The month of November closed with 2 questions:
#1. What is faith?
#2. Who is the Holy Spirit?
The first question, "What is faith?" stems from the Sunday School class I am teaching for our youth girls. We have been studying through Ephesians and we have now reached Eph. 2. As we have studied down through these passages, it has been so amazing to see how God has opened their eyes to understand things! I wanted them to understand the workings of salvation on a deeper level than just "Jesus died for my sins," and it has been overwhelming and amazing to see how God has been challenging them with his Word.
When we reached the topic of faith and I began preparing to explain what it means to "put your faith in Christ," God opened my eyes to some things I had never realized before. My devotions have brought me to Hebrews 11, and it is certainly NO coincidence that I am studying that chapter while teaching on faith ;-) I had never realized the centrality of faith in the Bible. Over and over and over again, this is cited as a defining factor: because of his faith, without faith it is impossible to please God, they did not believe, believe in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ, your faith has made you whole, because of their unbelief, and so on, and so on, and so on. As I prepared, I was overwhelmed with the responsibility that I had to define this and explain this well. What we believe is the most important thing about us. It affects what we do, it affects our attitudes, and it will determine where we spend eternity! Little did I know that God was going to use this preparation in an entirely different way than I had planned . . .
This brings me to question #2, "Who is the Holy Spirit?" My ESL student/Russian language teacher posed this question to me just a few minutes after I handed her my Russian Bible. She has a Russian Orthodox background, but had to leave her bible in Russia (along with the rest of her books), so she was so excited to receive a Bible! She then proceeded to ask if it had a commentary (which it did not). Then she got a little concerned and asked if I would explain it to her.
At this point, I am both excited and overwhelmed. We are seriously on a communication level of a 4 year old or so. How am I going to be able to communicate well enough to do this? This is serious! This is God's Word! We already have misunderstandings about what is being said concerning our day-to-day lives! How am I going to be able to do this?! (admittedly, I was a bit panicked) With both panic and excitement filling my being, I told her that I would explain it to her.
Bam! Right away, she turned to Deuteronomy 28:48 and asked if God would really send these bad people and bad things:
"therefore you shall serve your enemies whom the LORD will send against you, in hunger and thirst, in nakedness, and lacking everything. And he will put a yoke of iron on your neck until he has destroyed you."
So, hahahah, I spent some time explaining context, and reading the verses around it, but immediately after that, she asked,
"Is the Holy Spirit an angel or a demon?"
I told her that he is neither an angel or a demon. He is God.
She then wanted to know, "Is the Holy Spirit a who or a what?"
I told her he is a who, he is a person.
So now, the plan is to bring some verses and passages that talk about the Holy Spirit to our next ESL lesson, so that we can look at them together. Wow! As I drove home, I was just praising the Lord for his amazing and incomprehensible plan. At the same time, I was apprehensive about my ability to explain things to her and to understand her questions. These things are tedious enough to explain in English, the thought of doing it in my 4 year old Russian vocab scared me to death.
Then I remembered my Sunday School lesson about faith. Yes, God is trustworthy; He is faithful. He has given me the Holy Spirit (the very thing I am scared about explaining) to HELP me explain these truths!
So, the main question becomes, "Where am I putting my faith?"
Am I putting it in myself and in my abilities to explain these things? OR, am I putting it in God and in His ability to open her eyes to the truths of His word DESPITE my complete inadequacy as a vessel? God has completely stripped away any abilities I might have in explaining His Word in English and forced me to come to my knees and ask Him to do all the work. For I can do none of it. It is only his Word that is going to open her eyes. Although I already knew these things in my head, God knew that I needed to apply them in my heart.
#1. What is faith?
#2. Who is the Holy Spirit?
The first question, "What is faith?" stems from the Sunday School class I am teaching for our youth girls. We have been studying through Ephesians and we have now reached Eph. 2. As we have studied down through these passages, it has been so amazing to see how God has opened their eyes to understand things! I wanted them to understand the workings of salvation on a deeper level than just "Jesus died for my sins," and it has been overwhelming and amazing to see how God has been challenging them with his Word.
When we reached the topic of faith and I began preparing to explain what it means to "put your faith in Christ," God opened my eyes to some things I had never realized before. My devotions have brought me to Hebrews 11, and it is certainly NO coincidence that I am studying that chapter while teaching on faith ;-) I had never realized the centrality of faith in the Bible. Over and over and over again, this is cited as a defining factor: because of his faith, without faith it is impossible to please God, they did not believe, believe in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ, your faith has made you whole, because of their unbelief, and so on, and so on, and so on. As I prepared, I was overwhelmed with the responsibility that I had to define this and explain this well. What we believe is the most important thing about us. It affects what we do, it affects our attitudes, and it will determine where we spend eternity! Little did I know that God was going to use this preparation in an entirely different way than I had planned . . .
This brings me to question #2, "Who is the Holy Spirit?" My ESL student/Russian language teacher posed this question to me just a few minutes after I handed her my Russian Bible. She has a Russian Orthodox background, but had to leave her bible in Russia (along with the rest of her books), so she was so excited to receive a Bible! She then proceeded to ask if it had a commentary (which it did not). Then she got a little concerned and asked if I would explain it to her.
At this point, I am both excited and overwhelmed. We are seriously on a communication level of a 4 year old or so. How am I going to be able to communicate well enough to do this? This is serious! This is God's Word! We already have misunderstandings about what is being said concerning our day-to-day lives! How am I going to be able to do this?! (admittedly, I was a bit panicked) With both panic and excitement filling my being, I told her that I would explain it to her.
Bam! Right away, she turned to Deuteronomy 28:48 and asked if God would really send these bad people and bad things:
"therefore you shall serve your enemies whom the LORD will send against you, in hunger and thirst, in nakedness, and lacking everything. And he will put a yoke of iron on your neck until he has destroyed you."
So, hahahah, I spent some time explaining context, and reading the verses around it, but immediately after that, she asked,
"Is the Holy Spirit an angel or a demon?"
I told her that he is neither an angel or a demon. He is God.
She then wanted to know, "Is the Holy Spirit a who or a what?"
I told her he is a who, he is a person.
So now, the plan is to bring some verses and passages that talk about the Holy Spirit to our next ESL lesson, so that we can look at them together. Wow! As I drove home, I was just praising the Lord for his amazing and incomprehensible plan. At the same time, I was apprehensive about my ability to explain things to her and to understand her questions. These things are tedious enough to explain in English, the thought of doing it in my 4 year old Russian vocab scared me to death.
Then I remembered my Sunday School lesson about faith. Yes, God is trustworthy; He is faithful. He has given me the Holy Spirit (the very thing I am scared about explaining) to HELP me explain these truths!
So, the main question becomes, "Where am I putting my faith?"
Am I putting it in myself and in my abilities to explain these things? OR, am I putting it in God and in His ability to open her eyes to the truths of His word DESPITE my complete inadequacy as a vessel? God has completely stripped away any abilities I might have in explaining His Word in English and forced me to come to my knees and ask Him to do all the work. For I can do none of it. It is only his Word that is going to open her eyes. Although I already knew these things in my head, God knew that I needed to apply them in my heart.
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