Why is my Faith so small?

Mark 8:1-10

When I think of how we do church today, often even the best seems to fall short of the gospel.  I think about many things, like faith and often-wonder why is mine so weak?  So please put up with me wondering, not about Jesus taking a few fish and a few loaves of bread and feeding 4000, but about my lack of faith to believe or trust that He will do it now.

I am now in a church that has great leadership, our pastor and staff are people who trust God and listen to Him, and then do as they feel He is directing them to go or do.  I came from a church in the Woodlands that also has a great leader and pastor who is a man of prayer and loves both God and his people.  Both pastors have led the people under their authority to reach out with the love of Christ to the community and the world, and the workplace, and especially in their homes.

Both men have felt the need to have the people pledge an amount to build a new building that is needed because of God’s blessing of the ministry.  But I cannot recall either pastor preaching on the dangers of making a vow, and not keeping it, yet God is very clear in His word about doing so. Deuteronomy 23:21-23 states the following:

“If you make a vow to the Lord your God, you shall not delay fulfilling it, for the Lord your God will surely require it of you, and you will be guilty of sin.  But if you refrain from vowing, you will not be guilty of sin. You shall be careful to do what has passed your lips, for you have voluntarily vowed to the Lord your God what you have promised with your mouth.”  And Ecclesiastes 5:4-7, “When you vow a vow to God, do not delay paying it, for he has no pleasure in fools. Pay what you vow. It is better that you should not vow than that you should vow and not pay. Let not your mouth lead you into sin, and do not say before the messenger that it was a mistake. Why should God be angry at your voice and destroy the work of your hands? For when dreams increase and words grow many, there is vanity; but God is the one you must fear.”

Now that is something I’m struggling with because I trust both of these men and know that they have a great love for the people they serve.  Before you say something foolish like there is a difference between a vow and a pledge, look up the word pledge it is a solemn undertaking, a promise, or vow. 

David got in a lot of trouble for taking a military census, his lead general begged him not to do so, to just trust the Lord for what was needed, but he did not listen to them.  These were Joab’s words to King David;  ^“But Joab said to the king, “May the Lord your God add to the people a hundred times as many as they are, while the eyes of my lord the king still see it, but why does my lord the king delight in this thing?”  It seems to this writer that Joab was the man at that time with faith in a big God. 

So returning to Mark 8:1-10, once more was this a lesson on serving others and trusting God to supply what was needed to do so?  Nothing happens till we go, nothing happens when unbelief is in the room, it first needs to be put outside and then faith will always produce what is needed. 

After praying for weeks the Lord never gave me a number to pledge, but he did my wife, and in that we are one I will honor and do all that is required to meet her number.  First and foremost I trust my pastor and his leadership, and know we are on the right track, in our thinking big and reaching out to our community and world.  “The life of faith is not a life of mounting up with wings, but a life of walking and not fainting.” (Oswald Chambers).

From the Back Porch,

Bob Rice