#20 Believe in God!

[AI translation] It is hard to imagine a more general, flat, empty, meaningless statement from the pulpit than, "Believe in God! For more or less all preaching is about believing in God! There is nothing interesting, nothing special, nothing remarkable about it - it may as well mean everything as nothing! But now I want to talk about believing in God! Because Jesus spoke about it. And I feel that everything he said to his disciples in the fourteen verses he has just read, he said as an explanation of this statement. And if we look at the way He said it, the way He expressed it, the way He understood it: it will be filled with meaning for us, and we will see how important it is to believe in God in this way!It is immediately different when we consider when Jesus said this? A few days before his crucifixion. It was when He spoke openly to His disciples about His death, a death that He had willingly undertaken through suffering and humiliation, His going away, and where He was going, His disciples could not follow. Even this was so mysterious and incomprehensible to the disciples that their souls were almost shaken: what would happen when all these things Jesus had spoken of came to pass? That is why Jesus says, "Believe now! Now, when the great tribulation is really upon you. Now, when you will understand nothing of what is going to happen. Now, when your heart is troubled, now do not be troubled, do not despair, but believe! Now is the time to learn what faith is - do not give way to restlessness, to doubt in your heart, but now is the time to hold on to faith!
Yes: this is when faith is needed! It is one thing to see, and another to believe. You may see Jesus being killed, but believe! You may see that Satan is victorious, believe! You must believe when you have every reason to disbelieve, to doubt, to be anxious! When the situation becomes hopeless before him. When things happen around him and to him that shake his heart and soul. When one cannot see God, His helping hand, His goodness and mercy. When they don't understand why things happen the way they do? When there is darkness, no encouragement, no light. When it looks as if God is no longer God. When there is nothing visible and tangible to hold on to: then believe, you can still believe! So when the heart asks anxiously what will happen, when the soul sighs wearily that it can't go on: then believe! It's as if Jesus is saying: when I'm hanging on the cross, when everyone is mocking me, when you feel your heart breaking with pain: then you must believe! Don't believe what you see or what others say, but "believe in God!"
Jesus also says right away: how can we believe in God? Believe in God by believing in me! He narrows down, he makes faith in God concrete. Do not just believe in God in general, just as the Jews or even the Gentiles believe in God in some form - indeed, unbelieving and God-denying people believe in some God - but you believe in God in such a way that "believe in me!" From a Christian point of view, only a man can be called a believer in God who is a believer in Christ! We can only believe in God in Christ, through Christ and by Christ! In Jesus of Nazareth, the concept of God in general becomes for us a personal matter, a living reality, one who can be met, known and spoken to. He who does not believe in Jesus Christ will never come to true faith in God! "No one comes to the Father but by me." (v 14,6b) "If ye had known me, ye would have known my Father also." (John 14,7) "He who has seen me has seen the Father." (Jn 14:9b) Then he says, "Do you not believe that I am in the Father, and the Father is in me?" (Jn 14:10a) "The words which I speak to you, I do not speak of myself; but the Father who dwells in me does these things. Believe me, that I am in the Father, and the Father is in me." (John 14:10-11).
How God has made it easier for us to believe in Him by believing in Jesus! Jesus Christ lived the Father's invisible life in a human life that we can see. He was human, but He was God incarnate. Man on earth can never see God. Well, then, God put the radiance of His divine glory into the earthly, human person of Jesus and showed people how the invisible God feels and acts. So, when we see Jesus taking little children in his arms, talking to them, laying his hands on them, blessing them: we can see how God feels about children. When we see Jesus' compassion for human suffering, we understand from it what our heavenly Father feels when he sees the misery on earth.
When we see how Jesus behaves towards sinners - how he welcomes them, eats with them, offers forgiveness to the repentant - we see how compassionate God is! When we see Jesus on the cross, willingly giving his life as an atonement for the salvation of the lost, we see how God loves us! Yes: in Christ we know the Father. He who has seen Him has seen the Father! He who believes in Him, believes in God! Therefore believe in God, "Believe in me!"
