Faith - Fail

When we open the dictionary and find the word failure, this is what it tells us: Failure is: the lack of success, or the omission of expected or require action. So, an Easy way of understanding failure is by understanding that failure is an inability to perform a normal function well. So, if failure is unable to perform a function well, then I fail at a lot of things. I’ve failed at making coffee the other day.

I put the coffee in, I got my cup ready, I refilled the water resiviour, I turned on the coffee pot and then I walked away to begin my morning devotional. I began to smell the amazing aroma of a fresh cup of coffee. So I got up and went into the kitchen and guess where I found my morning coffee? all over the counter. I had put my cup on the counter in front of the coffee pot, but I failed to put my cup where the coffee dispenses.

and yes! I cleaned my mess up as any good faithful husband would do before my wife got up and saw my failure. If that story isn’t bad enough.. I did I it again on Thursday night. This time, I made tea. I put water in the machine, I placed my tea bag in my cup. I let the machine run and the tea sat on the counter to steep. I then went to bed and woke up the next morning to make my coffee and guess what?

my tea was just sitting there on the counter. I failed to remember I had made it and it sat there all night. I’ve experienced so much ‘failure’ in my life. I’ve failed in college, I’ve ‘failed’ in ministry, I’ve ‘failed’ in my marriage, ‘failed’ as a dad, ‘failed’ my friends, the list can go on and on. One thing I’ve seen throughout my life of failures is that failure can stop us from taking chances.

And at times, failure can stop us from being vulnerable and also failure can hinder us from wanting to take risks again. Failure can also prevent us from wanting to lead or trying something new. Have you ever wanted to do something new, but you fear you wont do it as well as someone else? Failure can fill us with self-pity and prevent us from believing in God’s plan for our lives.

Failure -or even just the fear of it- can destroy our faith! That’s the aim of Satan in our lives. To sift us till our faith falters and then fails. So that he can devour us as unbelievers. One thing Jesus is teaching peter and the disciples is that Satan Aims to sift our faith. Jesus tells Peter and the other disciples in verse 31, "Simon, Simon, behold, Satan demanded to have you that he might sift you like wheat." That sounds kind of harsh doesn’t it?

Satan wants to sift you. He wants to thrash you around and separate you. Now, before we go forward we need to understand something. In English we read this as if Jesus was having a conversation with only Simon Peter. As if Jesus was telling Simon what Satan intends to do to him. But in the Greek language, this “you” that is used is plural. So we could interpret this passage as, “Hey, listen, especially you, Simon.

Satan plans to sift all of “you” disciples like wheat. It’s plural.” Now, this thrashing is basically meaning that Satan is looking to cause a major disturbance and then prey on those weakened through the thrashing. This reminds me of mountain lions. Mountain lions prowl around looking for vulnerabilities. They search for the weakest, the youngest, the sick and the injured. Studies have shown that they follow the scent of their prey and then feast on whatever it is that they find.

It’s the same principle in our spiritual life. Our Hope is in Christ, but what takes us from focusing on our hope? What makes us fail in our faith? Turmoil and trouble. Turmoil comes because the enemy of our hope and happiness hunts with that same instinct, and with a cold-hearted and ruthless hunger for the weak and hurting. And because he’s clever he spends a lot of his time among the suffering.

He lies in wait, wanting to consume the fragile and vulnerable. Peter here soon will begin in the school of suffering, and he is about to learn this truth the hard way. He tells us what he learned in this school of suffering in I Peter 5:8 to be “8 Be sober-minded; be watchful. Your adversary the devil prowls around like a roaring lion, seeking someone to devour” Two things we need to know about Satan.

Satan has a lot of power in this world. Jesus calls him the "prince" or "ruler of this world" (John 16:11), and Paul calls him the "God of this age" (2 Corinthians 4:4) and the "ruler of the authority of the air" (Ephesians 2:2). He blinds the minds of unbelievers (2 Corinthians 4:4) and holds them in his snare until God releases them through the gospel (2 Timothy 2:25, 26). He can take life, as with Job's children; ruin health, as with Job's body (cf.

also Luke 13:16); torment with demons (Luke 11:18); provoke evil deeds (Luke 22:3); and cause natural disasters (Job 1:19). The fact that Satan has this much power in the world should give a kind of seriousness to our lives which unbelievers don't have. Should not our prayer life increase knowing that Satan has this much power? But the second thing we need to know and be reminded of is this: Satan's power is by permission from God.

There are not two ultimate powers in this universe. There is no Flying and an equally powerful counterpart called Yang. Satan has no ultimate power in this universe. We know from Job that Satan must come before God and ask for permission to do anything. There is only one: God. When Satan wants to have the disciples, he must go to God first. So, Jesus pictures satan as a farmer sifting violently the disciples as wheat.

He’s shaking their faith. Peter pictures Satan as a lion roaming around devouring anything in his path. And the only thing that Satan can not devour or sift is their faith. So what does Jesus do… well if Satan’s aim is to sift our faith, Jesus’s aim is to lift our faith. How does Jesus lift our faith… well he does it through prayer. I find it interesting that, we as Christians struggle with prayer.

