Cultivating a Faithful Heart: Lessons from God's Steadfastness
Here’s a summary of this week’s sermon:
Cultivating a Faithful Heart: Lessons from God's Steadfastness
Faithfulness is a powerful trait, exemplified by Sharon's grandparents' 70-year marriage, rooted in their unwavering faith in God. Their story teaches us about the essence of faithfulness and how it impacts our lives and relationships.
Faithfulness, as described in Galatians 5:22-23, is a fruit of the Spirit, alongside love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, gentleness, and self-control. But what does it truly mean to be faithful? It involves remaining loyal, steadfast, and true to one's word, making a person dependable, trustworthy, and honest.
Understanding God's Faithfulness
Lamentations 3:22-23 states, "The steadfast love of the Lord never ceases; his mercies never come to an end; they are new every morning; great is your faithfulness." These verses highlight God's unwavering love and mercy, providing hope even in the darkest times.
God's faithfulness manifests in two key ways: faithfulness to His word and faithfulness to His people. God does not lie; He embodies truth. Therefore, His promises are reliable and eternal. Isaiah 40:8 reminds us, "The grass withers, the flowers fade, but the word of our God will stand forever."
Embracing Faithfulness
Embracing faithfulness means more than just enduring tough times. It involves a relationship with God, allowing His Spirit to work within us, producing the fruits of the Spirit, including faithfulness. By walking in the Spirit and cooperating with God, we naturally develop this trait.
Faithfulness is not about self-improvement but about a loving, faithful relationship with God. When we truly grasp God's faithfulness to us, we are empowered to be faithful to Him and to others. This faithfulness brings wholeness into our lives, aligning us with God's perfect plan.
Conclusion
As we strive to cultivate a faithful heart, let's reflect on these questions: What does the Bible say faithfulness is not? How has the faithfulness of God or others impacted your life? Does being one of God's people mean a life without problems? In what areas do you need God's covenant strength and faithfulness now? If you're not a Christ follower, what do you think about God's offer of a covenant relationship with Him?
Exodus 34:6-7 tells us, "The Lord, the compassionate and gracious God, slow to anger, abounding in love and faithfulness, maintaining love to thousands, and forgiving wickedness, rebellion and sin." Let's embrace this steadfast love and cultivate a heart of faithfulness, drawing inspiration from God's unwavering commitment to us.
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Matt Edmundson: [00:00:00] Welcome to this week's Crowd Church service. We are a digital church on a quest to discover how Jesus helps us live a more meaningful life. We are a community, a space to explore the Christian faith and a place where you can contribute and grow. I want to invite you to connect with us here at Crowd Church and there are a few ways that you can do just that.
Firstly, you can engage with crowd from any device during our live stream, and if you're up for it, why not invite a few friends over and experience the service together. Church is all about connecting with God and connecting with others, and one of the easiest ways for you to do that is to also join our community.
One of our mid week groups where we meet online together to catch up and [00:01:00] discover more about the amazingness of Christ. You can also subscribe to our podcast called What's The Story where we deep dive into stories of faith and courage from everyday people. More information about all of these things that I've mentioned can be found on our website at www. crowd. church, or you can reach us on social media at Crowd Church. If you're new to Crowd or new to the Christian faith and would like to know what your next steps to take are why not head over to our website, https://crowd.church/next. And now, the moment you've been waiting for is here. Our online church service starts right now.
Good evening. Welcome to Crowd Online Church. My name is Matt and beside me [00:02:00] is my amazing wife this evening.
Sharon Edmundson: Good evening, everyone.
Matt Edmundson: Not just for this evening.
Sharon Edmundson: No, yeah. Yeah, I'm your wife all the time.
Matt Edmundson: Oh, it's only going to get better, folks. Welcome to Crowd Online Church. Great that you're here.
Great that you could join us wherever you're watching from in the world. Say hi in the comments. Lala is, Lala Hereford is on Instagram. Hope the cameras are working this week. Yes, me too.
Sharon Edmundson: You had problems last week, didn't you? Did you? Was that last week?
Matt Edmundson: I think so. It's just all merged into one.
Sharon Edmundson: One blur of technical difficulties.
Matt Edmundson: Yeah, pretty much it really. But they seem to be working fine at the moment. Whether they carry on working? You're gonna have to stay tuned to find out. So yeah, say hi in the comments. Let us know where you're watching from. Always nice to connect with new people. And tonight we have That's your cue, by the way.
Sharon Edmundson: Oh, we have me speaking. You've got double me tonight. I'm not sure whether to say you're welcome, or say I'm [00:03:00] sorry, I'm not sure. Yeah, I'm doing the talk tonight. I think it's your welcome. About faithfulness. And usually we try to have a different host on to the people that are speaking, but there was some last minute changes, so I'm filling in.
