Latest / The Father's Business Podcast / Fruit of the Spirit-Faithfulness

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Fruit of the Spirit-Faithfulness · The Father's Business Podcast

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: So, Elizabeth, we've been telling people about our Ruach Journey 2 conference that's coming up in October.
• 0:06
  Speaker 1: Are you getting excited for it?
• 0:07
  Speaker 2: I am getting so excited about it.
• 0:09
  Speaker 2: We have officially opened up our registration and people are starting to sign up and I can just feel the anticipation building inside of me for it.
• 0:18
  Speaker 2: And you know, Kimberly, you and I are starting to spend time praying and dreaming and asking God exactly what he wants this conference to look like, Because every Ruach conference we do is a little different from the last because it's based on who's there and what they're hungry to learn and what they want to know about and what God is laying on our heart for this particular group of people.
• 0:39
  Speaker 2: So I am super excited about this event coming up.
• 0:42
  Speaker 1: So just to remind people, it's October 16 through 18.
• 0:46
  Speaker 1: And it is in Maryland, at the Sandy Cove Retreat Center.
• 0:50
  Speaker 1: It's a gorgeous place.
• 0:51
  Speaker 1: Some of you have maybe not be familiar with Maryland.
• 0:54
  Speaker 1: I know we have a lot of listeners that are in the Southeast.
• 0:56
  Speaker 1: We really have listeners all over the place and we would love for all of you to come and join us, because Elizabeth and I the two of us went there right Like a couple of months ago.
• 1:05
  Speaker 1: Oh, yeah, I didn't want to leave.
• 1:06
  Speaker 1: Yeah, we were just there for a day and it was like can we stay longer and just sit and enjoy this beautiful place?
• 1:12
  Speaker 1: So I think it's gonna be a great place for a conference, don't you?
• 1:15
  Speaker 2: I do, and there's two different airports people can fly into, and so all the major airlines, including Southwest Airlines, can fly you to an airport near this retreat center.
• 1:24
  Speaker 2: And you know Southwest, if you're listening, you want to throw out one of those $49 fair deals.
• 1:29
  Speaker 2: We're open so that we can all get to the conference, but I think it's going to be a great, great time and something we're going to do.
• 1:36
  Speaker 2: A lot of people are asking so what do I need to do to get ready for this conference?
• 1:40
  Speaker 2: There's several different things that you can do to get ready for this conference.
• 1:44
  Speaker 2: You can listen to the podcast that we released last fall on the study on rock journey.
• 1:49
  Speaker 2: This summer we hope to continue to talk about some of the themes that we're going to be talking about at the conference.
• 1:55
  Speaker 2: Those would be great to continue to listen to to prepare our hearts for the conference and for the month of june.
• 2:01
  Speaker 2: We are going to reduce the price of the Ruach Journey study that's available on our website Now.
• 2:08
  Speaker 2: It's a 13 week study and some people get intimidated going.
• 2:11
  Speaker 2: Oh, my goodness, I don't have 13 weeks to do this, right, because summer's busy and crazy.
• 2:16
  Speaker 2: It's broken down into 13 lessons, but a lot of those teaching videos are just about 20 minutes long, so you can find ways from now until the end of the summer to get through the study at whatever pace you want, to do it with yourself or with a group of friends, and so we're going to be offering it at a discount rate to encourage people to go through the study, to refresh the ideas and the principles of Ruach journey in their mind, to get their hearts ready for what we're going to have in October.
• 2:47
  Speaker 1: So go to our website at thefathersbusinesscom.
• 2:49
  Speaker 1: If you want to order the study kit, you can go to the store.
• 2:52
  Speaker 1: If you want to sign up for the conference, you can go to the events link page and remember for now the conference is our early bird price is $3.99 a person.
• 3:01
  Speaker 1: You can pay extra if you want your own room.
• 3:03
  Speaker 1: We may be offering some special cost surprises coming up soon.
• 3:08
  Speaker 1: So you'll want to pay attention to the podcast Listen for those things.
• 3:10
  Speaker 1: If we offer that, remember it's October 16 through 18.
• 3:14
  Speaker 1: It's in Maryland.
• 3:14
  Speaker 1: You can fly into Baltimore.
• 3:16
  Speaker 1: You can fly into Philly.
• 3:17
  Speaker 1: We're going to help you figure out how to navigate to the conference center once you get there, so just stay tuned for more details.
• 3:25
  Speaker 1: We've got frequently asked questions on the website, but we're excited about it.
• 3:29
  Speaker 1: We look forward to seeing you then.
• 3:33
  Speaker 2: The Father's Business was founded by Sylvia Gunter to encourage people to a deeper relationship with God.
• 3:39
  Speaker 2: I'm Elizabeth Gunter Powell and I am Kimberly Roddy.
• 3:43
  Speaker 1: Welcome to the Father's Business Podcast.
• 3:45
  Speaker 1: We are so glad that you've joined us For today's podcast.
• 3:49
  Speaker 1: We're continuing in our Fruit of the Spirit series and today's lesson is on faithfulness.
• 3:57
  Speaker 2: Yeah, and Kimberly, I've got to admit, when you're looking at the list and I look at this one, I'm like, okay, I feel pretty good about this one, right, it's faithfulness.
• 4:05
  Speaker 2: I'm a pretty loyal person.