I do too… I still struggle with praying in public. Prayer must become a daily part of our lives. And it amazes me that Christian’s are able to know in their heads when they hear that we should be people of prayer, but we tend to find time for it. But why? Well I believe we know why but refuse to change the why….. I think we fail at prayer because Our faith is not as high as we might think.

We think very highly of ourselves. We stink with our own pride. What causes a person to not repent. Pride. What causes a person to not seek forgiveness. Pride. What causes a person to refuse to pray. Pride. Honestly, pride is more natural to us than prayer. Pride really takes away our reliance on God. and as long as we are self-sufficient and complacent, we don’t need to ask God for anything.

We don’t want him. It is only when we know we are powerless that we are prepared to listen to Jesus Christ and then do what he says. Prayer isn’t natural to us when humility isn’t leading our lives? And for most Christians, Prayer only becomes natural when all of their gifts, and all of their resources are exhausted. Prayer is hard because it interrupts the natural man’s tendency to seek personal ambition, and no person who is too busy has time to pray.

We must be reminded that… Prayer is what strengthens our faith. It’s our lifeline to God and it anchors our soul to God’s promises. Jesus used prayer to nourish the life of God in Him. And when we are born from above, the life of the son of God begins in us, and we can either starve it or nourish it. But prayer is how we nourish God’s presence in our life.

Now, put this into perspective… If there is an enemy that is trying to devour and sift us as God’s people and the only way for us to be safe during the enemies advances is faith, then wouldn't and shouldn’t we be people of constant prayer to strengthen our faith? If the only thing that can not go down the gullet of Satan is faith, would we not be found trusting and praying for more faith?

Jesus told Peter that he was praying for him, that his faith would not fail. And his faith did not fail. At the tomb, Peter stood and ran and stooped and looked. What he saw — or rather, what he did not see — changed everything (Luke 24:12). When a death-defying Savior prays that our faith does not fail, it doesn’t. Jesus had a plan for him. It wasn’t one without bumps and bruises, but it was Jesus’s plan, and he would pray it through.

What this means for us is that no matter how low or far we may have fallen, we again can stand in Jesus’s keeping power. We can turn again back to Jesus. We can lift our eyes to Christ and put our faith and trust into Him. But the issue is our pride. We can’t lift up our eyes to the cross if we refuse to take our eyes off of ourselves.

C.S. Lewis,, called pride “the great sin.” Every believer should read his chapter by that title in Mere Christianity. There Lewis said, “According to Christian teachers, the essential vice, the utmost evil, is Pride. Unchastity, anger, greed, drunkenness, and all that, are mere flea bites in comparison: it was through Pride that the devil became the devil: Pride leads to every other vice: it is the complete anti-God state of mind…

it is Pride which has been the chief cause of misery in every nation and every family since the world began. It’s pride that keeps the world trapped in the snares of Satan. It’s pride that keeps the nations at war with each other. It’s pride that keeps a church from repenting and focusing on Jesus. As I’ve heard before, no church will move into revival unless the people want and desire it.

And the only way to receive it is through the repentance of sins and coming too place our eyes on Jesus Christ the perfected of our faith. All of our faith on our own is nothing but counterfeit. Any faith of man that does not yield to the sanctifying grace and power of the cross is not faith at all, but a false faith that comes through pride. Honeslty,. Pride is dead faith.

And the devil’s most effective and destructive tool in our lives and in the church is to get people stuck on their faithless pride to devour them. So what does Jesus do, he prays for Simon, he prays for the disciples and he’s praying for us… Hebrews 12:2 reminds us to what? “To fix our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfecter of our faith… Jesus — full of grace, who is risen from the dead, prays for us, guiding us when it feels like we have nothing to offer, when we feel like we’ve ruined our chances — Jesus says to us, “I can still use you.” I want you.

I don’t care of your failures, Jesus said, bring them to me.. and I can use you….. turn your eyes on me, and I will perfect your faith. Isn’t that what we sing in our hymn books? O soul are you weary and troubled, No light in the darkness you see, There's light for a look at the Savior, And life more abundant and free. Turn your eyes upon Jesus Look full in his wonderful face, And the things of earth will grow strangely dim, In the light of his glory and grace.

The Truth is, God doesn’t see failure the way we do. God only sees something as a ‘failure’ when we quit. Put this in your heart this morning… when it comes to God’s grace and our failures.. His grace seeks nothing less than a new creation into the likeness of Jesus Christ, and the only time grace fails is when we fail by not receiving it and trying to walk in this life with false faith.

My point it this… If we already have an enemy that is trying to steal, kill and destroy our faith, and he devours the faithless. Why would we not want to look to Christ where our faith is uplifted, and strengthened and we’re kept safe from the ultimate battle of losing our souls. Why would we not pursue prayer to encourage and uplift. And if were Christians why would we not want to encourage one another.

