Great is Your Faith

August 16, 2020

Great is your faith.  That is what we all would love to hear.  How do we hear Jesus telling us that?  What does it take to have great faith?  I think we all want to have great faith; I think we all want to experience the affirmation of the Lord.  So how does that happen?  The journey of the Canaanite woman begins with acknowledging the power of the Lord Jesus Christ.  This woman overcomes obstacles to seek out Jesus.  She understands that He has the power to save her daughter.  She knows that Jesus will respond to the love she has for her child.

To have great faith one has to know the need we must have to trust and rely on God totally.  That is not easy.  We must also have a focus to seek the Lord and overcome obstacles that might be placed before us.  To be able to do this, faith must be practiced.  The practice of faith, the living of faith is a journey of subtraction.  The more I know, the more I realize God is beyond what I know and is not reliant on what I know.  The great acts of faith in my life come when I am called to a scene or incident, not knowing what I am walking into and what will take place.  That reliance on God comes from not relying on myself or my training.  As important as that is, subtraction, getting out of the way, that is the most powerful place for me.  When I am small, when I do not know what to do, I embrace a God of love in a different way.  I am amazed at the awesomeness of God.

For me personally, a place of vulnerability comes with my eyes.  I know every time I undergo a surgery, my eyesight might not only not come back better, but it also might not come back at all.  In this place, I rely on the surgeon.  I rely on his gifts and talents.  Internally, before that can happen I have to be prepared for the outcome to be not what I expect.  That subtraction, knowing I might come out with the eye not responding at all, is a place of powerlessness.  When I can get there in other aspects of my life, my faith increases.  I have to get to that place where reliance on God is all that is left.

Jesus gave us this way, this truth and this life by dying on the cross.  He was powerless, could not move, feet and hands nailed.  Still, the power of forgiveness and love conquered this experience and brought us new life.  His physical pain and surrender to the will of the Father, brought us hope and new life.

We all want great faith, we all want to hear those words, but to do so we have to sacrifice, surrender and subtract our very sense of self.

Father John Ouper