• 4:06
  Speaker 2: I'm faithful to my husband, I'm faithful to you as my best friend.
• 4:11
  Speaker 2: I feel pretty like of all the fruit.
• 4:15
  Speaker 2: I'm like, okay, I think I get it pretty if we're scoring them.
• 4:18
  Speaker 2: I get a pretty high mark on this one.
• 4:20
  Speaker 1: Yeah, I think it was like reliable, secure, yeah.
• 4:28
  Speaker 2: Dependable, loyal, yeah, like I am all those things, I'm good.
• 4:29
  Speaker 2: So I'm like, yes, finally a fruit I can get behind, you know.
• 4:33
  Speaker 2: But then, as we were studying and getting ready for this, I'm like, oh, wow, this go of course with everything.
• 4:40
  Speaker 2: It goes deeper than just being faithful in a relationship or marriage and I mean, that's definitely part of it and we want to be that type of person.
• 4:48
  Speaker 2: But, as with many things, when you start looking in the New Testament and you hear what Jesus has to say about it, he's looking a lot more about the thoughts and the interaction that goes on inside of us and what are the attitudes of my heart towards people and towards him at times.
• 5:07
  Speaker 2: And so I think it's going to be a great conversation for us today to dig a little deeper into.
• 5:12
  Speaker 2: What does it really mean to have the fruit of faithfulness in our life?
• 5:17
  Speaker 1: Yeah, I was reading a definition by Jerry Bridges who said a faithful person is someone who is dependable, trustworthy and loyal, who can be depended upon in all of his relationships and who is absolutely honest and ethical in all of his affairs.
• 5:32
  Speaker 1: Ouch, and I was like well, did you have to use absolutely Like?
• 5:39
  Speaker 1: Okay, now I went from having an A to having an F.
• 5:44
  Speaker 2: We've just raised the bar on faithfulness, and I mean he's not wrong, because if you look throughout Scripture, it keeps describing God as faithful, and if we are trying to achieve God's definition of faithfulness, there is a level of perfection that we cannot reach, which is why we need the Spirit through us giving us the ability to have the fruit of faithfulness in our life.
• 6:10
  Speaker 1: Yeah, sorry, trying, trying.
• 6:17
  Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, okay, all right.
• 6:23
  Speaker 1: I just didn't flow.
• 6:24
  Speaker 2: I'm trying, trying, just keep talking.
• 6:27
  Speaker 2: Welcome to the podcast with elizabeth owl.
• 6:30
  Speaker 1: Kimberly's not here today it's your job to set me up better, elizabeth.
• 6:36
  Speaker 1: I didn't know where to go.
• 6:38
  Speaker 1: Just admit that neither of us knew what was next.
• 6:43
  Speaker 2: I'm pivoting.
• 6:44
  Speaker 2: So one of the areas when I think about faithfulness where we got to dig a little deeper is thinking about our faithfulness to God.
• 6:56
  Speaker 2: And what is that?
• 6:57
  Speaker 2: What does loyalty, obedience, what does that really look like?
• 7:02
  Speaker 2: When you think about our faithfulness to God and I really think it boils down to obedience and trust Will I remain faithful even when I don't understand what God is up to?
• 7:19
  Speaker 2: And that's a big question that we've talked a lot about, because we both had things happen in our lives that we still don't fully get and understand why God allowed them to happen.
• 7:24
  Speaker 2: We can kind of see some of the fingerprints of God in them, but it still doesn't 100% make sense to us, and so I think about that verse in Hebrews 11.1 that says Now, faith is a confidence in what we hope for and assurance about what we do not see, and so I think there's a lot that we have to think about when I talk about the fruit of faithfulness in my life.
• 7:47
  Speaker 2: How often am I willing to follow him and be faithful in where I feel like he's leading me to go, without an explanation of where I'm headed right?
• 7:58
  Speaker 1: I think about faithfulness, that idea, like you were saying, of remaining committed no matter the circumstances.
• 8:04
  Speaker 1: I even I was thinking about some church history.
• 8:08
  Speaker 1: You see Polycarp, who was the Bishop of Smyrna.
• 8:11
  Speaker 1: He died by fire, a martyr, and some of his final words that were recorded when he was asked to deny Christ, he said 86 years I have served him and he has done me no wrong.
• 8:25
  Speaker 1: How can I blaspheme my King and my Savior?
• 8:28
  Speaker 1: We see that faithful attitude and so many of us, I know like you, read Voice of the Martyrs and all these different books and you're like, yeah, I would do that, I would do that, I would do that, I would do that.
• 8:37
  Speaker 1: It's like, okay, I'm convincing myself, I'm not going to deny him, I'm going to.
• 8:43
  Speaker 1: I'm not going to be fickle Like man, I'm going to be faithful and have the fruit of the spirit and, you know, be faithful to him.
• 8:51
  Speaker 1: But it's hard and I don't know that.
• 8:56
  Speaker 1: I don't know that I would really do that.
• 8:59
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean you just look at Peter.
• 9:01
  Speaker 2: Peter, who spent three years with Jesus and said I'll never deny you.
• 9:04
  Speaker 2: And then Jesus is like oh, but you are.
• 9:06
  Speaker 2: And he did.
• 9:08
  Speaker 2: Cockatoo is right, you know he did because we're human and we're frail.
