MY FAITH AND FULL TRUST IN OUR LORD
Sakkie Parsons
Translated from the Afrikaans Version: My geloof en volle vertroue op ons Here.
Translator: Lynda Botha
Someone wrote to me and I give an abbreviated version of the question to me:
"How can we say that faith consists of:
HEBREWS 11: 1: “Faith is the confidence that what we hope for will actually happen; it gives us assurance about things we cannot see.” if Christians who say this still arrange for insurance, medical aid and pension funds for example?"
I want to start by telling you about something that happened years ago which I have been involved in and made a great impression on me.
Working with me was a man who described himself as a Christian and he made it crystal clear that he does not believe in doctors. He go to the Lord. He himself was a very healthy man. Then his wife and two children got very sick from the flu and of course he didn’t take them to the doctor. They hoped and prayed to our Lord.
During this time of sickness within his family, my wife called me and asked me to please speak to – let’s call him John, as John’s family has really fallen very ill. I started talking with him and soon we ended up that he quarrelled and he was angry with me. I realized that I would not be able to persuade him otherwise and discontinued the conversation.
A little later in the day John makes a phone call and because we were in the same office, I obviously overheard their conversation. Apparently, his car gave carburettor problems and, the way I understood it from the conversation they had, he was struggling to synchronize the carburettor and he wanted to make an appointment to bring his car in so they could fix the problem.
The Holy Spirit spoke to my heart and as soon as he ended his telephone call, I said to him:
"John, do you know what feeble example you have now proclaimed to the world?"
He asked me what I meant.
I said to him:
"Even if I was not in the office, we are surrounded with spirits, forces of evil in the air and now they are rolling around laughing. Because, you just proved through your actions that:
God is a good doctor, so I entrust my family to Him and not to a regular doctor, but God is a bad mechanic, so I'll rather take my car to a qualified mechanic.
Many times, people will say I trust in God to provide for me but if His vehicle’s tank becomes empty, he would rather trust the attendant at the garage. Many Christians are like hypocrites. And because we live like John in this kind of faith, people out there just shake their heads and laugh at us.
Jesus spoke at a occasion on what the sacrifice is to follow Him and of course He also used a very practical example to demonstrate what He said:
LUKE 14:27: “And if you do not carry your own cross and follow me, you cannot be my disciple.”
LUKE 14:28: “But don’t begin until you count the cost. For who would begin construction of a building without first calculating the cost to see if there is enough money to finish it?”
Another beautiful example, to demonstrate how we as children need to look at today’s modern aid which surrounds us, we find in Genesis 41:33 and further where Joseph under the guidance of our Lord said to the Pharaoh what he had to do regarding the dreams the Faro had:
GENESIS 41:33-36
33 “Therefore, Pharaoh should find an intelligent and wise man and put him in charge of the entire land of Egypt.”
34 “Then Pharaoh should appoint supervisors over the land and let them collect one-fifth of all the crops during the seven good years.”
35 “Have them gather all the food produced in the good years that are just ahead and bring it to Pharaoh’s storehouses. Store it away, and guard it so there will be food in the cities.”
36 “That way there will be enough to eat when the seven years of famine come to the land of Egypt. Otherwise this famine will destroy the land.”
Whenever I go on a long trip, I pray about the matter and I use the common sense that our Lord has given me, to ensure that my car is roadworthy and full of petrol.
If I need medical attention, I trust in our Lord that He will bring me to the right doctor, because He initiated the doctors to benefit us.
I also trust our Lord and today I am a pensioner with a good medical aid.
I conclude with another tale of how we sometimes portray the Gospel of Christ as ridiculous:
One day I heard a man pray in a church service for people with this disease and praying for people with that disease. On one occasion he said that he is now going to pray for people with eye problems and since there was not a lot of people who responded he stretched his invitation out to other problems as well.
The question came to me and I asked my wife:
"Does the man wear glasses?"
She answered:
"Yes, but how do you know?"
I didn’t answer her but sat there and listened to the man.
Then, when he finished praying for the people with their eye problems, he took his Bible and walked off the stage with his glasses on.
If I wore glasses that day, which I didn’t because I was too blind to have one, and he prayed for me, I would have taken my glasses off and put in my pocket. But since he walked with his glasses on, off the stage, I would dumbfoundedly shake my head, slipped my hand into my pocket to retrieve my glasses which I removed, rubbed the lenses shiny and put them back on again.
My personal outlook in life, and I use an example from my own life:
In 1997 when my doctor told me I had melanoma cancer and if they can’t stop it, I will only have 3 to 6 months to live, I trusted our Lord to make sure that the experts will be doing the right thing, and on the 5th December 1997, I started the treatment.
Then, somewhere in that December I sat in a church service and a pastor said he would like to pray for me. After his prayer I knew I was healed but I still did everything the experts said I should do. Because our Lord placed them there for exactly that purpose, to give guidance and assistance to people like me when we are uninformed.
Today, many, many years later, I have these valuable lessons left that I learned from those events.
Therefore, I have continued my trust within our Lord in all things I’m not knowledgeable in.
For example, if I had car problems, I trust our Lord and took my car to a qualified mechanic. If I had electrical problems in my home, I trust our Lord and got an electrician to solve the problem for me. If my teeth had a problem, I trust our Lord to heal me and then go to a dentist who has been placed there by the Lord.
We should not be pretentious like most people and like John and say:
"I trust in the Lord” and then be selective in our live to what we trust our Lord in.
To make use of my hero Paul’s writing style..
"Or what shall we say about all these things, is all the worldly experts placed by our Lord, then only placed for non-believers?”
If you get into a certain situation –
Pray about the matter, consider the expertise around you, follow the guidance of our Lord and use the expert to whom our Lord has led you to resolve that matter at that time.
If there are someone reading this and you want to do it differently, then do it, but don’t make a mockery of the Gospel and of yourself by imitating my examples above, with your glasses on and going with your car to a garage.
In other words, do not be a hypocrite, selective in what is being preached which is inconsistent with the Word of God.
I myself pray about an issue and then I follow through with my common sense our Lord gave me with faith and with His guidance. What is this faith that I follow Him with full confidence?
HEBREWS 11: 1: “Faith is the confidence that what we hope for will actually happen; it gives us assurance about things we cannot see.”
The proof that this works for me is that I can sit here many years later after my cancer treatment and write this letter to you.
Greetings,
Sakkie