WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:07.660 Amen. Okay, let's see how we get on this evening. How do you tell a story? Let's begin there. 00:00:07.780 --> 00:00:13.280 ! So we had a fun community group chat where we were asking ourselves that question because we were 00:00:13.280 --> 00:00:19.679 ! recognizing that some people and some cultures tell stories quite differently to other people and 00:00:19.679 --> 00:00:24.480 other cultures. For some, when they tell a story, you need to give yourself a whole day because they're 00:00:24.480 --> 00:00:29.800 going to tell you the whole story at great length, and that story could go anywhere, and it grows 00:00:29.800 --> 00:00:37.600 arms and legs with the telling. Others, when we tell stories, it's with brevity. There's highlights. 00:00:37.840 --> 00:00:43.960 Often there's no context. We might jump into the middle of the story. It's interesting, isn't it? 00:00:43.960 --> 00:00:48.380 And sometimes when you think about patterns of storytelling, we think, well, it reveals something 00:00:48.380 --> 00:00:53.019 about a person's temperament, perhaps. Maybe it says something about the culture that they're from, 00:00:53.519 --> 00:00:58.359 and it also will probably tell us something about the emphasis that they want to draw out. 00:00:58.359 --> 00:01:05.060 And I would suggest that when we come to read the accounts of Jesus in the gospel writers, we see 00:01:05.060 --> 00:01:13.260 something of those same principles at work. So we've just read a very short, abbreviated account 00:01:13.260 --> 00:01:19.920 of these two encounters. You might be familiar with it in Mark's gospel or in Luke's gospel, 00:01:20.219 --> 00:01:25.560 and you get lots of extra details. You get the extended version. With Mark, you get the name. 00:01:25.560 --> 00:01:33.120 We're talking about Jairus. We get the age of his daughter. She was 12. We learn that when he first 00:01:33.120 --> 00:01:41.140 came to Jesus, she wasn't dead. She was dying. We learn about the crush of the crowds. We learn that 00:01:41.140 --> 00:01:47.260 this woman has spent everything from Luke to try and find a cure, and nobody could help. We learn from 00:01:47.260 --> 00:01:54.900 Mark that Jesus spoke words to the little girl in Aramaic, Talitha cum. But we don't get any of that 00:01:54.900 --> 00:01:59.600 with Matthew. And so some people have looked at that and said, well, that gives us a bit of a 00:01:59.600 --> 00:02:06.340 reliability problem. Here's the same account, but they sound very different. But just to mention that 00:02:06.340 --> 00:02:11.080 we would expect this, wouldn't we, from eyewitness testimony. If we were in a law court, if two people 00:02:11.080 --> 00:02:18.420 stood up and gave exactly the same account of events, we would be suspicious. But what we certainly see 00:02:18.420 --> 00:02:26.860 in our gospel writers, that each of them has their own emphasis. So how does Matthew tell his story, 00:02:27.300 --> 00:02:32.560 Jesus' story, and what does it tell us about his emphasis? Well, I would suggest that Matthew's 00:02:32.560 --> 00:02:38.979 condensed version has a clear focus. So we've been following for the last couple of chapters. 00:02:39.539 --> 00:02:48.020 Here is Jesus, God's Messiah King. He's been bringing in his kingdom with power. And now, at this point, 00:02:48.120 --> 00:02:54.520 Matthew uses these two stories to highlight the appropriate response to God's Messiah King, 00:02:54.520 --> 00:03:02.199 and that response is faith. So that's what we're going to think about this evening. And to help us, 00:03:02.199 --> 00:03:08.439 I was thinking about the New City Catechism. Question number 30, I think it's got a really 00:03:08.439 --> 00:03:13.919 helpful, I find it a helpful definition of faith anyway. So the question is, what is faith in Jesus 00:03:13.919 --> 00:03:20.500 Christ? And the answer, and we'll come back to this in 21 weeks on Sunday morning, faith in Jesus Christ 00:03:20.500 --> 00:03:26.979 is acknowledging the truth of everything that God has revealed in his word, trusting in him, 00:03:26.979 --> 00:03:33.359 and also receiving and resting on him alone for salvation as he has offered to us in the gospel. 