• 9:14
  Speaker 1: And he was in person with him right.
• 9:19
  Speaker 2: Like I know, I know and I try to give Peter a lot of grace because I recognize a lot of myself in him where I open my mouth and I say thanks before I really think about them.
• 9:27
  Speaker 2: But as like, like how, how could you in some ways you have been face to face, living, eating, sleeping, everything with Jesus for three years and then you get intimidated by by others and and deny him.
• 9:43
  Speaker 2: You get intimidated by others and deny him, but I mean, I love that that's in scripture.
• 9:46
  Speaker 2: That proves that the faithfulness of Jesus, even when we're not faithful to him, right.
• 9:53
  Speaker 1: You see that over and over a lot in the Old Testament with the Israelites right.
• 9:57
  Speaker 2: Yes.
• 10:00
  Speaker 1: And it got them in a lot of trouble.
• 10:01
  Speaker 1: Like let's just read all the prophets, just read all of them.
• 10:04
  Speaker 1: You know you had the heir of the Kings and the heir of the prophets.
• 10:06
  Speaker 1: And like it's like you see this this over and over again.
• 10:09
  Speaker 1: And when we were talking about this before recording Elizabeth, we were we were reflecting on the passage in Hosea.
• 10:16
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 10:17
  Speaker 1: I've been really thinking about, like what God was asking Hosea to do.
• 10:21
  Speaker 1: He was saying Hosea, you're, yeah, she's going to cheat on you.
• 10:29
  Speaker 1: She's going to cheat on you again and again and again and I want you to marry her and I want you to be faithful to her.
• 10:33
  Speaker 1: Like I'd be like what we're.
• 10:36
  Speaker 1: We're not to make stories here, but is there like a belly of a whale somewhere that I can jump into, because that sounds like more fun.
• 10:44
  Speaker 1: Yeah, I don't know that.
• 10:44
  Speaker 1: I want to do that.
• 10:46
  Speaker 1: That's like someone's going to outright disgrace you over and over.
• 10:51
  Speaker 1: You're going to be faithful.
• 10:51
  Speaker 1: You're going to be faithful.
• 10:52
  Speaker 1: And through all of that, why was he telling Hosea to do that?
• 10:58
  Speaker 1: Because the people of Israel he was painting a picture, right, he's painting a picture of.
• 11:04
  Speaker 1: You have not been faithful to me as my people Right, and that was a really strong lesson through one of the prophets.
• 11:15
  Speaker 2: Well then, I also think, speaking of prophets, bounce back to Jeremiah 2, where we talked about.
• 11:21
  Speaker 2: Remember, in the Journey series we talked about broken cisterns and God's chief complaint against them is they had been unfaithful.
• 11:29
  Speaker 2: You used to be a bride following after me in the desert and drinking of the living water, which is him, and now you've dug for yourself broken cisterns.
• 11:39
  Speaker 2: And that's where this gets a little too convicting is yeah, I'm like, oh, yeah, faithfulness, no problem, I got it.
• 11:46
  Speaker 2: Yeah, oh, I am faithful.
• 11:48
  Speaker 2: But a lot of the times, who I'm faithful to is myself, and I'm faithful to make sure my needs are met and I'm faithful that what I want to do in the moment is being done.
• 11:59
  Speaker 2: And so there's this deeper question of not only may be in our lives.
• 12:04
  Speaker 2: We're not being faithful to God.
• 12:06
  Speaker 2: We're being faithful to this thing that we think is going to fix, heal, bring us pleasure, whatever, for whatever reason.
• 12:20
  Speaker 2: We're running to that cistern.
• 12:21
  Speaker 2: We're running to that and saying this is going to make it better.
• 12:24
  Speaker 2: And you know, I'll, just I'll.
• 12:27
  Speaker 2: I'll again confess on this podcast all the time when I want especially food, sugar, something, salt, whatever it is.
• 12:35
  Speaker 2: You know, I want a frosty, I want bed and cherries, whatever it is I want.
• 12:40
  Speaker 2: I will go to great lengths, like.
• 12:43
  Speaker 2: There have been times, kimberly, you remember back when we were in our 20s.
• 12:47
  Speaker 2: We lived together in Atlanta.
• 12:49
  Speaker 2: We shared a, a shared a condo, and I remember one night in particular.
• 12:52
  Speaker 2: We're already in our pajamas, it is late, but I want something sweet.
• 12:58
  Speaker 2: So I mean I truck it down to the gas station that's close to our house and and get snacks and bring them back, and and I am very faithful to myself or to a need or to a craving when I want it.
• 13:13
  Speaker 2: And sometimes, when I look at my faithfulness to God, sometimes my fervor is just as strong.
• 13:18
  Speaker 2: But there are times when I'm more passionate about, like if Jesus had told me I want you to get up, I want you to go down to the gas station and pray for someone I'd be like, are you sure Can I not just pray for them from here?
• 13:30
  Speaker 2: But Ben and Jerry are waiting for me at the gas station.
• 13:33
  Speaker 2: I'm going to get up and get out of my pajamas and go down to the gas station and buy some ice cream.
• 13:38
  Speaker 2: So we got to be careful to kind of look deep into our heart and say what are you being faithful to?
• 13:44
  Speaker 2: Is it your own cravings?
