Faithing Together

 

Hebrews 10:19-25 - Therefore, my friends, since we have confidence to enter the sanctuary by the blood of Jesus,  by the new and living way that he opened for us through the curtain (that is, through his flesh),  and since we have a great priest over the house of God,  let us approach with a true heart in full assurance of faith, with our hearts sprinkled clean from an evil conscience and our bodies washed with pure water.  Let us hold fast to the confession of our hope without wavering, for he who has promised is faithful.  And let us consider how to provoke one another to love and good deeds,  not neglecting to meet together, as is the habit of some, but encouraging one another, and all the more as you see the Day approaching.

 

Continuing to talk about fostering our faith, I call your attention to v. 25 (in bold and underlined) above.  If you have listened to me for any length of time, you have heard me say in different ways that our faith is not primarily an individual faith.  We need to do our faithing with other people.  One of the reasons for this is that we have a really hard time sustaining our faith by ourselves.  But if I practice my faith and talk about my faith and serve with my faith all with other people, all of sudden, it becomes easier.  You all know my favorite thing about being a pastor is teaching.  One of the many reasons I love it so much is that having to teach has done more to grow my faith than anything else I do.  Knowing that I have to teach faith and preach faith with others “makes” me grow my faith.  If you want to grow your faith, make yourself responsible to others for living your faith out loud. 

“Not neglecting to meet together.”  This phrase has definitely taken on new meaning in the wake of a pandemic.  Meeting together right now has been a habit that has been broken for many.  Hugs, handshakes, holding hands, and the like are still a bit awkward.  Singing and hearing others sing around you has never sounded better to me.  Noticing the lady in the row in front of you on her phone and the kid crawling under the pew.  Teenagers whispering a little too loud (By the way, I was that teenager many moons ago).  People giving me a hard time about not wearing a robe or for wearing a robe.  Hearing a “Hmmm” when I say something during the message that makes someone think.  Hearing people laugh.  Watching people’s faces during prayer (I admit it . . .I do that sometimes).  I cherish it all more now.   Meeting together is essential.

I’m going to be honest here.  We gotta fight for this one right now.  We took for granted the built-in gatherings each week that helped us practice our faith together.  In order to do it now, we gotta work for it.  We might have to call someone when you hate talking on the phone.  We might have to learn a technology that we swore we’d never learn so that we can see other Christian faces.  We might even have to handwrite a letter to someone to connect in a deeper way.  But let’s not fool ourselves.  There ARE ways for us to “meet together” even when we can’t meeting together is strained.  But we have to really work for it. 

I have had some really good conversations over the last tow years with people I could not physically be with.  I have connected deeply with people who have emailed or texted me back and forth.  I felt the Holy Spirit connecting us across distance and time while I was leading online communion this past week.    I have connected with friends and family on Zoom when I would have never done that before.  I like to say it’s all been good.  It hasn’t. At times, it is really frustrating.  I find myself crying more often than I did before.  It’s hard work.  But you know what.  I can’t find any scripture that tells me, “faith is easy.”  (Just in case you’re thinking about quoting Matthew 11:28-30 to me, that’s not what Jesus was trying to say 😉).  Let’s take what we learned over the last two years and do it in addition to our coming back together. 

One of my Facebook friends said a while back “I’ve said this a thousand times and will say it a thousand more. If you don’t have a tribe you need one.”  It is so true!  You will always need a tribe – a group that you share life with, get support from, lean on from time to time, AND, practice your faith with. If you’re reading this and you don’t have a tribe, join us.  You can find us at hernandoumcfl.com  every Sunday at 10:00am in person or streaming on Youtube.    If not us, find another tribe. You need one.

 

Prayer:  God, we at HUMC are blessed with a wonderful, loving, crazy and quirky tribe.  Help us to stay connected to our tribe and see our faith grow in the process.

 

Prayer Focus:  Pray for your tribe or tribes today.

 

Song:  Come Together (Third Day) If you don’t like screaming guitars, at least read the lyrics to this one. I’ve listed them below.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jv6UMX-yA5U

You can all call me crazy

For the things that I might say

You can laugh all you want to

I know there will come a day

When we all will come together

And learn to set aside our hate

If we could learn to love our neighbors

Just like we would love ourselves

We've got to come together

'Cause in the end we can make it - alright

We've got to brave the weather

Through all of the storms

We've got to come together

'Cause in the end we can make it - alright

We've got to learn to love

You can call me a dreamer

But these dreams will come true

Yes, I am a firm believer

In the things that we can do

If we would all just come together

And let the Lord lead our way

There is nothing that we can't do

There is nothing we can't face

I know that there will come a day

When the Lord will call His own away

To a place that He has made for all of us

But until the day of His return

There's a lesson that we've got to learn

We are brothers and we're sisters

We are one