00:03:34.519 --> 00:03:39.979 So we're going to try and keep that in our mind as Matthew shows us in these few short verses, 00:03:40.259 --> 00:03:48.000 two people exercising faith as they are confronted by suffering on the one hand and death itself on the 00:03:48.000 --> 00:03:56.819 other. We see in these two different stories, interrelated stories, two people who recognize Jesus is 00:03:56.819 --> 00:04:06.219 the Lord, who come to him to receive his salvation, and who rest in him alone for that salvation, 00:04:06.219 --> 00:04:13.079 and they go away with good news and lives transformed. So we're going to ask ourselves the question, 00:04:13.180 --> 00:04:21.480 what is faith? And our first way to answer that is that faith recognizes Jesus is Lord. So just 00:04:21.480 --> 00:04:26.779 picture the scene with me for a moment. We'll borrow a little bit from the other gospel writers. We know 00:04:26.779 --> 00:04:32.939 that there is a huge crowd following Jesus at this moment. We think of that seething mass of humanity. 00:04:33.559 --> 00:04:40.939 Any group of people, however large or small, will have different hopes and fears. When it comes to 00:04:40.939 --> 00:04:46.539 crowds around Jesus, we know that there was excitement, but also lots of questions, and no doubt lots of 00:04:46.539 --> 00:04:52.959 different needs and burdens that people took with them to that time with Jesus that day. But for Matthew, 00:04:52.959 --> 00:05:01.339 his camera lens zooms in and focuses on just these two. First of all, in verse 18, the synagogue leader, 00:05:01.759 --> 00:05:08.799 and we learn of his story, he comes and kneels before Jesus, my daughter has just died. But come and put 00:05:08.799 --> 00:05:15.639 your hand on her and she will live. So in this situation of unbelievable fear that is now given way to 00:05:15.639 --> 00:05:23.399 grief. He falls on his knees before the Lord, his only hope, but he makes, doesn't he, a remarkable 00:05:23.399 --> 00:05:32.819 statement of faith. It is only to Jesus that you can say, make my dead daughter alive again. 00:05:34.259 --> 00:05:42.000 And then this second figure, this woman in verse 20, she's been subject to bleeding for 12 years, and she comes 00:05:42.000 --> 00:05:48.120 up behind him to touch the edge of his cloak. So she's coming in a different situation for her. It's 00:05:48.120 --> 00:05:55.300 very personal. It's personal weakness. This weakness that has made her unclean has cut her off from much 00:05:55.300 --> 00:06:01.540 of society. Her approach is very different. It's private. It's secretive. This time she uses no words. 00:06:01.600 --> 00:06:10.259 It's the touch of faith. So much separating these two figures, and yet they are bound by this shared 00:06:10.259 --> 00:06:19.099 response as they recognize Jesus is Lord, that he is the only one who can help and save them. They come 00:06:19.099 --> 00:06:27.180 in faith. Matthew has already told us that there were many religious leaders at the time who took a 00:06:27.180 --> 00:06:34.000 very different view to Jesus than Jairus did. There were many who were skeptical, many who are questioning 00:06:34.000 --> 00:06:41.800 Jesus or outright opposing him. Who is this fellow who speaks blasphemy by claiming he can forgive sins? Who is 00:06:41.800 --> 00:06:47.139 this man who eats and drinks with tax collectors and sinners? And many of those religious leaders would 00:06:47.139 --> 00:06:56.800 eventually conspire together with Rome to arrest and to hand him over. But this one is different, because God has 00:06:56.800 --> 00:07:03.540 given him the gift of faith. And so he comes to understand that everything God's Word says about 00:07:03.540 --> 00:07:11.500 God's King is true, and it comes true in Jesus. It's revealed in Jesus. He really does have the authority 00:07:11.500 --> 00:07:19.040 he claims. He really is the Son of God come on a rescue mission, and on that basis he comes for help, 00:07:19.040 --> 00:07:27.220 even as his daughter has died. And likewise, no doubt there were many suffering women and many suffering men 00:07:27.220 --> 00:07:34.700 that day as people were crowding in on Jesus, but only one makes this move towards Jesus in faith. 00:07:36.759 --> 00:07:42.340 Now some people look at the story and say, well, it sounds a bit like weak faith. She doesn't want to be 00:07:42.340 --> 00:07:47.960 seen by anyone. She comes up from behind. Some have even suggested that she, ascribing some kind of 00:07:47.959 --> 00:07:55.000 magical power to the cloak of Jesus, what counts is that she reached out to Jesus in faith. 