• 13:46
  Speaker 2: Is it your own reputation and making sure that people think well of you Like?
• 13:51
  Speaker 2: There's a lot of things we can be faithful to.
• 13:54
  Speaker 1: Yeah, when we think about Jeremiah, when we think about Hosea, all throughout the prophets, you had that idea of God painting a picture of his relationship as faithful God with the unfaithful people of Israel right.
• 14:09
  Speaker 1: And over and over.
• 14:11
  Speaker 1: His message is you're seeking other idols, you're seeking other gods, you're seeking other things and we can look at that and we can be pretty judgmental, because I think that we look at their idols and they're so foreign to us that we're like why would you do that?
• 14:27
  Speaker 2: Right, yeah, the golden calf thing.
• 14:29
  Speaker 2: I don't get that at all, yeah yeah, right, you do that, Right.
• 14:32
  Speaker 1: Yeah, the golden calf, thing, I don't get that at all.
• 14:34
  Speaker 1: Yeah, right, but but to think about our day and our current world and what we live in.
• 14:37
  Speaker 1: I have to recognize recently, you know, if I'm honest, it is like I I want to check out.
• 14:45
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 14:46
  Speaker 1: And so I, honestly, I pick up my iPad and I turn on Netflix or Hulu or Prime or whatever, and I just disengage.
• 14:57
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 14:57
  Speaker 1: And I check out and that is comforting.
• 15:00
  Speaker 1: But in a lot of ways it's turning to something to fulfill me, so I don't have to deal with what's in front of me.
• 15:09
  Speaker 2: Right.
• 15:10
  Speaker 1: And, honestly, sometimes being faithful to the things that God's calling me to, because they're just hard.
• 15:14
  Speaker 1: Right, absolutely it can be.
• 15:16
  Speaker 1: We encourage people like.
• 15:18
  Speaker 1: We've aired a podcast called Broken Cisterns Go check it out and listen to it.
• 15:22
  Speaker 1: We've aired it a couple of times, but in that we talk more and more about how there's lots of things it can be.
• 15:29
  Speaker 1: One extreme can be food, the.
• 15:32
  Speaker 1: There's lots of things it can be.
• 15:33
  Speaker 1: One extreme can be food.
• 15:34
  Speaker 1: The other extreme can be exercise.
• 15:34
  Speaker 1: One extreme can be comfort binge, watching things right Like going to friends.
• 15:37
  Speaker 1: It can be alcohol, it can be.
• 15:40
  Speaker 1: It can be anything on the spectrum that you're.
• 15:43
  Speaker 1: You may know that you're abusing it, but it may be something that you think is a good thing, but you're choosing to turn to that rather than choosing to look at God and turning to practicing contemplative prayer, practicing the for Jesus to do box exercise, middle of the page exercise prayer activities.
• 16:04
  Speaker 1: Rather than choosing those things, we're pulling away and we're looking for something else to make us feel better, honestly concerned about our feelings.
• 16:10
  Speaker 1: Right, right, we're pulling away and we're looking for something else to make us feel better, honestly concerned about our feelings.
• 16:14
  Speaker 2: Right, right.
• 16:16
  Speaker 1: And that's not faithful.
• 16:16
  Speaker 1: That's not faithful Because, again, we go back to that idea of dependable and trustworthy, steadfast.
• 16:26
  Speaker 1: The verse in Hebrews right, whether we see it or not, not having hope and assurance for something, confidence in in the god, who has been faithful and is always faithful, that's.
• 16:40
  Speaker 2: I mean he says that in second timothy yeah, if, if we're faithless, he will be faithful, because he can't deny himself yeah, I think, on a much deeper level, there is a connection between all of this, the verse you were just talking about in Hebrews 11, where it says now, faith is confidence in what we hope for and assurance of what we don't see.
• 16:58
  Speaker 2: A lot of times when I'm running to these other idols, when I'm running to these broken cisterns, when I'm putting my faith in something else, it's because I don't trust what God is up to, and so I know better how to take care of myself than trusting that God is going to come through for me.
• 17:16
  Speaker 2: Or it's more immediate for me to take care of my own needs and put my faith in something that I can control, rather than waiting on him.
• 17:24
  Speaker 2: And I think about the story of Sarah and Abraham and how God promised Abraham you're going to be the father of multiple generations, he told him, your offspring are going to be more numerous than the stars in Genesis 15, but they don't have kids.
• 17:39
  Speaker 2: And now Sarah's past childbearing age and it just doesn't seem logical that God is going to be faithful to this promise, Right?
• 17:47
  Speaker 2: So then Sarah's like hey, just you know, sleep with my handmaiden Hagar, and we'll just have an heir that way, so that you know as much as again.
• 17:56
  Speaker 2: It's very easy to be judgmental of people in Bible stories like how dare you?
• 18:00
  Speaker 2: God said he was going to do it, but here I am running after my own comforts and my own things because I don't want to trust for God to meet me in that moment, God to meet me in that moment.
• 18:09
  Speaker 2: And so Hagar gives birth, and then God's like what are y'all up to?
• 18:13
  Speaker 2: And then Sarah gives birth, and then we know all of the conflict that continues to this day has its seed right there where Sarah and Abraham took things into their own hands versus trusting God's promise.