That takes me to the final thought.. Satan aims to sift, Jesus aims to lift… and then Jesus strengthens us so that we can strengthen one another. Here Jesus was telling Simon and the disciples. Satan is coming for you. That’s a fact.. and guess what. Satan to this day, right now is gunning for us today. He wants to sift us and divide us and get our faith in Christ to fail.

And one way he can do that is to get us to turn from being encouragers. When was the last time you took a moment to encourage someone? I find in my life that when I am hurt, or feeling pitty for myself and getting down. The best way to get myself encouraged is by encouraging others. This week on Friday I was praying for for the lords anointing and after prayer at 7:58am, i get a text from a person in our church that reads, “Just wanted to say, Hope you have a good day.” Earlier in my personal devotional time I was praying Proverbs 16:24..

“Kind words are a honey, sweet to the soul and healing to the body.” So my prayer was answered on Friday…. Because my prayer on Friday morning for us as a church was this… “Jesus, if your kingdom is going to be realized here at twin Hills, it must begin with people who are seeking to be encouragers like you, and not discouragers.” That was my personal prayer on Friday for all of us.

So, what did I do? Well I left and went to Panera bread to study. The word of God that is, not soup and Sandwiches. Although… Panera does reminds me of the bread of life and Jesus makes us one like a delicious Cheesey broccoli soup. But as I was there eating and writing the message for today, the Lord said, Matthew.. my word never returns to me void. Why not put that to the test.

So… I saved an image from my Bible app with proverbs 16:24 and I texted it to over 120 people to encourage them. Because I was encouraged earlier. Out of all of those text messages, i got maybe 1-2% to respond back. But again, I'm not looking for validation as much as I am looking for open communication with others. Ya know, peolle might give up on us.. but there is one thing I can say.

I personally haven’t given up on anyone. I still believe that repentance works. But as I encouraged over 120 people. One person wrote back: “Matt, you have me in tears. I just sent an encouraging text to some of my Sunday school teachers and a prayer that God laid on my heart. I literally pushed send as you texted me. It amazes me that while I'm trying to encourage others, you encouraged me !!

God is so good!!! Thank you!” There were many more who wrote back encouraging reminders of God’s goodness. Friday was an amazing day of encouragement for me. And a test to show me that God is good and he is faithful… and he is the ultimate encourager who strengthens our faith. So I shared that text with the one who first shared encouragement. And I reminded them, that their beautiful one seed of encouremgent.

Blossomed into a beautiful garden of love and encouragement for others. It was to show them that one act of encouragement can spread like fire among people who are willing to receive it and then to return it to others. Be an encourager to others.. pride must be laid down at the foot of the cross and faith in Christ must be received through Christ who strengthens us by His prayers.

Remember what I said a couple weeks ago, before we do anything for Christ, he must serve us first before we attempt to serve others. That is what happened to Peter… on the night of His betrayal and peters denial, Satan began to sieve Peter. And on that night, God broke the back of Peter's pride. He let Peter go through the sieve, but he never lets him go. He turned him around and forgave him and restored him and strengthened his faith.

And now it was Peter's mission to strengthen andf to encourage the other ten. This week I wrote this in my prayer journal and I hope it helps you… “Sometimes God must break the backs of the prideful and the self-reliant. Jesus isn’t letting us go but taking us to a place of repentance to strengthen our faith and to restore us on the rightful path of living faith.” The great lesson for us is this…

Sometimes God must deal with us through the sifting of Satan’s sieve to get us to a place where faith can take hold in our lives so that we can be encouragers. And when we are encouraged, we should reach out to encourage others. And when we are feeling blue and down, that is a sign that we should be reaching out to encourage others. The strengthened becomes the strengthener. As we depart this morning, I want to give us two concluding thoughts for us to think about and to take home.

What if our turmoil and trouble is actually God driving us to a place of greater faith? And what if the things we deal with on a daily life are opporuntities for us to be encourgers? If we’re desiring a deeper faith, it’s going to require a deeper commitment and cost to us. A deeper life in Christ will cost us. ultimately it will drive our pride to humility. But it will cost us friends, it will cost us a comfortable lifestyle, it will cost us Financial stability.

It could cost us our very lives. Jesus tells us, we need to count that cost. To pick up our cross and to follow him. Where he leads us, we may not know. It could be through the valley of the shadow of death… that sounds fun doesnt it? I hope it’s a cruise… but we all know when we go through that kind of valley, it’s usually a slow pilgrimage.

But regardless of what mountaintop or valley he leads us to.. it’s needed in our lives at times to strengthen our faith so that we can strengthen others. So here are my two concluding thoughts… Only in a world where faith is difficult can faith exist. And only in a world where pain is real can love be proved. Faith cant exist in a world that’s easy, and if there is no pain in what it costs us to be ripped from the grasp of this world to follow Christ by faith, would we even truly love Jesus and one another?

Whenever God encourages our heart with the promise, that Jesus prays for us, while Satan tried to sift our faith, his promises is that he will not fail or falter to care for us, but he will encourage and double our joy by using the sieve to strengthen us, so that we can return and strengthen our brothers and sisters who are struggling as well. Let’s stand and pray together. *