Building an Authentic Faith - Passion

Luke Brinker is a retired UM minister and he and his wife Theda were members of my congregation in Lewisburg. Luke was a big supporter of Sunday School and he would often ask me if he could give a plug for Sunday School during worship and I would always say yes. Luke would then speak powerfully about how important Sunday School was, how good the classes were and how much he and others would love to see people attend. The thing about Luke is that he didn’t just stand up and make the announcement – each and every week Luke would make his way through the people before worship, after worship and during the greeting time and he would personally invite people to stay for Sunday School. Luke would call people during the week to invite them, and I know for a fact that a lot of people ended up in Sunday School because of Luke.

Luke would always apologize to me for being so vocal about Sunday School and I would continually tell him that he didn’t need to apologize because I loved his passion. One day Luke took me aside because he didn’t really understand what I meant when I said I thought he was passionate about Sunday School - so I tried to tell him that for me passion is enthusiasm and energy; it’s excitement. Passion is such a strong feeling about something that you work relentlessly to see it happen. More than any other quality of faith, what I am drawn to the most is passion.

The author Mike Yaconelli defines passion as being fully alive, or living with expectancy, anticipation and enthusiasm, and he says that the mission of Jesus was to introduce us to the passion of living. A genuine faith needs to be a passionate faith; it needs to be a faith that is fully alive. A passionate faith is a relationship with God where we fully anticipate and expect God to move and do great things in us and through us. A passionate faith brings life and joy and power not just to ourselves, but even to those around us, and the best example of what this passionate faith looks like is found in 4 un-named people in the gospel of Mark.

Mark 2:3-5.
Some men came, bringing to him a paralytic, 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 and, after digging through it, lowered the mat the paralyzed man was lying on. When Jesus saw their faith, he said to the paralytic, "Son, your sins are forgiven."

Notice that what Jesus responds to is not the faith of the paralyzed man, it says that Jesus say their faith, not his faith. What Jesus sees is the faith of the 4 friends who have carried the man to the house, lifted him up to the roof and then dug through the roof so they could lower their friend to Jesus. It’s clear to me that what Jesus sees in these men is passion, the fully expect Jesus to heal him and Jesus is so moved by what they have done that he does heal their friend not just physically but spiritually as well. Jesus is so moved by the passion of these people that he brings a fullness and wholeness to this man’s life. These 4 friends are passionate and they show us what a passion is all about.

First and foremost a passionate faith sees the power and love there is God and a passionate faith believes that God can and does and wants to help us. These 4 men worked so hard to get their friend to Jesus because they believed Jesus not only could do something to help, but that he would. They would not have gone to the lengths that they did if they did not think Jesus was able to help their friend. A passionate faith starts by seeing the power in Jesus. A passionate faith understands that God’s power and love can and does change people’s lives.

A passionate faith not only sees the power in God it also sees the needs in people. These 4 men know that their friend is paralyzed. They don’t think about coming to Jesus for themselves, they aren’t thinking about what Jesus can do for them – they are thinking about what Jesus can do for their friend. Luke Brinker was always thinking about others. Luke could see the spiritual needs in people and he believed to the very core of his being that Sunday School would help bring people closer to God who in turn would help people in life. A passionate faith is always thinking of ways and finding ways to bring people to Jesus even if it means our own needs go unmet.

Virginia Smeltzer was in her 80’s when I was the pastor in Altoona and while I was there we made a lot of changes to one of worship services and we introduced a lot of new music. As you can imagine, there was a lot of discussion about this, and one day Virginia stopped me in the hall of the church and she said, I want to share with you my thoughts on the new music. I said OK, and then I braced myself for what was to come. Personally, she said, I don’t like it, but when I look around and see the young people singing and enjoying it, I realized that this is what we need to do and we need to keep singing it. That’s a passionate faith. Virginia could see the needs of the youth and young adults around her and she willing to say, it’s not about me – it’s about bringing others to Jesus, so let’s do what we need to do to get them there.

In so many ways I want to be as passionate as Virginia and I can only hope and pray that when I’m in my 80’s and not liking the new music of the church that I’ll be willing to say, it’s not about me, it’s about bringing people to Jesus. A passionate faith that wants to help and reach out to others can be seen in lots of ways. Maybe it’s an 80 year old woman being willing to sing contemporary music – maybe it’s a motorcycle ride through the hills of central PA to raise money for ministry that will reach our youth, maybe it’s inviting people to Sunday School, maybe it’s being willing to step up and teach Sunday School. While it can be expressed in so many different ways, a passionate faith is always finding ways to bring people to Jesus, even if it calls for sacrifice and even if it calls us to work hard.

That’s something else we see in these 4 friends, they worked hard. Look at all the obstacles they had to overcome to get their friend to Jesus. First he is paralyzed so they have to carry him to the house where Jesus is staying. When the crowds are so large that they can’t get through, they don’t give up they get creative and this is the part I love. You have to wonder how they came up with this idea to lower their friend through the roof. What a crazy idea – what a creative idea – what a great idea, but it meant they had to work hard. I can’t imagine it was easy to carry a paralyzed man up onto the roof and most roofs would have been made of hardened clay and twigs so digging through by hand would have been difficult – even a little dangerous. But they do it and again that’s passion. Passion is creativity, it is risk taking, it is working hard until you get the job done, and it’s not letting anything stand in your way, not even the criticism of the people.
While it’s not recorded in the story here, you have to know that the homeowner could not have been very happy to have his roof destroyed. Maybe he was yelling at them from inside the house to stop but he couldn’t get to them because the crowds were so large, or maybe Jesus just looked at the homeowner with some understanding and reassurance and somehow told him it was going to be ok. And what about the rest of the crowd that was also trying to get to Jesus – you have to believe that not everyone was happy as this scene unfolds – but the 4 friends didn’t care – they were focused on getting their friend to Jesus, so they kept going. They didn’t let negative criticism stop them.

Will we work hard and do whatever it takes to bring people to Jesus? In many ways Faith Church is a passionate church and our passion is seen as we welcome students after football games, and send people out on mission trips, and support those in need within our own community. We have not let obstacles stand in our way of doing what we can to bring people closer to God and we can’t stop now – we have to keep taking risks, and we have to keep thinking creatively, we have to keep moving forward to bring people to Jesus. I’ve been wondering this week what the next creative risk taking step is going to be for us. Somewhere out there (maybe in one of you) is God’s plan for us to do something outrageous so that we can bring others to Jesus. My hope is that when the plan is identified and we know it is of God, that we will not allow any obstacles to stand in our way and that together we will commit ourselves and work hard to make it happen.

And that’s the last thing I want us to think about as we look at these 4 friends – they were in it together. They worked together to help their friend get to Jesus. One man couldn’t have done it alone. A passionate faith is not a lone ranger faith it intentionally seeks to draw others in. Actually I think passion itself just draws people together. We have all been around those people who are so enthusiastic and energized about God’s plan that we can’t help but want to be with them and work alongside of them. Again think of these 4 friends. We’re not sure which one came up with the plan but which ever one it was spoke about it with such passion – such enthusiasm and expectation about what Jesus would do that the other 3 were eager and willing to go along with him. Passion is a like a flame that simply ignites everything around it so that the fire burns brighter.

And I think this is how passion is stirred up within us. I’m not sure we can set out today to just be more passionate, I don’t think we can will it to be within us – passion is caught from others who are fully alive. Passion is ignited within us as we spend time with people who are excited and enthusiastic about their faith and who eagerly anticipate God moving within them and around them. Passion is ignited within us as we spend time with Jesus who is the author of life and faith and who introduces us to the passion of living.