• 18:25
  Speaker 2: They screw it up like every way you possibly can.
• 18:29
  Speaker 2: It doesn't stop there, you know.
• 18:31
  Speaker 2: At one point Abraham lies and says that Sarah is his sister, not his wife.
• 18:36
  Speaker 2: And so the king almost sleeps with his wife.
• 18:38
  Speaker 2: It's like how dare you?
• 18:39
  Speaker 2: Why didn't you tell me this is your wife?
• 18:40
  Speaker 2: Like they screw up a lot, which I appreciate it being in the Bible for that reason.
• 18:47
  Speaker 2: But then you look into Hebrews 11, that same chapter where it's talking about faith.
• 18:53
  Speaker 2: In Hebrews 11, it says by faith, Sarah herself received power to conceive, even when she was past the age since she considered him faithful who had promised.
• 19:03
  Speaker 2: And then in Galatians, they refer to Abraham as a man of faith, and so they are honored later in scripture as people of faithfulness who had faith even though they didn't do it perfectly.
• 19:16
  Speaker 2: And I love that so much about the grace of God that he gives us so much opportunity to come back again and back again, because where Abraham did show himself faithful is okay.
• 19:29
  Speaker 2: You finally have this son that's been promised to you.
• 19:32
  Speaker 2: And now God's like and now I want you to go sacrifice him.
• 19:35
  Speaker 2: I don't know that I would have been able to do that.
• 19:38
  Speaker 2: I was like what do you mean?
• 19:40
  Speaker 2: You want me to go sacrifice my son?
• 19:42
  Speaker 2: And he goes all the way to the point of ready to kill him.
• 19:46
  Speaker 2: And then God's like okay, stop, You've proven your faithfulness to me, and so I love the ups and downs of this story that it shows that, as you were, as you've already quoted, even when we're not faithful to him, he continues to be faithful to us, and it's a part of this journey of him growing us up into him.
• 20:05
  Speaker 1: But there's so much about trust and obedience that's wrapped up in faithfulness one of the core ideas in there is that reality is is that God is faithfulness.
• 20:16
  Speaker 1: Like we talked about, god is love.
• 20:19
  Speaker 1: Right when we talked about love as a fruit of the spirit.
• 20:22
  Speaker 1: And so we're.
• 20:23
  Speaker 1: We will always fail at at being faithful because we're sinners.
• 20:30
  Speaker 1: That doesn't justify it, right, but?
• 20:34
  Speaker 1: But I think we have to remember, as we've said over and over again, the fruit of the Spirit is an overflow of the Spirit, and so we have to walk in that walk by the Spirit, be aligned with the Spirit, and so what we see in Scripture over and over again is that faithfulness, god is faithfulness.
• 20:49
  Speaker 1: We see in Lamentations the steadfast love of the Lord never ceases.
• 20:53
  Speaker 1: His mercies, they never come to an end, they're new every morning.
• 20:56
  Speaker 1: Great is your faithfulness, we see in Deuteronomy.
• 20:59
  Speaker 1: Know, therefore, that the Lord, your God, is God, the faithful God, who keeps covenant and steadfast love with those who love him and keep his commandments to a thousand generations.
• 21:08
  Speaker 1: Your steadfast love, o Lord, extends to the heavens.
• 21:11
  Speaker 1: Your faithfulness to the clouds is Psalm 36.
• 21:14
  Speaker 1: Love, o Lord, extends to the heavens.
• 21:16
  Speaker 1: Your faithfulness to the clouds is Psalm 36.
• 21:20
  Speaker 1: In the New Testament, 1 Corinthians God is faithful, by whom you were called into the fellowship of his Son, jesus Christ, our Lord.
• 21:23
  Speaker 1: Let us hold fast the confession of our hope without wavering, for he who promised is faithful.
• 21:27
  Speaker 1: So that's where we see that idea of he is faithful.
• 21:33
  Speaker 1: Let us then hold fast, right?
• 21:36
  Speaker 1: That's that.
• 21:37
  Speaker 1: Over and over again in the New Testament we see that.
• 21:40
  Speaker 1: And then the reminder in Hebrews that I love, hebrews 13, 8,.
• 21:44
  Speaker 1: Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, today and forever.
• 21:46
  Speaker 1: He's faithful, he's steadfast.
• 21:49
  Speaker 1: We see it over and over again, I think there's.
• 21:55
  Speaker 1: How many verses are there on his faithfulness or his steadfast love?
• 21:58
  Speaker 1: Probably hundreds.
• 21:59
  Speaker 2: Yeah, at least, because when I was kind of doing a word study on it, I had 14 pages of verses on the faithfulness of God and I was like we can't read all these, which it really struck me how often it talks about God's faithfulness.
• 22:15
  Speaker 2: And I think that is because we are all of us are a lot like Peter.
• 22:18
  Speaker 2: We are, as much as we have good intentions.
• 22:21
  Speaker 2: We are weak, we are frail, we have doubt, we have fear and we need to be reminded over and over again of the faithfulness of God.
• 22:30
  Speaker 1: And I think that faithfulness it's directly tied to our salvation and our sanctification.
• 22:34
  Speaker 1: Like we can't forget that that's incredibly important In His grace.
• 22:40
  Speaker 1: It is His faithfulness to us that brings about our redemption.
