House Of Faith

It's one thing to say we have faith, quite another to prove it by our actions. This demonstration of faith is from March 15, 2011.

If you grew up in Sunday school, you probably learned this definition of faith from Hebrews chapter eleven and verse one:
Now faith is being sure of what we hope for and certain of what we do not see.

What an understandable and concise picture of trust in the Almighty. Let me give you the best application of that faith I have ever witnessed.

The Lord has blessed me to be able to go on eleven summer mission trips to Honduras. The groups I went with were called TORCH Missions and SHINE Missions and the two were comprised of many of the same Christians. The TORCH groups in particular focused on allowing teenagers to have mission experiences and we probably had about sixty per cent of our number under age twenty. In the early years of my participation, we stayed in the capital of Tegucigalpa. Later, as part of SHINE, we worked more in the Choluteca area, close to Nicaragua. About nine years ago, we were concentrating on building houses for Christians in the villages around Tegucigalpa. We were assigned one project in the city- to construct a house for a Christian family. The family was told on Sunday that we were coming on Monday morning and would build on the site of their current home. Do you know what they did on Sunday night? They tore their house down to make sure they were ready for our arrival. Mind you, we were a temporary congregation with a large concentration of American teenagers and they had never met us. And yet, when we arrived early in the morning, that space on a side street reeking of squalor was cleared and ready for a new lodging. That, to me, is the best demonstration of faith I have ever seen. How many of us would possess that kind of trust in God AND foreign brothers and sisters of somewhat limited maturity to be able to sweep away all traces of what was their only shelter from the elements? What a testimony to their faith in the Father. I need a double portion of their ability to see the unseen. I saw it embodied on a backstreet in Central America.

*The picture above is one I took of a typical home in some of the poorer Honduran villages where we have worked.*

Applicable quote of the day:
"Faith is taking the first step even when you don't see the whole staircase."
Martin Luther King Jr


God bless,
Steve
Luke 18:1
http://www.hawleybooks.com/
E-mail me at steve@hawleybooks.com