Anchored Faith: Living Beyond the Surface

Dr. Monica Hill: question. So for me the question today was what is faith? Well I went back to the primary source
which is for me the Bible. So how does the Bible define faith? Well if we go to Hebrews 11 1 it
says faith is a substance of things hoped for and the evidence of things unseen. So whenever you
think about that, that five little word hope it holds a lot to it. The reason it has so much
because if you slide on down to verse 6,
it says without faith it's impossible to please the Lord
because he rewards those who believe he is one,
who he says he is, and who those who seek him.
So this reward thing is very important
because that's a promise.
Wherever your faith is seated,
there's going to be something that comes out of that.
But if it's seated in the Lord,
there's a reward that comes with that.
So I want you to tuck that away as we move forward.
so there are a couple of things that are reasons that i believe that the lord had me start there
because he immediately took me back to something that christ asked and it's written on my right
board if you've been in my office you know at the top of my right board says who do you say i am
christ asked that question of the disciples he says who do they say i am and then he made it
personal he said who do you say that I am because again where your faith is situated
that is what you're going to live out of so Peter pipes up because you know that's what the homie
Peter does he pipes up first he pipes up and says you are the messiah the son of the living God
now I don't want you to just slide past that because if you do you're going to miss something
for those of you who know that story jesus fast forwards to and says hey flesh and blood didn't
reveal that to you the spirit revealed that to you and so then peter gets an opportunity to get
some insights into wait a minute the holy spirit taught reveal that to me so guess what that means
that your stamp is on me if your spirit is already in me and it's already revealing things to me
so that gave peter right there a little bit of insight and i don't know if he realized that
until after he denied him, that the Lord would need him to live out of that truth.
That his faith isn't anchored on his understanding of, oh, you're the Messiah.
His faith was anchored in the fact that you are the son of the living God who is the Messiah.
That's not an earthly understanding.
So that leads us to the next thing.
What is this lived faith business?
I believe that faith isn't meant to just be spoken about.
meant to be experienced. So what does that look like? Help me James. James 2,
show me your faith I'll show you my faith by my words. Faith should bear
fruit. It should bless the people around. If I am not living in my faith then how
am I truly a blessing? If I'm trying to live out of my faith in my own strength
in my own power what's backing it? What's backing it? If I'm trying to serve you
and my faith is based on Monica's strength, then I'm dealing with faulty data.
There's too much fault in that.
Nothing's holding it up.
But if my faith is steered and guarded and kept by my Heavenly Father,
then whose responsibility is it to order my steps to teach me how to serve you guys,
to teach me how to love, to teach me how to receive his correction?
It's his responsibility.
so
I think about
as I was preparing for this
he reminded me of the lesson of the fig tree
and he cursed the fig tree
Jesus cursed the fig tree
he didn't curse the fig tree because it didn't look the part
he cursed the fig tree because it didn't bear fruit
it looked the part
a form of godliness
but it wasn't bearing fruit
you're like man that seems kind of harsh
is it
Jesus kept it pretty simple for us.
He gave us two charges when the Pharisees and the Sadducees,
when the teachers of the law were trying to hem him up.
And they said of the 600, they didn't give the number, but it was 613 laws.
They said, which ones are the most important?
He said to love the Lord and to love people.
So if I'm walking around and I'm only given a form of godliness,
but that's my faith, then I'm shortchanging his kingdom.
Because I'm not doing the thing I was created to do, and that's good works.
So let's talk about this essence of faith business.
Well, this one's going to be real short.
The essence of my faith is him.
He is the backing for my faith.
He is the keeper of my faith and everything in between.
He is literally the anchor for my soul.
Literally, as my little nephew Tristan will say, literally.
So what's a cat faith?
Well, it has nothing to do with me.
He's the one holding it in his hands.
And he hasn't lost one from his hands.
You know that, guys?
We have to leave him.
He doesn't leave us.
You have to make a concerted effort to leave the Lord.
You have to make a decision to leave him.
So I don't just walk out of, I don't just, he just doesn't leave me and abandon me.
I have to literally turn my back on him and decide to leave.
But I leave everything connected because remember, he's a reward of those who seek him.
So then I have to leave him too.
And that means I have to forfeit the reward too.
So I don't think of losing my faith in terms of losing my faith.
I mean, when you lose something like a game, you normally show up to play, right?
I think of it more in terms of a forfeiture.
Like the game is there.
It's on the calendar.
I can go play it, but I refuse to play.
I refuse to even show up.
That's a forfeiture.
So as the author and finisher of my faith, he holds my salvation in his very hand and is protected in heaven.
That's what my faith is all about, that one day I get to see him.
But while I'm here, I hope I conduct myself in such a way that makes it attractive and appealing and makes people around me curious about this crazy hope that I have.
And something that you may not be able to see, but I sure hope that you experience it.
So, I lived in California, loved trees and loved water.
And you're like, you live in Lubbock.
Yes, that's a whole other conversation.
We can have that, you know, offline sometime if you would like.
It is called obedience.
And then the people.
Love the people.
But I would see these buoys when I would hang out at the beach.
And I'm like, okay.
And then some days, I probably shouldn't have been out.
But I'm watching these waves and they were violent, towering waves that would just come through and smack these buoys that are about half a mile out.
And I would think to myself, huh, they're going to need some new hardware after this.
But that resilient little buoy would pop right back up.
And it really wasn't out of position.