• 22:46
  Speaker 1: We talked earlier about 2 Timothy 2.
• 22:48
  Speaker 1: If we're faithless, he remains faithful because he can't deny Himself.
• 22:53
  Speaker 1: But we can also look at 1 John 1.9.
• 22:56
  Speaker 1: If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.
• 23:02
  Speaker 1: We know that verse many of us.
• 23:04
  Speaker 1: But in the middle of it it says he is faithful and just to forgive us.
• 23:10
  Speaker 1: One of my favorite verses that was very significant for me during my teenage years is 1 Corinthians 10.13, where again we see God is faithful.
• 23:17
  Speaker 1: So it's that idea of no temptation.
• 23:19
  Speaker 1: It's the verse that says no temptation has overtaken you.
• 23:22
  Speaker 1: That is not common to man.
• 23:24
  Speaker 1: God is faithful.
• 23:25
  Speaker 1: He will not let you be tempted beyond your ability, but with the temptation he will also provide the way of escape that you may be able to endure it.
• 23:35
  Speaker 1: The verse I know that you talk about a lot 1 Thessalonians.
• 23:41
  Speaker 2: In 1 Thessalonians 5, 23, where it says Now the God of peace himself sanctify you completely and may your whole spirit, soul and body be kept.
• 23:51
  Speaker 2: Blame us at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ.
• 23:53
  Speaker 2: We use that verse a lot in the journey, study and talking about the sanctification process that he wants to do in our spirit, soul and body.
• 24:02
  Speaker 2: But I love the second half of that, which says he who calls you is faithful and he will do it.
• 24:10
  Speaker 2: And then another verse that's very familiar to us Philippians 1.6,.
• 24:15
  Speaker 2: And I'm sure of this, that he who began a good work in you will bring it to completion at the day of Jesus Christ, Just again underlying his faithfulness to us.
• 24:26
  Speaker 2: And I love in all of these verses that we're talking about Kimberly.
• 24:29
  Speaker 2: As much as we want to be redeemed and right and holy with God, he wants it more.
• 24:35
  Speaker 2: He is.
• 24:37
  Speaker 2: We can't do it.
• 24:38
  Speaker 2: Our works can't get us there.
• 24:40
  Speaker 2: It's his grace that gets us there.
• 24:42
  Speaker 2: But even after the salvation issue which, referring back to 1 John 1 and 9 that you were talking about, it could have just as easily read if we confess our sins, he is just to forgive us of our sins and cleanse us from all unrighteousness.
• 24:55
  Speaker 2: But I love the fact that he puts in there that he's faithful, because as many times as we screw up, as many times as we act like the people of the Old Testament and the New Testament that we're so quick to judge and go, how dare they act that way?
• 25:08
  Speaker 2: Well, we do it a thousand times a day.
• 25:09
  Speaker 2: He is faithful and just and he has a covenant with us that he's not going to let go and he is going to fight for us to become more like Him every day.
• 25:20
  Speaker 2: And that's just a beautiful picture of what faithfulness should look like.
• 25:24
  Speaker 2: So, kimberly, my question to you is all right, that is a great picture of God's faithfulness, but how does that translate into my relationships here on earth?
• 25:36
  Speaker 1: Well, again, elizabeth, we're going to fail at not just being unfaithful to God, but we're going to fail at being faithful to, relationally, to our horizontal relationships.
• 25:47
  Speaker 1: But again, that's not a license or a warrant, it's not a license to seek to fail Right.
• 25:54
  Speaker 1: But the opposite of being faithful is to be faithless.
• 26:00
  Speaker 1: And if you look at that, it means not keeping faith, being dishonest, being disloyal, being unreliable, undependable and unbelieving, being doubting, being treacherous, being unscrupulous.
• 26:15
  Speaker 1: I think I mentioned earlier we don't want to be fickle humans, we want to be like faithful God.
• 26:21
  Speaker 1: And so, relationally, when I treat others in a way that causes them to think I'm being dishonest or causes them to think that I'm fickle and I'm unreliable, that's not really honoring the relationship or honoring the Lord, if I'm honest about it, right, right.
• 26:41
  Speaker 1: So I think, relationally, being faithful is really hard, to say the least.
• 26:51
  Speaker 2: Like why is it hard, what's hard about being faithful in a relationship.
• 26:54
  Speaker 2: Like why is it hard, what's hard?
• 26:55
  Speaker 1: about being fateful in a relationship.
• 26:56
  Speaker 1: It's hard because it goes against my selfish nature.
• 27:00
  Speaker 1: It goes against what I want, my comforts.
• 27:03
  Speaker 1: It means choosing to show up for someone else, choosing to possibly put someone else's needs above my own.
• 27:13
  Speaker 1: It means sometimes being uncomfortable.
• 27:15
  Speaker 1: It means sometimes being misunderstood and not fighting for my way or my words or my intent to be understood, which is really hard.
• 27:25
  Speaker 2: Yeah, it is.
• 27:26
  Speaker 1: It's one thing to be outright dishonest with someone, to outright lie to someone, to outright cheat on someone.
• 27:33
  Speaker 1: That's outright right.
• 27:36
  Speaker 1: It's wrong.
• 27:37
  Speaker 1: It's wrong, yeah, it's very wrong.
