Known Faith

 DEVOTION

THE LETTER TO THE ROMANS

KNOWN FAITH

Rom 1:8-10

8 First, I thank my God through Jesus Christ for all of you, because your faith is being reported all over the world. 9 God, whom I serve with my whole heart in preaching the gospel of his Son, is my witness how constantly I remember you 10 in my prayers at all times; and I pray that now at last by God's will the way may be opened for me to come to you.

NIV

Now that we are thanking God through Jesus Christ for all the believers that we personally know as well as all those we do not know, we should look at two more thoughts that come to our mind. First, they reason Paul thanks God for them, is because of their faith which was being reported all over the world. We wonder how in a time when there was no cell phone, television, radio, internet and thus no Twitter, Instagram, or any other of our modern means of spreading the news about the faith of a local church, how did the whole world hear of the report of their faith? Nevertheless, Paul says their faith is known all over the world, or at least the known area of the world Paul was aware of.  We do wonder if our personal faith is known by anyone other than those who attend the same church we do? Even then, are they fully aware of our faith? Is anyone reporting, or witnessing to others about our faith? It would seem the reason the faith of the church in Rome is so well known is that they were living their faith out loud, that is their actions were motivated by their faith. That would be both in their deeds within and without the church. Without getting into a dissertation on what consists of deeds, some type of behavior, or activity of theirs was the evidence of their faith. Surely faith causes a personal transformation for faith always insists transformation happens. Faith causes a complete change; a metamorphosis is a person’s life. Surely faith causes us to live differently than the rest of the world. Faith causes our language to change from what it was when we spoke as one from the world, as they of the world do not believe in Jesus Christ as the Son of God. Then we must ask ourselves if we are outspoken in our new language which is motivated by our faith. Do we witness about Jesus to everyone we are able to encounter? The second thought is interwoven into this thought about faith. Paul said that God, whom he served with his whole heart is his witness. We will leave this God witness for later, as we want to focus on the transformation that occurred in Paul’s life and how that translates into our lives. For Paul to change from persecuting the people of the Way to being one of the most powerful witnesses for Jesus Christ is surely an example or witness of his deed of faith. We know that sounds strange to think that faith is a deed, but we think of those words of Jesus when he was asked what a man must do to do the works that God requires. Jesus said the works, or deeds that God requires is to believe in the one He sent. Paul certainly believed, in being transformed by the God. This is just another truth that awakens within. We cannot cause any transformation, or any change in our lives. Only God, through Jesus Christ and the Holy Spirit brings about this change in us because we decided to believe. We decided to exercise the measure of faith that God has given to us, for he gives every person a measure of faith. This means we cannot even have faith without God. Once again, we think we could go on forever with these thoughts, creating a book instead of a devotion. However, we do wonder how much is our faith known by others?