00:07:56.219 --> 00:08:02.199 Whether her faith is strong or weak is not the point. The point is the object of her faith, and he is a strong 00:08:02.199 --> 00:08:10.779 Savior, and she knew deliverance. Yesterday, by way of illustration, we watched a TV show where a father and a son 00:08:10.779 --> 00:08:17.459 both shared in a skydive from a place, and their responses could not have been more different. 00:08:17.459 --> 00:08:22.939 The son was loving it, having the time of his life, and you could see him coming down in the camera, and he was so 00:08:22.939 --> 00:08:30.979 full of excitement, and the dad was in blind panic in the plane, and even as he was hurtling towards the 00:08:30.979 --> 00:08:38.579 ground, you could see stark terror on his face. But do you know what? At the end of the day, it didn't matter 00:08:38.580 --> 00:08:46.740 in terms of how they ended up safely on the ground. Because the key for both wasn't whether they felt 00:08:46.740 --> 00:08:52.040 really joyful or really panicking. The key for both was that they were strapped into a qualified 00:08:52.040 --> 00:08:58.800 instructor, and they had a parachute strapped onto their back. And the wonderful thing about faith is 00:08:58.799 --> 00:09:07.959 that faith straps us to Jesus, and when we are with him, whether our faith is weak or strong, he will make 00:09:07.959 --> 00:09:17.979 sure we are safely home and that we are saved. And so, we're being presented by Matthew again with Jesus 00:09:17.979 --> 00:09:25.419 on the mission of the Messiah, the promised Savior King, and he comes doing remarkable things. He comes to 00:09:25.419 --> 00:09:31.339 show mercy and to call sinners. He comes to bring the forgiveness of sin. He comes to drive out evil. 00:09:31.679 --> 00:09:39.919 He comes to give a window into his coming kingdom. Every miracle, every healing is a signpost that says, 00:09:40.439 --> 00:09:46.799 in my future kingdom, it will be free of sickness, disease, suffering, and death. 00:09:46.799 --> 00:09:56.500 And faith recognizes Jesus is who the Bible says he is, and acts accordingly. 00:09:58.919 --> 00:10:05.439 That penny dropped for me 35 years ago. I was quite surprised when I did the maths. It's been that long. 00:10:05.979 --> 00:10:10.639 I grew up knowing the stories of Jesus. I love the stories of Jesus. I was always really happy to go to 00:10:10.639 --> 00:10:19.399 church and to go to Bible clubs and those kind of things. But one day in particular, that realization 00:10:19.399 --> 00:10:26.600 struck me in a way that it hadn't before, that as much as I'd grown up going to church and loving the 00:10:26.600 --> 00:10:34.159 stories, that I was sinful. And that because of my sin, I was by nature separated from God. And because of 00:10:34.159 --> 00:10:41.519 that separation, I was heading for eternal judgment, and I needed to be rescued. And at that point, the 00:10:41.519 --> 00:10:48.240 same realization came to me that Jesus came and He died for me, that Jesus came to demonstrate His love 00:10:48.240 --> 00:10:55.600 for me. And God, in that day, gave me the gift of faith to repent and to believe in Jesus as Lord. 00:10:56.120 --> 00:11:03.459 Faith is a gift that enables us to recognize Jesus as Lord. And if that's your story, if you received that 00:11:03.460 --> 00:11:08.960 gift, let's never stop giving God thanks for that. And if you're here today and you're not yet a 00:11:08.960 --> 00:11:15.800 Christian, let me encourage you to keep reading God's Word, to keep asking God's people questions, 00:11:16.259 --> 00:11:25.720 keep praying that you too might recognize Jesus is Lord and Savior. So what is faith? Faith, first of all, 00:11:25.720 --> 00:11:35.860 recognizes Jesus as Lord. Secondly, faith receives Jesus as Savior. I wonder if you have ever fallen victim 00:11:35.860 --> 00:11:44.399 to one of those identity theft scams. They are becoming increasingly elaborate. I suspect with AI, 00:11:44.680 --> 00:11:51.220 we will have to be ever more vigilant. There are so many ways now for an individual to suggest 00:11:51.220 --> 00:11:58.340 they're a real company, a real bank, a real person in need. And if we have fallen prey to that, when we 00:11:58.340 --> 00:12:07.480 trust the other person, we become a victim and we experience loss. And so from