• 27:41
  Speaker 1: But to do that in the more subtle ways of you know, the term that's used a lot today is gaslighting, and what that means is it's a subtle way that makes you question if you messed up on something or if you you know, but it's someone else causing you to question yourself by being a little unscrupulous.
• 28:08
  Speaker 1: To be honest, right, like yeah like shifting the blame on yeah.
• 28:13
  Speaker 2: Well, that gets a little more personal, kimberly, when you start talking about unfaithfulness being stuff like that.
• 28:18
  Speaker 2: Because I think for most of us we're like, hey, yeah, I'm there for my friends, I'm there, yeah, I'm faithful to my spouse.
• 28:24
  Speaker 2: But it does get more into that attitude of the heart and am I looking out for the good of the other person, sometimes sacrificing what I want in order to do what is right in the moment, and I struggle more on the other end of this.
• 28:43
  Speaker 2: I actually even had something happen in the past week where I think you can also take faithfulness to an unhealthy extreme, where I needed to say no to someone.
• 28:53
  Speaker 2: I didn't have the time to help that person with that thing, but I didn't want to hurt their feelings by not being faithful and showing up for them and being loyal and whatever, and so you agree to do it anyway.
• 29:10
  Speaker 2: And then you're resentful, yeah, and cranky and bitter Because I'm helping this person with this thing when I really don't have time to do it and, you know, comes out not necessarily at that person, but it comes out against my family or someone else and it's like you know what the more fateful fruit in me would have been to be honest with that person and say you know what, as much as I want to be there for you, I don't have the bandwidth right now to do this.
• 29:40
  Speaker 2: There's, you know, other things in my life that are got to be a priority, and so I can't do this right now.
• 29:47
  Speaker 2: And I think the person would have been like, hey, I get it, I understand, thanks for telling me.
• 29:52
  Speaker 2: But instead I found myself internally having not so righteous thoughts about the situation, because I felt, well, faithfulness means I always say yes, or faithfulness means I'm always there for that person.
• 30:05
  Speaker 2: And so there is this thing that we often talk about, about having to go to God and say you know, god, is this my assignment, is this what you want me to be focused on right now, and, if so, what part?
• 30:20
  Speaker 2: And what's your timing, versus just thinking well, if they ask, that means I need to say yes, because that's what a good Christian does.
• 30:27
  Speaker 2: And so there is this continually returning to this theme of abiding with Him and going okay, god, what's your agenda for my day, my week, or what is my role to play?
• 30:37
  Speaker 2: To show all of the fruit of the Spirit, not only to this person in front of me who needs something, but how it's going to impact all the other relationships in my life.
• 30:47
  Speaker 1: Yeah, I think there's a fine line in some of these things between being like we need to know ourselves and be honest, like you're saying.
• 30:55
  Speaker 1: We don't need to just say we can do something and think that we're being.
• 30:58
  Speaker 1: I need to be faithful to this person, I need to show up for this person, I need to sacrifice for this person, but then doing that, like you said, where we build resentment internally because it's not, we really don't have the bandwidth, we really don't have the capacity, we really can't, for maybe practical reasons, when that type of pattern continues over and over again, where we're saying, yes, we're showing up, but we don't want it internally, that resentment leads to really unhealthy places in our relationships.
• 31:28
  Speaker 1: And so we've got to choose to be honest and work on being honest in our relationships, but also honest in the way that sees the other person and honors the other person and honors the Lord.
• 31:40
  Speaker 1: Because we're talking for right now I'm talking healthy Christian relationships or relationships between people that want to.
• 31:49
  Speaker 1: Maybe you're in a relationship with someone who's not a believer, but you're seeking to honor the Lord through that relationship.
• 31:54
  Speaker 1: Like our heart, motivation as believers needs to be I want to be faithful to the Lord and what he's called me to, and in this relationship he's called me to be honest, to be secure, to be reliable, to be dependable and to be that for the other person and to hope that they will be that for you, but to not demand that they be that for you.
• 32:19
  Speaker 1: Right, and that's where relationships just get really sticky because we don't really know how we try to be faithful to each other.
• 32:28
  Speaker 1: But it's hard because we disappoint each other, and then when we disappoint each other, that narrative is really big.
• 32:34
  Speaker 1: It's a loud narrative that says, well, I can't trust you, and so if I can't trust you, I'm not going to be faithful to you, and so that's where this conversation just gets really tricky and really hard.
• 32:46
  Speaker 1: But I think under it all it's like okay, can we see the faithfulness of God over and over again?
• 32:54
  Speaker 1: And maybe I struggle to see that in my life right now.
• 32:58
  Speaker 1: Maybe I can look back 10 years ago and see it, or maybe it's really good right now and I can see His faithfulness Beyond our life and our experience.
• 33:05
  Speaker 1: Can you see the faithfulness of God that we see in Scripture and how His true nature he cannot deny himself.
• 33:12
  Speaker 1: That true character of God is faithful and steadfast love over and over and over again, to the point to where God would send his son, jesus, to die on a cross and Jesus would choose to die on the cross so that we could have salvation.
• 33:27
  Speaker 1: That is an utterly faithful act of steadfast love.
• 33:31
  Speaker 1: Can we let this teaching on the fruit of the Spirit with regard to faithfulness show us and motivate us to just try each day to wake up each day knowing, like Lamentations says, his mercies are new every morning.