Matt Edmundson: Yes, clash of timetables.
Sharon Edmundson: It does mean that I actually, the amount of things that I didn't get to put in the talk, I can talk about now. Yeah,
Matt Edmundson: it's not a bad thing actually, is it? Because you do get that extra space to go, oh, we didn't talk about this, we didn't talk about that. And it also means you don't have to swap up for the
Sharon Edmundson: Yes.
Yeah, because normally if it's someone else speaking, I like to listen to it first and think about it, make some notes. Yeah, I had to do that this time. Yeah, very good. Although actually I have got some notes. You've still got notes? Yeah.
Matt Edmundson: Oh, I love that. Love that. And so yeah, so we have got double Sharon tonight, which is just a beautiful thing, really.
So yes, good to see you. Good to see you in the comments, ulaurence18. Great that you're here. Lala says two of, two of my two favorite people in the world. I assume she's [00:04:00] talking about us.
Sharon Edmundson: Okay, cool. Not me and me. Me hosting, me speaking, I don't know. Yeah,
Matt Edmundson: I'm gonna go with that. No, I'm gonna go with that.
It's probably more accurate. Sorry to presume there that I might be on the list. Actually, it's just, it's double. Sharon, my two favourite people in the world. Answer me before I can understand why. And yeah. It's making
Sharon Edmundson: my eyes water now from the laughing.
Matt Edmundson: Okay, we've got tissues over here. You'll get emotional.
We've got tissues. It's fine. So yes, very warm welcome to you. So we're going to get into the talk. As we play the talk, feel free to write your questions, your thoughts, your stories your just whatever, write it in the comments to keep it clean. And yeah, we're going to get into that in Conversation Street, what we call Conversation Street, which comes after the talk where we get to talk about the talk and Sharon gets to include all the bits.
Sharon Edmundson: That's the thing about these talks, like you start off with what seems like a really small subject, and then the more you look into it and look up the [00:05:00] Bible, it just goes whoosh, and you're like, oh, what do I put in? What do I not put in?
Matt Edmundson: Yeah, no, it's fair play. And the topic's faithfulness, isn't it?
So yeah, it's a pretty big topic to try and cover in 20 minutes, to be fair. It's more like a sort of a 10 week series, isn't it really, that you get to do, but never mind. We're going to do it in 20 minutes. Was it 20 minutes? How long was your talk? No
Sharon Edmundson: idea.
Matt Edmundson: We're going to find out real quick. Grab your notebooks, grab your pens, we're going to play the talk.
Sharon and I will be back after this. Here we go.
Sharon Edmundson: When my maternal grandfather died, as a family, we were looking for people to talk at his funeral. My uncle, one of his sons, said he would talk, but it was difficult to find anyone else willing. Some family members were not confident talking in public, especially when grieving, which is understandable.
Others were perhaps not sure what to say about someone so eccentric and at times puzzling and [00:06:00] difficult to connect with. I volunteered, as a few years before he died, I'd interviewed my grandad about his life story on a number of occasions, and during this time I'd come to understand a little bit about why he was the way he was.
And I'd come to a place where I really loved and respected him and actually marveled at how well he'd done in life, in spite of the things that had happened to him. This included being evacuated from Dunkirk during the Second World War, along with over 338, 000 other soldiers. One of the characteristics that I admired so much about my grandad and talked about at his funeral was his faithfulness.
Since he'd first given his life to the Lord, he'd been faithful to God and since he'd married my nan, he'd been faithful to her, sticking with her through the hard times as well as the good. He'd also supported her when she went to train for church ministry when she was in her 50s, at a time when women really didn't do that.
My nan also [00:07:00] had the same characteristic of faithfulness and when my granddad died, he and my nan had been married for over 70 years. And several years before she died, my Nan commented that the they were only successful in their marriage because of the grace of God. Their faithfulness in marriage was a result of their faithfulness in a faithful God.
In case you hadn't already guessed, today we're going to talk about faithfulness. The talk is based on this passage from Galatians 5. But the fruit of the Spirit is love. Joy, Peace, Patience, Kindness, Goodness, Faithfulness, Gentleness and Self Control. Against such things there is no law. The Greek word for faithfulness used here is translated as faith for most passages in the New Testament, but this is one of the few verses where the translation of faithfulness makes sense, though I think there is a link between faith and faithfulness.
We are [00:08:00] going to ask, what is faithfulness? Is it just about hanging on through gritted teeth through, through thick and thin, or is it more than this? We're currently in a series about wholeness. I'm gonna look at how being on the receiving end of God's faithfulness makes us whole, and what effect does our faithfulness have on others?
I'm also gonna give some examples of what being faithful looks like in everyday life. So the dictionary defines faithful as remaining loyal and steadfast, being true to the facts or the original, and being steadfast in affection or allegiance. Faithful people are true to their word, promises, beliefs and commitments, and as a result, they are dependable, trustworthy and honest.
