you want to be delivered from your affliction? If you want to do what it takes to get that job and find a way to make ends meet or if you just want to keep pretending to look for a job and complain that there is too much competition so you’ll never get hired. What if Jesus is asking you to stop saying “Woe is me!” and make a decision to take a step in the right direction?

In verse 7 the invalid actually tries to make an excuse. He says no one will help him get into the pool and he is always just a little too slow on his own to make it. You know what Jesus does? It’s right there in verse 8. He doesn’t even acknowledge the excuses! Jesus hears the man, but immediately replies by telling him to, “Get up! Pick up your mat and walk.” With this, the man gets up and walks away.

If we’d just look to Jesus to help us with our problems and be ready to respond immediately when he moves on our behalf, we would save a lot of wasted time and time pitying ourselves. You know, we’ve all gone through it and we’ll all go through it some more, but sometimes we just have to rise above it all and know that Jesus is asking us if we really want to be delivered and empowered and waiting for us to say “YES!” Won’t you stand up and pick up your mat and walk and say “YES!” to Jesus today?

As I’ve been thinking more and more about leading a missional community through Revolution Church Sacramento next year, I’ve also had thoughts about video preaching as part of what we do. Coinciding with these thoughts was a blog post by Perry Noble that reinforced his position that video teaching honors God and connects with people.

When we did our first month of preview services to share our vision with the members of our mother church, it was video preaching for 3 weeks, with me preaching 1 week. We participated in the One Prayer with LifeChurch.tv which many of you know about already. I was so totally blown away by the quality of the preaching from Perry Noble and Steven Furtick that I was hooked. I mean, I think I can be a pretty funny guy, but usually I evoke a laugh or two during a message while Noble just raised the roof and kept it up the whole 30 minutes. The guy seems like he isn’t even trying, yet he causes us to fire on several emotions in just one message. All this and he wasn’t even in the building! How can a guy in South Carolina talking about eating big, buttery biscuits and people believing or not believing in the power of Christ connect so well with us here in California? I don’t know how or why, but I just know what I saw and how people responded and it was amazing and incredible. Pastor Furtick is another one of those guys that doesn’t seem like he is trying, yet he can convey passion about watching an ice cube in such a way that you never thought possible all through the power of Christ in his life and his love for seeing people hear the gospel and come to know the saving grace of Christ. I was teary-eyed during the last half of his message and again, he wasn’t even in the building!

Can a guy like Noble or Furtick cause things to be stirred up here in Sacramento through video preaching? I think they could. As Revolution Church Sacramento takes shape and launches next year, we are looking to connect with a younger generation for Saturday and/or Sunday evening service. Mostly singles and young couples. However, could we partner with a great visionary preacher like a Pastor Noble or Pastor Furtick (or a Craig Groeschel or Ed Young, Jr. or…) and provide a gathering for families on Sunday mornings and see the kingdom grow even more? Could being missional and putting our faith into practice and sharing the love of Christ with the world be the glue that binds us together, even though we have two different worship styles, with two different meeting times, and two different demographics? I’m beginning to think we could. I’m feeling like the work that needs to be done here in Sacramento is far greater than what I could do even on my best days, and that partnering with another ministry with someone that can lead the way through their preaching and teaching while we work to connect people into service could honor God hugely. Who says that multiple services on a weekend must be the same exact message with the same exact preacher every time?

Maybe this is just another one of those dreams too big for the moment or my abilities. Could be that my mind is wandering and this isn’t what my thoughts should be on these days. However, I just can’t help but feel like this is worth some prayer and discussion and seeing what God would have me do here. My preaching doesn’t really translate well to video, but I’ve seen others with the gift for it and know that it’s being used to make a big impact on people in awesome ways. Just consider me more than a little intrigued at this point.

I invite your prayers and thoughts on this.

Use it or lose it! I hear that from Obama a lot these days in response to the oil companies sitting on a bunch of land that isn’t being used for drilling for oil. Obama says use the land or the government is gonna take it back.

