BELIEVE

What do you believe and why does it matter? These are just two of many very important questions that we will get to explore, wrestle with, and be blessed by as we go through this coming year together.
 
For the next several months, Oak Hill Church will be walking through a series called “Believe.” The content of this sermon series is based off the work done by those who wrote “The Story,” which is a series we went through together as a congregation a few years ago. The basis for “The Story” was to familiarize people with the connecting narrative of the Old and New Testaments in a way that showed that God’s Upper Story, His Grand Narrative, was all about Him bringing grace and truth into our world and our lives through the person of His Son Jesus Christ. If you know the Son, you know the Father, and if you know the story, you know the mercy, forgiveness, and hope found in the Gospel.
 
The next question can become “Now what?” or “So what?” That is what “Believe” will seek to share and show. In this series, we will be looking at questions like, “What do I believe?” “What should I do?” “What am I becoming?” Knowing the foundation of the Gospel and the message of the cross of Jesus really helps to put those next things into perspective.
 
We need to have a faith-first perspective as we look at these questions. Without this foundation, without this perspective, we can lose sight of the gift that faith is. When we hear the phrase, “What should I do” or “What am I becoming” we can begin to look at things like good works as something that should be running the show. We can be driven by a theology that says we either have to do good works to earn or pay God back for His gifts to us or we can operate under a perspective that idolizes good works as badges or trophies to be put on display. Both of these perspectives and viewpoints fall short of what God intended for us to experience.
 
I stumbled across a powerful quote by Martin Luther that spoke on this dynamic of faith and accompanying good works. Here is what he had to say about it:
 
I have often said that the Christian life has two dimensions: the first is faith, and the second is good works. A believer should live a devout life and always do what is right. But the first dimension of the Christian life – faith – is more essential. The second dimension – good works – is never as valuable as faith. People of the world, however, adore good works. They regard them to be higher than faith.
 
Good works have always been valued more highly than faith. Of course, it’s true that we should do good works and respect the importance of them. But we should be careful that we don’t elevate good works to such an extent that faith and Christ become secondary. If we esteem them too highly, good works can become the greatest idolatry. This has occurred both inside and outside of Christianity. Some people value good works so much that they overlook faith in Christ. They preach about and praise their own works instead of God’s works.
 
Faith should be first. After faith is preached, then we should teach good works. It is faith – without good works and prior to good works – that takes us to heaven. We come to God through faith alone.
 
With a foundation that is firmly grounded in a faith-first perspective, we can hear and experience a question like “What should I do” in the freedom and purity that Christ designed us to hear them in. May we learn what that means and may we experience the joy that this brings in allowing the work first done in us by Christ to be shared with those around us.
 
Pastor Ben

1 Luther, Martin, By Faith Alone. Iowa Falls, IA: World Bible Publishers, 1998.