It's like, it's not like I had a ruler and I was like measuring how far it was off course.
I mean, it didn't go down that way.
And then you're just eyeballing it.
but the buoy would disappear and I was like, yep, there it is. You took an L today company.
No, it will pop right back up over and over and over again. And then it reminded me,
Lord, that's what my faith looks like when it's kept by you. The waves of life are coming.
No one is immune to them, but praise the Lord that he has handed me in and that he is in the
anchor. So I started researching these little resilient buoys that they have out there.
One of the things that I found out that there's an anchor on this buoy and there's this mooring
and these other things, other systems that we don't really see, which goes back to faith isn't
always seen. It isn't spoken, but that doesn't mean it's not there, not always spoken.
So that's where the buoyant faith comes in.
Life is coming.
It will smack.
It will keep coming.
But if your faith and your identity is anchored in the Lord, you cannot be moved.
You will get back up.
Because he will get you back up.
You know, the cool thing about, I turned 50 this year.
And so the cool thing about turning 50 is it's not the boogeyman that people make it out to be.
Actually, it's pretty cool because everything that I'm sharing with you comes with some life perspective now where I've done life really, really wrong.
And then I can go back.
Revelation says that you over to come by the word, by the word of your by the blood of the lamb and the word of your testimony.
So as I trail all the way back and I come forward, this faith thing, when he says he's taken us from faith to faith.
That's how I can measure this consistency thing.
My faith is wavered.
His never has.
He has been faithful.
He has been good.
And he had no reason to be good to me.
That's what faith perspective will get you.
When you look back and you see the hand of the Lord covering you all of these years.
So if there are two takeaways from this, I want you guys to know that he loves you.
And while I came here to talk about my faith, it's an invitation into you having your own faith.
Don't rent my faith.
Don't rent it.
Don't.
You should benefit from my faith, but you will need your own.
To stand up, to even experience true joy in this world, you will need your own faith.
Because otherwise, what are you living out of?
What are you filtering through?
So identity is one of the things, one of the areas of expertise.
And the reason I enjoy identity so much is because I realized that I was a two-sport college athlete.
Obviously, being 50, my eligibility has been up a long time.
So track and basketball.
And the cool thing about playing those two sports is that I realized later perspective, remember?
you can look back and you can see where you took some L's.
How much of my identity was connected to me being an athlete?
I didn't know who I was outside of being an athlete.
If I put my GPA up here, one, these two gentlemen at the front would be like,
we hired her, really?
Why?
If I showed you my GPA after I left sports,
how do you go from being an international, like, honor society in the doctoral program
to riding the probation bubble not once but twice?
all around the time that I walked away from sport.
I thought I was going to leave sport because I was going to focus on academics.
No, my faith was in me being an athlete.
It had nothing to do with the Lord.
I knew him on paper, but all my receipts were pointing to me as an athlete.
Even now, if I'm not careful, identity begins to creep in
that's everything outside of him.
which gives insight into where my faith is located.
Is it about him?
Or is it about the thing posturing, that form of godliness?
Really, I don't really have interest in me posturing anymore.
So I find it very easy to fall on my face and ask him to help me get it right.
So, as I said, I came here to use my faith as a backdrop,
but really it was an invitation to invite you to discover your own.
And so some of you are like,
I'm not going to assume that everyone out here is born again, believer,
loves Jesus with everything in him,
while this is a Christian university.
I get it.
I'm not going to assume everyone in here has faith.
And some of you, it may be a rented faith from your parents.
What I'm asking you to do is walk with someone on this campus.
There are a number of people.
I didn't script this,
So I'm going off script.
I need faculty and staff, LCU, to stand up, please.
If this faith thing is scary to you, look around this room.
And I'm just talking to faculty and staff right now,
who would be willing to walk with you.
Look around the room, some of whom you already know.
Some of you do not.
but these people will walk with you.
Many of them I don't regard as friends, they're family.
We will walk with you.
If you are curious about this faith thing,
we want to walk with you.
Thank you, guys.
There are students in your residence halls,
in your classes, who have already decided
that faith is for them, Jesus is for them.
They will walk with you.
But I want to challenge you to do something else.
If you want to know if he's real, he has a vested interest in revealing himself to you because his love for you cost Christ his life.
He doesn't want any to perish.
He wants you to walk with him.
So how about you just ask him?
If you want to know if he's real, you have not because you ask not.
That's his word.
Let me give credit where credit is due.
I tell you I like research.
If you're not going to wax the mic, give props to the people who said it first or the person who said it first.
He said you have not because you ask not.
And remember, those who seek me find me.
He cannot lie.
If you want to know if he's real, ask him.
Ask him.
Ask him.
I love you guys too much to get up here and pretend that it's going to be an easy walk, though.
But it's sure a cool one with him.
I've done it both ways. I've done it without him and I've done it with him.
Learn from those who bear the scars of life what not to do. I'm telling you walk
with him. He will take you and reveal things to you. If you want to know who
you're what your true identity is you cannot find it and you will never
discover it without him ever he loves you so if you don't believe any or if
you don't hear anything else or believe anything else so that I say today I want
you to believe two things he loves you circumstances will lie to you but he
He loves you.
And 50's not the boogeyman.
It's actually pretty cool.
Our family's fairly youthful.
We don't have any sins.
But guys, he loves you.
I'm gonna bookend it with that.
And with that, you are dismissed.
Thank you.