Is there something you have been given, such as a talent that you aren’t using? Did you think that you could just hang onto it and keep it in your back pocket forever?

Luke 8:16-18: 16“No one lights a lamp and hides it in a jar or puts it under a bed. Instead, he puts it on a stand, so that those who come in can see the light. 17For there is nothing hidden that will not be disclosed, and nothing concealed that will not be known or brought out into the open. 18Therefore consider carefully how you listen. Whoever has will be given more; whoever does not have, even what he thinks he has will be taken from him.”

This is a parable that Jesus tells to his disciples as a way of letting them know that they are to share the truth (the light) with the world, not keep it for themselves. However, in general terms we can think of the light as the talent or gift that God has entrusted us with. Should we keep that talent or gift hidden so that no one else can know it? If so, why did he give it to you in the first place?

Maybe it’s something you know needs to be shared, but you are scared or feel you aren’t good enough yet. Well, in verse 18 we see that whoever has will be given more, but whoever does not have, even what he thinks he has, will be taken away from him. If you work on the talent or gift to make yourself better, God will honor that commitment and continue to lead you to improvement and confidence. If you don’t apply yourself, then some day you may want to only to realize that it has been lost.

Have you ever been in a place where you want to kick yourself for not doing something you think you should have? I hear this a lot with people that wanted to play music when they were younger, but as they got older they don’t have the time or the patience to develop the talent and always end up wondering what it could have been like had they just played when they had the chance.

Some of you know that you can sing well if you just tried, but you keep to yourself because you think others won’t appreciate your voice. Some of you have a gift to connect and relate with strangers, but you won’t share the gospel with another because you are afraid that they may reject you because you stumble in your words. As the old saying goes, practice makes perfect so practice! Everyone has to start somewhere, and it’s never at the top.

Take a risk! Be bold! Thank God for giving you that special gift or talent and commit it to him and share it with the world. You were given the talent or gift for a reason and it shouldn’t be kept hidden. Have the faith in knowing that God wants you to share it with others so that he may be glorified. Sometimes you only get one opportunity and then it’s too late. Don’t let this pass you by. Have faith and enjoy the experience. You’ll feel much better for trying and you’ll probably please and bless a bunch more people than just yourself

Have you ever thought about how great things used to be? You know, back when you weighed less, or your joints didn’t ache or when you had more hair or when all there was in life was school and socializing? Boy, I know I have! Making money and having the world at my feet created a very easy existence for me. Sure, I was a slave to my job for many years, but the nice house and new cars every year and dinners out all the time sure seemed to make it all worthwhile. Now after serving in ministry for over 3 years with full-time hours, but no pay and often-times no reimbursement for expenses, is it right for me to ask why things used to seem so easy when I was an atheist compared to now as a Christian in ministry?

Ecclesiastes 7:10 reads: Do not say, “Why were the old days better than these?” For it is not wise to ask such questions.

Why is it not wise? Because it’s the wrong question! The right question would be why am I here in this moment going through what I’m going through and how can it be used to glorify God? Also, what can I take away from the old days that will help me get through today or avoid making the same mistakes? We go through experiences and seasons of life for reasons. Sometimes they aren’t known to us until after we go through them; other times we may never understand why we go through them.

God has placed us on a journey with a beginning and an end. We didn’t have a choice as to when our life began and we won’t have a choice as to when it will end. God will be God. Therefore, why not just embrace the blessings we have today. We all know that no matter what we are going through, there is always going to be someone somewhere that is suffering even more than we are. It’s not a competition!

Let’s not look to our past to see how good things used to be and how bad they are today and cause ourselves to lose heart or become depressed. Our past shapes who we are, but we have a legacy that we will leave behind and it will end on a positive note if we just keep our eyes focused ahead of us and do our best to learn from our past so that we may have a better tomorrow. God’s gonna get you through everything if you’ll just trust in him and be at peace with all you are facing right now.

