The Faith You Can Muster
Lk. 17:1-10[1]
Just as there’s a fine line between honesty and dishonesty,
so I think there’s a fine line between faith and unbelief. You might think that they are poles apart,
opposites on the ends of a very long continuum.
But I don’t think so. In my
opinion, that makes faith into something complicated, something we have to
create on our own, and perhaps even something that is within our ability to
control. But I would say that faith is
at once simpler and more profound than that.
As the twelve-step movement reminds us, faith can be as simple as
surrendering, as simple as “letting go and letting God.” And yet, maintaining even that simple faith
is something that can test us to the very core of our being. At times, it can be beyond our grasp,
something that seems impossible for us to muster.[2] Even then, the Scriptures remind us that
“nothing shall be impossible with God”!
In our Gospel lesson for today we find Jesus instructing
the disciples about some of the ways in which their life together could get
sticky. Especially in the time when Luke
was composing this Gospel, every community of Christians would experience the
tension that results from having persons at various stages in the faith
journey. Unfortunately, sometimes those
who are just beginning the journey can go too far in their zeal, and can look
down on the more mature faith of those who have been walking the path for many
years. But the opposite can happen as
well, sometimes those whose faith is deep enough to allow them the freedom to find
joy in all aspects of life can forget that new Christians may be offended by
their freedom. In fact, they may even
stumble so far as to seemingly “lose” their faith. Jesus insisted, as did St. Paul, that those
who are more experienced with the Christian faith and with their discipleship
to Jesus must consider the effect of their conduct on those whose faith may be
more fragile.[3]
Another sticky situation in the community of those who seek
to follow Christ is when one person positively sins against another. Perhaps it’s a matter of someone taking what
is not theirs. Or we may lose our temper
with a Christian brother or sister and let hurtful words damage the
relationship. Or, as can often happen,
perhaps one person may be guilty of publicly slandering another. All of these situations create a potential
rift in the body of Christ, which is supposed to be united. So Jesus urged his disciples to correct those
who sin against them, and when they repent, to forgive them. In fact, he wanted them to know that this was
so important to the community of faith that he instructed them that even if someone
sinned against them in the exact same way seven times in one day, when they
returned and repented, the disciples were to forgive.
Now, we’ve been following Jesus and his disciples in the
Gospel of Luke as they’ve been making their way from Galilee to Jerusalem. And we’ve listened in to the extended “Sermon
on the Way to Jerusalem,” and all that Jesus has said to them about what it
means to follow him in discipleship. We’ve
heard him warn them to let go of their pretension about their own
righteousness, to let go of their expectations for any recognition or reward
for following him, to let go their compulsion to fill their lives with “stuff”
instead of God. We’ve heard Jesus call
the disciples to persevere in living out the values of God’s Kingdom in the
face of the contradictions of the other loyalties of our world. We’ve heard him challenge them to recognize
the humanity of every face, especially the poor and needy, and to recognize the
injustice that oppresses them. And we’ve
heard him insist that those who follow him must include everyone they meet in
the grace and mercy of God.
It’s no wonder that when Jesus added to all that the demand
that they see themselves as responsible for the well-being of other disciples they
cried out, “Increase our faith” (Lk. 17:5)!
And yet, Jesus’ somewhat strange response makes it clear that they were
approaching it from the wrong perspective altogether.[4] They were assuming that their ability to live
out their commitment to following Jesus was ultimately dependent upon their own
strength, their own abilities, and their own faithfulness. From that perspective, fulfilling the demands
of discipleship might seem as impossible as commanding a mulberry tree to be
uprooted and plant itself in the sea!
But Jesus knew something they seemed to forget often: with God all
things are possible. If they could just
muster enough faith to let go and let God take care of the “impossibilities,”
they would find they had all the faith they need.[5]
For some of us, faith comes easy. It’s as natural as a fish swimming in water,
or a bird flying in the air, or a horse running through a pasture. For others of us, faith seems like a wall
that is impossible to climb. For all of
us, Jesus encourages us to think outside the box of our own abilities. When we let go and let God, when we stop
holding on so tightly and simply open our hands and let go the illusion that
we’re in control of our lives, then we can walk the path of following Jesus. [6] And as we walk the path, seeking our lives in
God and not in the stuff around us, loving those around us, all those around
us, living in the imperfect community of those who are striving to follow
Jesus, the farther we go the more we find that the faith that once may have
seemed beyond our grasp is really quite simple after all.[7] All it takes is all the faith we can
muster. And whether all the faith we can
muster is a lot or a little, it’s enough.[8]
[1] ©
2013 Alan Brehm. A sermon delivered by
Rev. Dr. Alan Brehm on 10/6/2013 at First Presbyterian Church of Dickinson, TX.
[2] Cf.
John Caputo, On Religion, where he
says that a religious sense of life moves us “past the manageable prospects of
the present, beyond the sphere in which we have some mastery, beyond the domain
of sensible possibilities that we can get our hands on” and into “the sphere of
the impossible, of something whose possibility we just cannot conceive” where
“only the great passions of faith and love and hope will see us through.”
[3]
Cf. Clark Pinnock, Luke, 199: “Paul
states what Luke 17:1-2 implies: there is a law higher than the law of freedom
and that is the law of love. In the
fellowship of believers, disciples are to be responsibly considerate of one
another.”
[4]
John Nolland, Luke 9:21–18:34, 839: “For
those who have been touched by the coming of the kingdom of God in connection
with the ministry of Jesus, what is needed is not the increase of faith, but
simply the active exercise of faith.”
[5]
Cf. John Rollefson, “The Measure of Faith,” The
Christian Century (Sept. 21, 2004): 21: “Faith is ever and only a response
empowered by an amazing grace originating from outside of our own efforts that
enables us to entrust ourselves willingly to One we have found trustworthy.”
[6]
Cf. Pinnock, Luke, 200: “Faith lays hold of
God with whom nothing is impossible, and it is God who empowers the life of
discipleship.”
[7]
Cf. William Willimon, “Doing Faith Until You Have It,” accessed at http://thq.wearesparkhouse.org/featured/doing-faith-until-you-have-it/. He says, “More faith comes through faithful
living. Just do it; your faith will be increased, not as a personal
achievement, but as a gift of God.”
[8]
Cf. Karl Barth, Church Dogmatics
4.2:233.
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