• 33:47
  Speaker 1: His love is steadfast to me.
• 33:49
  Speaker 1: This morning I can receive His steadfast mercies, his new mercies today, and in His new mercies I can seek to offer myself new mercies, I can seek to offer others new mercies and out of that I can choose to walk out faithfulness as I'm walking in step with His Spirit.
• 34:08
  Speaker 1: That's the only way, moment by moment, day by day, minute by minute, that I think we can actually live out the fruit of the Spirit Absolutely.
• 34:18
  Speaker 2: And I want to add, as we're closing, just a special note For those of you that find yourself in a situation right now where it's hard to see the faithfulness of God and it may feel to you that there's some promises he made to you that have been broken.
• 34:33
  Speaker 2: Whether they've been broken or not, that's a whole nother theological conversation to have later, because he is faithful, but it feels like what I'm living in now is not what I thought you promised and we've all been there.
• 34:47
  Speaker 2: It's those the moon is round moments that we talk about right Kimberly so much on this podcast where you just have to trust in the goodness and the faithfulness of God when you can't see it.
• 34:57
  Speaker 2: My heart goes out to people who find themselves in those situations.
• 35:02
  Speaker 2: We are all in those situations at different points in our journey, but for anyone listening to this right now, who may be listening to that, we just want to bless your spirit, to receive the full truth of who God is as the faithful one, so that it can then be translated down to your soul and your body that are really struggling to understand where God might be right now.
• 35:23
  Speaker 2: So let's end with the blessing of the fruit of faithfulness Spirit.
• 35:28
  Speaker 2: Listen to God's word for you in Galatians 5.22.
• 35:31
  Speaker 2: The fruit of the Spirit is faithfulness, and in Isaiah 49, 7, the Lord who is faithful, the Holy One of Israel, has chosen you.
• 35:42
  Speaker 2: He proclaims of himself in Exodus 34, 6, the Lord, the Lord, the compassionate and gracious God, slow to anger, abounding in love and faithfulness.
• 35:56
  Speaker 1: Spirit.
• 35:56
  Speaker 1: Hear this.
• 35:57
  Speaker 1: There is no sure testimony in scripture than that your Father is the faithful God who keeps his covenant of love with you.
• 36:05
  Speaker 1: He binds himself to you in his faithful love and he does no wrong.
• 36:10
  Speaker 1: Because of his great love, you are not consumed, for his compassions and great faithfulness never fail.
• 36:17
  Speaker 1: Jesus is the faithful and true witness whose name is faithful and true.
• 36:22
  Speaker 1: He is faithful to keep you in temptation and faithful to forgive, because he is a merciful and faithful High Priest.
• 36:30
  Speaker 1: He is faithful because God called you into fellowship with him, faithful to his promises and faithful to strengthen you.
• 36:36
  Speaker 1: He has to remain faithful because he cannot deny himself.
• 36:42
  Speaker 2: Spirit.
• 36:43
  Speaker 2: Be blessed with his covenant-keeping spirit.
• 36:45
  Speaker 2: He speaks his faithfulness into you so that you are not blown about or given to fickleness.
• 36:52
  Speaker 2: Your faithfulness clings to his faithfulness to keep his promises and accomplish his will, for God's eyes are on his faithful ones.
• 37:01
  Speaker 2: Be blessed to stand firm in your faith, trusting and believing in him.
• 37:06
  Speaker 2: Be blessed with knowing whom you have believed and being persuaded that he will keep you faithful.
• 37:13
  Speaker 2: Be blessed with letting his steadfastness keep you, according to the plumb line of his trustworthiness.
• 37:22
  Speaker 1: Spirit cling to justice, mercy and faithfulness, which Jesus said were important for you to pursue.
• 37:28
  Speaker 1: Paul instructed his spiritual son to fight the good fight and hold on to faithfulness and a good conscience.
• 37:34
  Speaker 1: He told him to flee the evil desires of youth and pursue righteousness, faithfulness, love and peace, along with those who call on the Lord out of a pure heart.
• 37:43
  Speaker 1: He told him to guard the good deposit of faith that God placed in him, to guard it with the help of the Holy Spirit who lived in him.
• 37:50
  Speaker 1: He held his own life up as an example of teaching purpose, faith, patience, love, endurance and sufferings.
• 37:57
  Speaker 1: By God's grace, be blessed to make this your testimony as you, in faithfulness, live out what God in Christ has for you, resulting in transformed character and a godly way of life.
• 38:13
  Speaker 2: Many tests that have come to you were not to prove the faithfulness of God, but to prove your faithfulness in spite of circumstances.
• 38:20
  Speaker 2: Be blessed to prove true to your faithfulness to God and to others.
• 38:25
  Speaker 2: Be blessed with consistency in your practical Christian faith, faith with legs, faith that is lived out to the glory of your faithful and whom he invites to share his happiness.
• 38:58
  Speaker 1: Be blessed with the fruit of faithfulness that the Spirit produces in you, your appropriate response from his faithfulness to you I want to thank you for listening to the Father's Business Podcast.
• 39:15
  Speaker 2: This podcast is made possible through donations by people like you.
• 39:19
  Speaker 2: To donate, go to wwwTheFathersBusinesscom.
• 39:24
  Speaker 2: No-transcript.