March 29, 2024

Hope (A Profession)

SeekingHimLogo
So let us seize and hold fast and retain without wavering
the hope we cherish and confess and our acknowledgment of it,
for He who promised is reliable (sure) and faithful to His Word.

Hebrew 10:23 AMP

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In the KJV the same verse says,

Let us hold fast the profession of our faith without wavering
(for He is faithful that promised).

What are we seeing here?  Hope is the profession of our faith.  What is  ‘profession’ then?  In biblical terms, this is a calling.  It is ‘an occupation, practice, or vocation requiring mastery of a complex set of knowledge and skills through formal education and/or practical…’.

So if we take the AMP version that we should hold fast…without wavering…the hope, we are saying we should take the profession of our faith without wavering.

In a business world setting, if you know that you are an accountant, anything concerning administration does not concern you because there is nothing you can do about it.  You are not trained for that and you do not have knowledge concerning it. This is also true with the profession of our faith…we are called in this field of hope in which we are being trained to hope in the Lord, we are being equipped to undertake this profession without wavering.

We are called to this profession ourselves because God already knows that we need training.  The training is the faith which needs to be exercised on a daily basis.

Faith comes by hearing and hearing the word of God…
Romans 10:17

Once you hear  the Word of God, hope in the Lord moves from one level of glory to the other.   Faith and hope are inseparable professions that we as believers need to know and must have.  We need to combine these professions if we want to live a successful life.  A life of abundance only comes when we take our certificates in the profession which are desire, prayers, and belief.  (“What things soever you desire, when you pray, believe that you receive them, and you shall have them” Mark 11: 24).

For God to act on anything we need to have hope and faith in God.  Don’t doubt God.  Brethren I have never seen the righteous forsaken therefore let us hold fast our profession in God for He never fails.  Those marriages we are hoping for will come…finances needed…babies we desire…. All these will only come when we exercise our profession (HOPE).

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Father, I thank You for the wonderful time we had in Your Presence.  Thank You for the Scripture we have read;  we pray and believe that grace shall abound in us that we shall do our profession without wavering.  Grant us that grace, Lord, for we need it to exercise our inheritance in Your Kingdom.  For without faith we cannot please You!   We need it time and time again.  In Jesus’ name. Amen.

Level of Faith

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Some men came, bringing to him a paralyzed man, carried by four of them.
Since they could not get him to Jesus because of the crowd, they made an opening in the roof
above Jesus by digging through it and then lowered the mat the man was lying on.
When Jesus saw their faith, he said to the paralyzed man, “Son, your sins are forgiven.”
Mark 2:3-5

The portion of Scripture we have this week describes the level of faith that we ought to have. The men believed that Jesus was the one to heal this paralyzed person…and they did not allow any stumbling block between themselves and the Healer.

Typical of a determined human being who wants to do some investmenting, whenever you know that there is a profit to be received out of a particular business, you strive to get together the capital either by borrowing from friends or through a bank loan, so as it will aid you to the achievement of your profit.

Faith is like a blank check where we need to feel everyday as we live.

So then faith cometh by hearing, and hearing by the word of God.
Romans 10:17 KJV

If you don’t hear the Word of God you will not know what the Word has for you.  These people in Mark 2, had been hearing a lot of things that Jesus did, for Jesus went about doing good.  So, the news that Jesus healed people was all over their cities [Mark 1:29 – 34] and through many testimonies they had been hearing of Him healing many as well as His miraculous deeds.  Their level of faith grew each day by hearing these testimonies and probably many others, too, had followed Him to another place where the miracle took place in their presence.

When you have a high level of faith you can do the extraordinary—this is what we see in our Scripture this week.  Their level of faith did not allow stumblingblocks to the healing of their brother; hence, the opening on the roof.

If we want to succeed in life, we have to do extraordinary things through Christ Jesus.  And so coupled with our faith we shall be given whatsoever we desire (Mark 11:24).  Extraordinary things like:

  • Praying more
  • Meditating on the Word more
  • Giving alms more
  • Loving more
  • More charity, etc.

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Our Lord and our Father, hallowed be Thy Name.  We thank You for the measure of faith that was allotted to us when we were being created as Your Word tells us in Romans 12:3.  Thank You that You have also given us an opportunity to grow in this faith by hearing Your Word.  We pray, Lord, for the grace for our faith to grow more and more; so much that we would be able to scale mountains.  We are blessed as we move from one level of glory to the other, in Jesus’ name we pray, AMEN!