Trevin Wax - You Can't Pass On Faith You Don't Have

You Can’t Pass On Faith You Don’t Have

Jan 17, 2015 | Trevin Wax

Here is a challenging word in First Things from Charles Chaput:

As I look back on the last sixty years, one of the Scripture passages that stays with me most vividly is Judges 2:6-15. It’s the story of what happens after the Exodus and after Joshua wins the Promised Land for God’s people. Verse 10 says that Joshua “and all that generation also were gathered to their fathers; and there arose another generation after them, who did not know the Lord or the work which he had done for Israel.”

It’s worth reading. So is the research Christian Smith has done on the religious beliefs of American teens and young adults. Every generation leaves a legacy of achievement and failure. In my lifetime, I’ve had the privilege of knowing many good men and women of my generation—Christians, Jews, and people with no religious faith at all; people who have made the world better by the gift of their lives and their joy in service to others. But the biggest failure, the biggest sadness, of so many people of my generation, including parents, educators, and leaders in the Church, is our failure to pass along our faith in a compelling way to the generation now taking our place.

We can blame this on the confusion of the times. We can blame it on our own mistakes in pedagogy. But the real reason faith doesn’t matter to so many of our young adults and teens is that—too often—it didn’t really matter to us. Not enough to shape our lives. Not enough for us to suffer for it.

I know there are tens of thousands of exceptions to this, but it is still true. A man can’t give what he doesn’t have. If we want to change the culture of a nation, we need to begin by taking a hard look at the thing we call our own faith. If we don’t radiate the love of God with passion and courage in the example of our daily lives, nobody else will—least of all the young people who see us most clearly and know us most intimately. The theme of this essay is “strangers in a strange land.” But the real problem in America today isn’t that we believers are foreigners. It’s that our children and grandchildren aren’t.

- Charles Chaput

Comments

Repackaging the gospel? It's more like obscuring the gospel!

Preface : I recognize this post may make me unpopular with some, but I think it is an important issue to blog about here. I’ve had time to reflect on this video and in my opinion, I think what is in this video raises some questions. This gentleman featured below is slotted to speak at the SBC's 2020 Pastors' Conference and it prompted me to think more about this illustration. I want to note that I don't know him and I have no personal issue with him. I assume he is a brother in the LORD. Having said that, I see some significant issues here that relate to this type of preaching being clear on the gospel of Jesus Christ. In fact, it appears to be obscuring it in my observation. Concern: Should the SBC or churches, in general, be in the habit of holding this up as a good and healthy example? Let's think about it some together. (Watch this clip below here first.) Context: The clip was posted to stand on its own as if it were wise and sound on it

Smith: "Many people believe God opens the door of salvation and then stands back...".

Jonah 2:9 “Salvation belongs to the LORD!” God’s dramatic intervention in the life of Jonah is full of hope—not only for those who seek God, but also for those who, like Jonah, have determined to shut him out. Many people believe God opens the door of salvation and then stands back, leaving it up to us to decide if we want to come in. But if God made salvation possible and then stepped back, refusing to interfere with our choice, then the entire life of believers would be about us—our believing, our serving, our following, and our choices to live a good life. In the case of Jonah, imprisoned in the whale’s belly, God was claiming someone who was quite incapable of performing any redeeming work to compensate for his sin. God was not relying on Jonah to save Jonah. The message remains the same for each of us today: if you have trusted God for salvation, he has done more than simply make salvation possible; he has actually saved you. Colin Smith, “Jonah,” in Gospel Transformation B

Men stirred, boys exhorted, and Jesus exalted!

Neh 8 v 13 (CSB) 13 On the second day, the family heads of all the people, along with the priests and Levites, assembled before the scribe Ezra to study the words of the law. Notice the feel of the scene. After that long day in the Word, it appears that the women and children were, understandably, exhausted and urged to stay home on this occasion. And, among the men, there is a growing interest of “What else are we missing right now as it pertains to obeying God's Word?”. So clear is the fact that the family heads, the men, came back to get more. The real sense of enthusiasm starts with the men here. If you were an able-bodied man here, you stayed behind to get instructions so that you might be a good instructor at home. The text says these men came together to study the words of the law . That means to give attention to and ponder. This is the process of thinking through complex things, resulting in wise dealing and the use of good practical common sense. Here in

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