In Matthew 22:39 we are commanded by Christ to “love your neighbor as yourself.” In other words, love others equally as you would love yourself. However, what if you really don’t love yourself very much? Interesting dilemma!

It’s really okay to feel good about yourself…really! You were created in the image of a loving God that cares for you more than words can say. He wants you to embrace that love and unleash it onto others around you.

Believing in yourself and liking who you are is not pride and it’s not a sin. It’s encouraged by God as he wants you to celebrate life and your relationship with him! Through you others can come to know God’s love for them and realize they are important. If you don’t appreciate yourself and your ability to contribute then how can God show his love through you? Therefore don’t be ashamed or afraid to give yourself hug and tell yourself how great you are and that God has an awesome plan for your life and it will affect a lot of other people in your lifetime. He has things planned for you that no one else will have the ability to do. God created you with a unique purpose and he needs you to see that purpose fulfilled. You matter to God and you matter to us!

Remember, it all starts with you. Let God show you how much you really mean to him and how important you are. Let him put a smile on your face and joy in your heart. Just ask him to share this with you. He’s waiting on you.

Stop and pause for a moment. What do you hear?

• Traffic? Isn’t it funny that some of us worship our cars, yet we don’t appreciate the noises they make?
• Tv? How can we focus on what we are reading and grasp it if we distract ourselves by leaving on the tv, which we can’t even watch while we read anyways?
• Music?Have you ever thought that the music you hear while reading can impact the way you perceive the words? Happy, upbeat music won’t cause you to respond appropriately to sorrow, yet sad, downbeat music can cause you to overreact to things with sad words causing greater sadness and happy words rubbing you the wrong way.
• People Talking? We may not be paying attention to the chatter as we believe we are reading, but part or our brain is observant and receiving the perceptible conversations and keeping us from focusing on what we are reading…like this blog post
• Silence? Isn’t it strange that the thing which has no sound is something we say that we can actually hear? Remember, the question was what do you hear. Even the lack of sound or noise impacts us as something we hear. We are just that used to audible input.

Okay, what’s my point? We are so accustomed to hearing things and having auditory stimulation that we don’t even realize how it affects other things. So much so that when there is silence, it causes people to become greatly uncomfortable. Have you ever been speaking to someone and then, as you can’t think of anything else to say you pause, and then they pause, and then there is that awkward silence that makes you feel really uncomfortable? Why is that? It’s because we have conditioned ourselves to the noise. It seems so strange without it.

In radio, they call silence “dead air.” It’s a definite no-no. It’s as if the world has come to an end if there are a few seconds of silence.

I think we need a lot more dead air in our lives. Especially in our conversations. I’ve been guilty of this at times, but one of the things I hate is when I see two or more people engaged in a conversation where someone asks a questions and encourages a response, yet the person responding never has a chance to fully respond because the asker of the question keep imparting their words into the discussion. Here is a huge pet peeve of mine. Have you ever had someone ask you how you are doing, then immediately go into what they wanted to say? “Hey, how ya doin’ I was wondering if you knew the way to San Jose and did you know that the dow dropped 700 points last Thursday?” Why ask me how I am doing if you really don’t care to hear an answer? If you’re going to ask, at least pause so I have a chance to respond! Wouldn’t a few seconds of dead air be appropriate here?

I spent most of my adult life in sales and marketing. At times it was very successful and very lucrative. However, at no time did I ever sell something to someone that wouldn’t positively benefit from the product or service I was marketing. I asked questions and listened to the responses on occasionally finding myself telling prospective clients that they would be better off without what I was representing at the time. I couldn’t do that if I didn’t listen carefully and try to assess their needs rather than keep speaking and forcefully presenting features and benefits even though the benefits may not be benefits to the prospective client.

