Simple Faith

 

 

My hope is built on nothing less
Than Jesus’ blood and righteousness;
I dare not trust the sweetest frame,
But wholly lean on Jesus’ name.

When darkness veils His lovely face,
I rest on His unchanging grace;
In every high and stormy gale,
My anchor holds within the veil.

His oath, His covenant, His blood,
Support me in the whelming flood;
When all around my soul gives way,
He then is all my hope and stay.

When He shall come with trumpet sound,
Oh, may I then in Him be found;
Dressed in His righteousness alone,
Faultless to stand before the throne.

On Christ the solid Rock I stand;
All other ground is sinking sand,
All other ground is sinking sand.

Lyrics by Edward Mote

Music by William Bradbury.

The Cokesbury Worship Hymnal

Copyright 1938

I often find myself humming this faithful, old hymn during the day. 

Sometimes the humming is conversational . . .

a warmly familiar act of fellowship with the Carpenter of my days. 

Sometimes it is prayerful . . . 

a deliberate step of faith in trials that test both meddle and faith. 

Sometimes it is unconscious  . . .

echoing from memory’s musty halls like a timeworn photograph. 

It is a life song for me.   A hymn of many seasons.   The theme of a life lived in the Gospel.

If there is any mystery in Christianity,

it is the mysterious penchant of Christians to muddle-up elegant, simple Truth. 

Why do we do that? 

To try to be “deep?” 

To try to impress people? 

To try to convince others that our more mysterious revelation . . .

since it is greater than their more simple one . . .

earns us loftier notoriety or higher authority or greater specialness?

My faith is simple and my God is profound.

This is the 51^st year of my life . . .

my 45^th year of walking with the Lord . . .

the year 2010.

This year my resolution, my life-vision, is very simple: 

to be a bond-servant of Christ Jesus.

A bond-servant. 

In Greek, a doulous. 

A slave. 

A person owned by another,

devoted to another to the disregard of one’s own interest.

It is a life of "grace plus everything."  That's what my husband calls it. 

The grace of God bestowed and wrought in a life

through faith

that results in obedience.

Grace.

Faith.

Obedience.

So very simple.

This year,

I expect to experience forgiveness . . . as I repent.

I expect to experience freedom . . . as I turn away from the things that oppose God.

I expect to experience peace . . . as I choose trust instead of fear.

I expect to experience abundant blessing . . . as I share what I have been given.

I expect to work hard and to rest deeply.

I expect the Gospel of Jesus Christ to only and amazingly be

The Gospel.

Simply.

Profoundly.

Sovereignly.

For me, that’s the good life.

It is more than enough.

It always has been.

And always will be.

- Lesa K. Reid

“The Christian profession does not consist in a notional knowledge or a bare assent, 

much less in perverse disputings, 

but in obedience.” —Matthew Henry