that negative point of 00:12:07.480 --> 00:12:14.920 view, we come to understand that credentials matter. Being able to trust someone's Word matters. It's why 00:12:14.920 --> 00:12:19.879 when people come to check your gas, they will have their lanyard to show, 00:12:19.879 --> 00:12:28.100 I come from this company, you can trust me. As Matthew sets out to tell these faith stories, 00:12:28.899 --> 00:12:35.740 as we see the faith of Jairus, as we see the faith of this woman, we're also being shown, aren't we, 00:12:35.939 --> 00:12:42.759 Jesus' credentials. That Matthew, because remember Matthew's been called to be a follower of Jesus, 00:12:43.220 --> 00:12:49.519 so Matthew is standing for us as an eyewitness. He could say, I was with Jesus for those three years. 00:12:49.519 --> 00:12:55.439 I was there when these miracles happened. And he writes his gospel to say to us, Jesus is someone 00:12:55.439 --> 00:13:01.019 that you and I can trust. And when we trust Jesus, we experience not loss, but gain. 00:13:02.379 --> 00:13:06.720 And so Matthew's done a really helpful thing for us in chapters eight and nine, in that he's pulled 00:13:06.720 --> 00:13:13.039 together lots of stories in a really short space of time to help us to see exactly who Jesus is, 00:13:13.039 --> 00:13:20.099 and to see exactly why Jesus came, and to help us to see exactly what difference faith makes here in 00:13:20.099 --> 00:13:27.519 the lives of these two people. So again, just to think about our requests, think about how bold 00:13:27.519 --> 00:13:37.039 a request is from Jairus. My daughter has just died, but come and put your hand on her and she will live. 00:13:37.039 --> 00:13:44.120 For anyone to say that is, of course, faith. And we see Jesus' willingness in that he goes, 00:13:44.519 --> 00:13:50.959 verse 19, he got up and went with him, and so did his disciples. And as we come to the end of the 00:13:50.959 --> 00:13:57.099 passage, as we see him enter the synagogue leader's house, he clears out the crowd of mourners. He 00:13:57.099 --> 00:14:01.779 announces that it's going to be as easy for him to wake her from death as it would be to wake her from 00:14:01.779 --> 00:14:11.459 sleep. And the story ends with her restored to life again. The second request is also a great 00:14:11.459 --> 00:14:18.919 statement of faith. In this woman's mind, she is saying to herself, if I only touch his cloak, 00:14:19.000 --> 00:14:24.480 I'll be healed. I'll be healed of this illness that's lasted for 12 years, this illness that nobody 00:14:24.480 --> 00:14:32.360 else has been able to do anything about. And again, Jesus responds, verse 22, take heart, daughter, 00:14:33.320 --> 00:14:40.740 your faith has healed you. And the woman was healed at that moment. She is restored to wholeness. 00:14:41.560 --> 00:14:51.879 Both of them have received salvation, in that physical healings provide, again, a window into 00:14:51.879 --> 00:15:01.820 spiritual reality. And so further evidence is being added to the case for Jesus being the Christ. 00:15:02.580 --> 00:15:09.580 Because Matthew has shown us Jesus is the one who can heal the lepers. Jesus is the one who can make 00:15:09.580 --> 00:15:17.539 the paralyzed to walk. Jesus is the one who can deal with all kinds of disease, who can stop a storm, 00:15:17.539 --> 00:15:24.719 who can drive out a demon, who can forgive sin, and who can even raise the dead. 00:15:26.539 --> 00:15:35.819 If Jesus were a doorstep visitor, saying to us, I have come as God's Son and God's Savior, 00:15:36.379 --> 00:15:45.559 here's my card, here's my credentials, we recognize here is someone we can trust. 00:15:45.559 --> 00:15:55.659 And going further, he is someone we need to trust. That just as the only hope for Jairus, 00:15:56.159 --> 00:16:02.059 just as the only hope for Jairus' daughter, just as the only hope for the bleeding woman was Jesus, 00:16:03.559 --> 00:16:06.799 we need to recognize ourselves in that same position. 00:16:06.799 --> 00:16:15.000 Spiritually, the Bible would say we are all like that bleeding woman in that by nature, 00:16:15.799 --> 00:16:25.779 we are unclean. We are unfit for the presence of the Holy God. And we cannot undo by ourselves what 00:16:25.779 --> 00:16:33.740 is wrong with us. Sin and its effects run too deep. And so we are rendered unclean. 