When someone comes to you and needs someone to talk to, they may actually be coming to you because they need someone to just listen to them. Your words of wisdom may not be what they need even if they say that’s why they came to you. Maybe they just need someone to hear them out and allow the wisdom to be revealed in their own voice. how empowering it would be to let them know that they knew the answer all along and it just took someone like you to help them bring it to the surface!

When someone loses a loved one, do you always know what to say? Probably not, but ever notice how we always feel like we should say something? How about just looking them in the eye and letting them know it’s okay to grieve, embrace them and let them get a little emotional, then smile and let them know it’s all going to be okay?

Many times the things we can convey in silence are much more powerful and effective than anything we could ever say. Sometimes the true meaning and relevance behind what we read could impact us far greater if we turned off the noise and committed our full attention to what we were reading.

Sometimes, it’s not what you hear, but it’s what you’re not hearing that is important. Sometimes not hearing your own voice and listening to what is being said is more important.

Are you excited? Outreach magazine just published their compilation of the top 100 largest churches in America. While I’m glad that people are still gathering in masses to worship the one true God, I find myself scratching my head at why anyone would want to glorify the church in this manner.

The sad fact of the matter is that there are pastors out there that will inflate their attendance numbers so that they can run with the big boys. They are immersed in the numbers game. They seek to grow numerically in order to confirm their status within the kingdom of heaven. In the minds of many senior pastors is the misconception that a growing church is a healthy church.

However, when polled most senior pastors will say that they are not interested in numbers, but instead they desire to see many to come to know Christ as their Lord and Savior. That’s a noble thing, but at the same time many encourage people that were previously baptized in a church already to come forward and be baptized in their church, thus inflating the numbers of salvations and diminishing the scripture in Romans 10:9 which clearly states:

That if you confess with your mouth, “Jesus is Lord,” and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved.

I guess contrary to the word, confessing once isn’t enough?

We are taught not to envy or covet, yet we see statistics like this glorifying the local church and putting them on a pedestal because of the number of attendees they draw. When health and numerical size are used as factors to determine “success” in the church, how can a pastor not want to seek credibility for what God is doing in their church in the same fashion? It can cause us to see our numbers diminish within the smaller church because people are flocking to the mega-church because the music is so professional or they have more technology and staff in their children’s ministry and then believe that God is working in the mega-church, but abandoning us in the smaller churches.

I believe that God is working through the mega-church model to see people come to honest professions of faith in the Lord, with transformed lives making a difference in their community as the result. My criticism isn’t on the mega-church, but it’s on the glorification of the mega-church. Look closely at the image above or click here to see the whole list of the top 100 largest churches. It’s not just the top 100 churches listed, but they are ranked in order from largest to smallest and there is also the name and photo of the senior pastor and in addition to that, there is even a link to books that some of the pastors have authored. Sorry, but this just brings the kind of attention to the pastor that rewards him for obtaining such high status on lists like this. Somehow, it just doesn’t seem like such a godly thing for pastors to be recognized in this way or worse yet, to see them strive for such notoriety.

As I write this, I think the thing that gets me most is the notion that it’s all about attendance and not about transformations and loving others. As many of you know, I’m excited about the missional church movement. Not only the missional church ethos, but of the nature of the missional church to be more organic and empowering others to lead and disciple communities based on visions God gives them to be pastors and ministers of the gospel. What about the missional church that honors God through the Greatest Commandment and the Great Commission and sees itself being reproduced throughout the city or the world? If a mother church grows to 200 in attendance and then starts reproducing itself by sending missionaries/pastors out to lead others and disciple them in the ways of Christ, only to see this repeating itself time and time again, isn’t this the way of the first century church? The mother church may ebb and flow and never break the 200 barrier by intention, yet be responsible for seeing 20,000 come to know Christ and carry on his mission through daughter churches and other ministries. Should they be off the radar screen or not viewed in as high a regard as the mega-church of 10,000 members that lands on the list of top 100 churches? I don’t think so. Is having a congregation of 12,000 meeting in one building a better definition of outreach than having groups of 1,000 people meeting in 12 different buildings? Again, I don’t think so.