He who thus believes in God through Jesus Christ sees God with his spiritual eyes where no one else sees Him. Philip is right when he says, "Show us the Father and it will be enough for us! It is indeed enough! To see God in the events of the world, to see God's hand of blessing or punishment in the unfolding of your own life, to see God's plan, will, purpose: this is the greatest, the most comforting, the happiest thing in the world! When a sick person, for example, feels the loving care of the heavenly Father in his sickness, sees a divine plan in his own sickness, and can give thanks for it: what a great thing that is! Or as a country brother said the other day when he had lost everything: I accept it as a judgment from the hand of God. Where others shake their fists, crying for vengeance, the soul that believes in Christ bows under the weight of divine justice with a humble, grateful spirit. "Show us the Father, and He is sufficient for us" (v. 8), says Philip. Well: Jesus shows him the Father! Where others see only fate, the whim of blind chance, you see the Father. Where others see misfortune, misfortune and despair, you see the chastening of the Father's love. Where others are discouraged by success, you are filled with gratitude to the Father who gives. Do you thus see God in the events of your life, in the turn of your destiny? To see Him is to see meaning, purpose, to look with confidence and serenity into a troubled world - and that is enough! It is enough indeed. What more can man want on earth than to see the Father like this! Only in Jesus can one see the Father like this! As He means this statement, "Believe in God!"
Whoever believes in God through Christ in this way, the horizon begins to widen. Observe what heavenly horizons are opened up by this saying of Jesus, "In my Father's house are many mansions: and if it were not so, I would have told you. I will go and prepare a place for you. And when I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and receive you to myself; that where I am, there you may be also." (Jn 14,23) It's as if he was saying to his disciples, who were grieving over the farewell: don't cling to this land! Do not think that this earth is everything! On the contrary: this whole visible world is only a certain kind of dwelling place in the Father's great house, but there are many other dwelling places besides. There, beyond death, there are also dwelling places, dwelling places - so see something of God's infinite riches! Do not measure God's dimensions to your own smallness, for as a thousand years before him are as many as a day, so three thousand such worlds as you know are as many as a matchbox to him. "In my Father's house are many mansions!" And now He is going away - not to forget there those whom He has left behind, but to pray and work for them there also. I am going, He says, "to prepare a place for you."
So to believe in God is also to be free from attaching too much importance to earthly things: we are free to rise above them, to look at and appreciate events from a perspective that includes heaven. After all, my place is already being prepared over there, the Lord has gone ahead, to make my lodgings! And when my place is ready, He will come for me and take me with Him! Let's see beyond earthly boundaries and limits! How we can be bitter when a door closes, a way or an opportunity closes! Lift up your eyes and see that another of our Father's many glorious dwelling places is already opening, the door of the one made for you! So to believe in God is also to live on earth in the certainty that there is a prepared dwelling for me there! I will not be left out of the world of heavenly salvation for want of a place! It will not happen to me, as it did to Jesus when he came to earth, that there was no room for him in the inn! He Himself has gone to prepare a place, He Himself is coming for me, and He Himself will bring me to Himself where He is! Until then, I can live in peace, I can wait, I can prepare! Yes! Just believe in God!
And finally, Jesus adds, "Verily, verily, I say unto you, He that believeth on me, the works that I do shall he do also; and greater works than these shall he do: for I go unto my Father. And whatever you shall ask in my name, that will I do, that the Father may be glorified in the Son." (Jn 14,12-14) Believing in God as Jesus means it: not idle idleness, not contemplation, not meditation, but activity, action, work, movement, life with the greatest impact! "He who believes in me will do the things that I do, and greater things than these will he do." Almost unbelievable! How can this be? It is that Jesus went into that other world beyond death not only to prepare eternal rest for His own, but also to develop His work on earth from there, now truly and with full power. But now not only in a narrow circle within the borders of one country, as hitherto, but throughout the whole world, in a wider circle, on a larger scale! So it is understandable that he is "doing greater things". Well, Peter's sermon at Pentecost was attended by 3000 people. All at once the gospel began to reach a wider audience! It spread further, further! And it was only possible to do greater things than Jesus because Jesus went to the Father! So, what a believer in Him does, Jesus Himself does! Jesus, who is with the Father, listens to the supplication of the disciple to his Lord, and begs for help in the struggle of his life on earth. And whatever the disciple asks in the name of Christ, the Lord himself does. At the disciple's request, a divine action is set in motion: "Whatever you ask in my name, I will do." The prayer of the believer is answered by the power of the risen Christ!
Where are these actions that the Lord now wants to perform through us, from above? How is it that our works are not greater, but pitifully less, miserably less than the works of Christ?! Is it not because we do not believe?! We do not believe in God as Jesus meant when he said: "Believe in God"?!
"Believe in God!" - Yes! That's what we want! Let us cling to this promise of the Lord, "And whatever you shall ask in my name, I will do it." Only He can make us believe in God!
So let us ask together, together! With a hymn that goes like this:
Teach us to believe, Lord, teach us to ask,
Teach us, Lord, to ask for the great faith of children.
Revive my heart, inspire it to you.
To gather souls, teach me to ask.
Canto 479, verse 1
Amen
Date: 22 April 1951.