00:16:33.740 --> 00:16:44.100 And spiritually, we are all like Jairus' little daughter, in that by nature, 00:16:44.539 --> 00:16:52.659 we are spiritually dead in our trespasses and our sins, that we are cut off from God, the source of 00:16:52.659 --> 00:17:03.500 spiritual life. And so faith recognizes Jesus as Lord, and faith recognizes I need Him as Lord and Savior, 00:17:03.500 --> 00:17:12.140 that only Jesus can ransom and heal and restore and forgive. And that's why He came into this world. 00:17:13.140 --> 00:17:22.279 He came into this world to die our death, to become unclean by bearing our sin and the curse of sin 00:17:22.279 --> 00:17:27.139 before being raised to new life in victory. 00:17:30.139 --> 00:17:35.440 When Jesus comes to our door as Messiah, what is it that He offers to us? 00:17:35.440 --> 00:17:45.019 The Bible says that Jesus offers to be our substitute, to take our death and to give us His life, 00:17:45.580 --> 00:17:52.680 to take our sin and our guilty record, and to give us His perfect record of righteousness, 00:17:52.960 --> 00:17:58.400 to take our guilty verdict and give us the great verdict of being justified in God's sight. 00:17:58.400 --> 00:18:07.580 He offers to be our Savior. Whether we've made a total mess of our lives, whether circumstances have 00:18:07.580 --> 00:18:13.280 caused us trouble, whether we're desperately trying to be good enough for God, no matter whether we know 00:18:13.280 --> 00:18:20.120 a lot or whether we know a little, Jesus would be a Savior for each one of us. His invitation comes to us 00:18:20.119 --> 00:18:29.779 to trust Him, to welcome Him in, because Jesus has come that we might have life and have life to the full. 00:18:33.479 --> 00:18:39.299 Thirdly, as we're trying to answer the question, what is faith? So, faith recognizes Jesus as Lord, 00:18:39.399 --> 00:18:47.439 faith receives Him as Savior, but thirdly, faith rests in Jesus for salvation. This week, 00:18:47.440 --> 00:18:56.160 I watched an interview with the chap on the screen with Ben Sasse, a former senator of Nebraska, 00:18:56.920 --> 00:19:05.140 the head of a university in the States. He was diagnosed recently with stage four pancreatic cancer, 00:19:06.140 --> 00:19:10.940 and he sat down with Michael Horton, if you know the theologian Michael Horton. He sat down for an 00:19:10.940 --> 00:19:18.900 extended conversation with Michael Horton, and talked at length about how faith and theology 00:19:18.900 --> 00:19:26.299 is helping him to face his death. I would encourage you to find that. If you want to know where it is, 00:19:26.580 --> 00:19:33.299 I can maybe send the link out. It's a really powerful discussion. And he says things that his first reaction 00:19:33.299 --> 00:19:40.200 on hearing his diagnosis, he said, I felt an overwhelming sense of peace. That expression of 00:19:40.200 --> 00:19:48.839 Paul's, that for me to live is Christ and to die is gain, was the first feeling that he had. He was 00:19:48.839 --> 00:19:56.839 asked the question, why is the gospel an anchor as people face death? He said some really interesting 00:19:56.839 --> 00:20:03.759 things. He said, when I'm facing my own death, it becomes much easier to say that any idea of my own 00:20:03.759 --> 00:20:12.339 producing righteous deeds seems absolutely nonsense in light of my approaching death and meeting with God. 00:20:13.359 --> 00:20:19.459 But what's become increasingly precious to him is the knowledge that Jesus did everything to fulfill 00:20:19.460 --> 00:20:30.819 the law and Jesus did everything to forgive his sin. He spoke about God for us in Jesus Christ as a truth to rest in. 00:20:32.680 --> 00:20:39.579 And there was throughout that video just powerful evidence of here is what it looks like when a person 00:20:39.579 --> 00:20:50.699 of faith runs to and rests in Jesus for salvation. We run to Jesus and we go to the cross and we receive 00:20:50.699 --> 00:20:58.519 forgiveness. We come to Jesus day by day to receive sustaining grace, but we also look ahead 00:20:58.519 --> 00:21:05.259 to future final salvation and glory. So again, I would commend that in that video. 