We should not be working to receive our rewards here on earth. Pastors can say that who am I to write about this when God is the one sending people to their church and they are just doing their best to shepherd his people. Okay, I’m with you on that. However, what about the inverse of this? How about when your mega-church of 10,000 people and 40 staff members sees its attendance drop to 5,000 in less than a year. Do you believe that God has his hand in moving the sheep to another shepherd, or do you go into panic mode and start cutting programs and laying off people and doing all you can to figure out how to get your attendance numbers back up to justify the big building and church campus?

Church attendance numbers in no way portray the effectiveness of outreach or seeing people come to know Christ for the first time. They do not accurately reflect the health of a church, nor the genuine nature of those that gather. A mega-church of 10,000 in attendance on Sundays, but 90% of the congregation is from church hoppers is not deserving of being more highly regarded than a church of 50 that live the mission of Christ everyday, drawing in people that may take years of living in a community of faith before they actually take the step of faith to put their trust in Christ eternally.

[At this point I feel a disclaimer is in order. I'm not envious of the mega-church or their pastors. I have not had any negative experience from serving or attending in mega-churches.

I have a great respect for the calling and vision of every pastor on the top 100 list of largest churches!

Those that know of my work in the ministry know that I speak highly of Pastor Craig Groeschel and participated with LifeChurch.tv in their One Prayer campaign last July. I have read and been blessed by several books authored by Andy Stanley of North Point. I'm amazed at what it took to see Bill Hybels ask for a raw and unfiltered assessment of Willow Creek through surveying their members and then responding in revolutionary ways to change the course and direction of their ministry in order to see true discipleship and transformation occur.

I am encouraged when I see how the Reveal study that was done by Willow Creek is causing local churches to take a look at what they are doing and why they are doing it. When things like this surface not because of diminishing numbers, but because of lack of discipleship and mission it can only be a positive step that deserves recognition. Most of my friends within ministry are pastors of larger, non-denominational churches with seeker-sensitive services. I love and respect each of them and sometimes feel they are better-suited to ministry than I am because of the larger resources at their disposal and their big faith to serve and make a difference. Again, I'm not in opposition to the mega-church model. I just think we are flirting with danger and temptation when we in ministry and those in the media begin putting so much attention to only those with larger attendance numbers. Bottom line is that I love the church and I love God and I pray daily that the church will start working to be more unified and seeing the love of Christ personified in cities all over the world. I just believe that in our humility we should seek to have God get all the glory and for people to see Jesus and not be awestruck by the celebrity status that pastors are being encouraged to embrace. It's a dangerous thing and we've already seen the enemy take too many people out of their calling to see the gospel reach the ends of the earth.]

Church envy…is it godly?

Title: Why did Lazarus Have to Die?: A Test of Faith, Part 1

Scripture: John 11:1-16

1Now a man named Lazarus was sick. He was from Bethany, the village of Mary and her sister Martha. 2This Mary, whose brother Lazarus now lay sick, was the same one who poured perfume on the Lord and wiped his feet with her hair. 3So the sisters sent word to Jesus, “Lord, the one you love is sick.”

4When he heard this, Jesus said, “This sickness will not end in death. No, it is for God’s glory so that God’s Son may be glorified through it.” 5Jesus loved Martha and her sister and Lazarus. 6Yet when he heard that Lazarus was sick, he stayed where he was two more days.

7Then he said to his disciples, “Let us go back to Judea.”

8“But Rabbi,” they said, “a short while ago the Jews tried to stone you, and yet you are going back there?”

9Jesus answered, “Are there not twelve hours of daylight? A man who walks by day will not stumble, for he sees by this world’s light. 10It is when he walks by night that he stumbles, for he has no light.”

11After he had said this, he went on to tell them, “Our friend Lazarus has fallen asleep; but I am going there to wake him up.”

12His disciples replied, “Lord, if he sleeps, he will get better.” 13Jesus had been speaking of his death, but his disciples thought he meant natural sleep.

14So then he told them plainly, “Lazarus is dead, 15and for your sake I am glad I was not there, so that you may believe. But let us go to him.”

16Then Thomas (called Didymus) said to the rest of the disciples, “Let us also go, that we may die with him.”

1. What experiences can we look back upon to affirm our faith?
John 11:2- This Mary, whose brother Lazarus now lay sick, was the same one who poured perfume on the Lord and wiped his feet with her hair.

Our study begins and ends with two people that we know had times of great faith and not-so-great faith. Mary, as we will find out next week, fails the faith test when she condemns Jesus for not being there in time to save her brother Lazarus from death. Yet, as referenced in John 11:2, we come to know that Mary lavished expensive perfumed oil on Jesus’ feet to the dismay of Judas and others in the room.

Mary has a chance to be a little lackluster in her faith, yet through her experience with Jesus in John 11 we can understand why her faith stands out so strongly in John 12 when she is rebuked by Judas, yet praised by Jesus. We must reflect on times when we relied on our faith and God honored that by seeing us through the difficult time and made us stronger by having gone through the trial.

2. Is it faith if we demand it to be on our timing and not wait on God’s timing?
John 11:6- Yet when he heard that Lazarus was sick, he stayed where he was two more days.

Imagine if you asked God to answer a prayer, yet didn’t see any response. Would you give up? Would get angry? Here we see Jesus explicitly stating that he knew Lazarus was sick, yet he did not go to visit him for two more days. God works on his timing and we are not in a position to try and bring him down to our level. We must be patient and trust in the Lord as his might and his power can only be glorified when he works within the heavenly realms, and not our earthly ways.

3. When God calls upon our faith, how do we respond?
John 11:12-13- His disciples replied, “Lord, if he sleeps, he will get better.” 13Jesus had been speaking of his death, but his disciples thought he meant natural sleep.

How many times have we heard God’s voice, yet responded in an incorrect or inappropriate manner? In John 11 Jesus is making his way to Jerusalem (through Bethany, which is just 2 miles away) for the Passover and his death on the cross. Therefore by this time the disciples had walked with Jesus for 3 years, yet when he says Lazarus is asleep, they don’t realize he meant Lazarus was dead. They question Jesus and wonder why he would want to wake up Lazarus when sleep may do him so good. When God calls us to respond in faith, do we act in faith or do we hear what we want to hear and then question his motives?

4. Everyone has experienced doubts sometimes
John 11:16- Then Thomas (called Didymus) said to the rest of the disciples, “Let us also go, that we may die with him.”

Here Thomas shows a strong faith in Jesus exclaiming that all the disciples should go to Bethany and die with Lazarus so that they may have new life and that God may be glorified. However, most of us know the disciple Thomas as Doubting Thomas. This is the same Thomas that couldn’t believe Jesus had risen from the grave and now walked amongst his followers. His faith was very low at the time and he even challenged Jesus by saying the only way he would believe was if he could put his finger into the hole where the Roman soldier had pierced his side on the cross. Have you ever been so bold as to challenge Jesus when he called upon you? Has it made you feel guilty or ashamed? Jesus knows us and knows that we will have times when we doubt his call or fail to follow his voice. We are placed in this world and do our best to be godly in all things, yet we are incapable of perfection. God knows this and therefore doesn’t give us such experiences of stumbling in our faith so that he can make us feel guilty. He wants us to learn from the experience and help be able to better discern his voice and to respond without fear as we grow and mature in our relationship with God.

You are not alone when you doubt and it doesn’t make you any less of a Christian when you do. Remember, it’s not necessarily about the choices we make, but it’s how we handle them that mark who we are in Christ.