00:21:05.259 --> 00:21:11.640 And watching that video and reading Matthew 9 and thinking about this, I was saying to the elders, 00:21:11.759 --> 00:21:16.720 it's one of those moments where I feel a fatherly sermon coming on. There are those moments where you 00:21:16.720 --> 00:21:21.920 think, do you know what? There are some truths that are just so important. And especially because what we 00:21:21.920 --> 00:21:29.180 have here is people of faith showing us how to respond when we face the reality of suffering and we face the 00:21:29.180 --> 00:21:38.240 reality of death. We are called to rest in Christ, to know him, to trust him, to rest in him. And maybe 00:21:38.240 --> 00:21:43.600 especially knowing that a bunch of us who are younger, maybe we haven't had much experience or 00:21:43.600 --> 00:21:51.500 suffering or death. Let me encourage you towards a particular kind of wisdom or some wisdoms. 00:21:51.500 --> 00:21:57.940 First of all, the wisdom of Ecclesiastes. If you've ever come across David Gibson's book, 00:21:58.380 --> 00:22:04.940 Live Backwards, Living Backwards is a wonderful book. The book of Ecclesiastes encourages us all the 00:22:04.940 --> 00:22:15.599 way through to recognize our mortality, to live life today in light of eternity. Know your creator and 00:22:15.599 --> 00:22:24.219 your savior today. Enjoy life today, but hold on to it lightly as gift and live in light of eternity. 00:22:26.259 --> 00:22:31.319 Think about the wisdom of Jesus towards the end of the Sermon on the Mount. Remember that call that 00:22:31.319 --> 00:22:37.659 he made as he closed that great sermon, build your life upon the rock. And what rock was he talking 00:22:37.659 --> 00:22:44.379 about? He was talking about building upon Jesus himself and his words. And he spoke about storms that 00:22:44.380 --> 00:22:50.580 would come. And so before the storms come, it is so important to lay that kind of foundation 00:22:50.580 --> 00:22:56.900 before the storms of trials and death and judgment. Make Jesus your priority. 00:22:59.500 --> 00:23:09.420 Get to know how glorious and good he is. Don't imagine that you can lay a foundation at some future 00:23:09.420 --> 00:23:16.019 time. Do it today so that you know who to run to and where to rest when those trials come. 00:23:18.740 --> 00:23:26.920 Consider the wisdom of Paul. Paul faced unimaginable amounts of suffering for Christ Jesus. You know, 00:23:26.940 --> 00:23:31.120 he would talk about shipwreck and beating and being stoned and all of those things. 00:23:31.119 --> 00:23:38.819 But he was able to say, compared to the glory of Christ, compared to glory that's coming, 00:23:38.939 --> 00:23:45.799 all of those things, looking back on them will seem like a light, momentary affliction. 00:23:47.399 --> 00:23:53.859 Live in light of eternity. Live in light of Jesus. Think about the wisdom of these two characters 00:23:53.859 --> 00:24:00.899 Jesus met. When they were faced with suffering, when they were faced with death, where did they go? 00:24:02.139 --> 00:24:10.379 They went to Jesus. I know I can trust Jesus. I've received him. I will rest in him as Savior. 00:24:12.240 --> 00:24:19.199 When the woman rested her faith in Jesus, weakness became strength. Exclusion became embrace. 00:24:19.200 --> 00:24:28.360 When the synagogue leader rested his faith in Jesus. Mourning became rejoicing. Separation gave way to 00:24:28.360 --> 00:24:38.160 reunion. Matthew records these stories, and indeed this whole section, to say to us, remember, 00:24:38.319 --> 00:24:46.519 faith is not a leap in the dark. Faith is not an emotional crutch for weak people. We are weak. 00:24:46.519 --> 00:24:54.940 But faith is a reasonable response in light of who Jesus is and what Jesus came to do. 00:24:56.299 --> 00:25:05.059 Jesus came to rescue us, to sweep us up into the arms of God. What a wonderful image. 00:25:05.799 --> 00:25:11.420 As we were walking through the meadows today, there was a group of people, we weren't quite sure whether 00:25:11.420 --> 00:25:16.340 they were practicing being cheerleaders or whether they were practicing, you know, those trust falls, 00:25:17.000 --> 00:25:21.420 where you have someone standing behind you and you have to lean back, lean all your weight into the 00:25:21.420 --> 00:25:31.320 person behind you. What is faith? Faith is falling into the arms of the loving God who sent his son 00:25:31.320 --> 00:25:40.340 to redeem you. Faith is resting in God's embrace. That's where we find our ultimate security. 00:25:40.339 --> 00:25:51.220 unity. Let's us rest in Jesus for our salvation. And we know that he is our hope in life and in death.