They can be counted on in good times and bad. Now a talk on faithfulness sounds like it should be a simple thing. It could go something like this, God is faithful and he wants us to be faithful to him and other people. And that's true, but there is so much [00:09:00] depth to this subject as hopefully you'll see.
So let's start by looking at the faithfulness of God. Lamentations 3 says, The steadfast love of the Lord never ceases. His mercies never come to an end. They are new every morning. Great is your faithfulness. These verses were probably written by the Prophet Jeremiah. The verses before these are a poetic outpouring of emotion to God by Jeremiah about the awful things the Prophet was suffering.
He certainly didn't hold back in describing how he felt. He talks about how he feels shut out and afflicted by God. But he says it's calling to mind God's love, mercy and faithfulness that give him hope for the future. If you're going through a tough time right now, you might find it helpful to read the whole chapter of Lamentations 3.
If you don't have a Bible, you can just look it up online. Sometimes, it can help a lot to realise that someone else understands how we [00:10:00] feel, especially if that someone can help us look beyond ourselves and our situation to God. I want to look at two aspects of God's faithfulness. One, he is faithful to his word, and two, he is faithful to his people.
So let's look at the first of these, God's faithfulness to his word. Now God can't lie. He doesn't just tell the truth, He is the truth. So when He says something, He means it. He doesn't change with the wind. He's not one thing one minute and something different the next. He's not faithful one time but not another.
James 1 says every good gift and every perfect gift is from above. Coming down from the Father of Lights, with whom there is no variation or shadow due to change. And Isaiah 40 says, The grass withers, the flowers fade, but the word of our God will stand forever. As Christians, we believe that Jesus is one of the three persons of the one [00:11:00] God.
The Bible says this about Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, today and forever. Because God is faithful by nature he'll always do what he says. If he makes a promise he keeps it, not just sometimes but always. Now many times I've heard people talk about their experience growing up with a parent who's unstable and volatile.
One minute that parent might lash out in anger or withhold affection for no apparent reason, the next they can act all loving. They make promises but go back on their promises. You can't really trust what they say. One of the effects of this kind of parenting is that the child grows up extremely anxious.
They never know quite what they're going to get. And when you live with that baseline level of anxiety and insecurity, it's hard to thrive and live up to your full potential. You're never quite sure if your parent is going to carry through on their word or back you up when you need it. God is the opposite of this.
He's always faithful and he's always [00:12:00] motivated by love. Because he's faithful to his word, we can trust his promises. He promises to forgive us. He promises that he hears our prayers, that he guides us, that he has a plan for us. God's is God's faithfulness to his people is the second aspect that I want to talk about.
This is a theme that runs through the Bible, but who are God's people? How would you answer that question? In one sense, we're all God's people and that we're all created by him and loved by him. However, the Bible tells us a different definition of who God's people are. Long ago, the Bible tells us that most of the population of the earth had turned away from God and his ways and were doing their own evil things.
So God decided to leave them to it, but to create a people that he could call his own. To do this, he started by choosing one man, Abram. Abram didn't have any children, as his wife, Sarah, couldn't have any kids, but [00:13:00] God changed Abram's name to Abraham, which means Father of Many Nations, and he made Abraham some promises.
He promised him land, so many descendants that they would be hard to count, blessings for him and his descendants, and blessings for all the nations through him. Abraham asked God how he could be sure that God would keep his promise. God chose to use a common practice of everyday life in the ancient Near East to illustrate his commitment.
The practice was blood covenant and blood covenants were serious things. They were about being one or being bound to one another permanently for a common purpose. First terms of the covenant were agreed. There'd be blessings for keeping the covenant and curses for breaking the An animal would be cut in half and the halves arranged opposite each other.
Then a representative from each party would remove their sandals and walk through the blood, which had pooled between the pieces. It was a [00:14:00] symbolic way of saying, may I become like this dead animal if I break my commitment in the covenant. Now today we sign contracts with one another for various things, but we often try to wiggle out of them if they become inconvenient to us.
A covenant was to the death. But there was something different about God's covenant with Abraham. Instead of God and Abraham both walking through the blood between the pieces of animal, God puts Abraham into a deep sleep and then the Bible says this, When the sun set and it became dark, behold, there was a smoking oven and a fiery torch that passed between these pieces.
The smoking oven and the fiery torture to do with God's presence. God is the only one to walk through the blood. God is the only one who guarantees the responsibilities of both parties. As people, we can be unreliable, even when we've got good intentions. All Abraham had to do was believe God. And this is such a powerful symbol of God's [00:15:00] faithfulness, of how much God is on the side of his people.
Steadfast in affection and allegiance, as the definition says. God is faithful to his people. Now, God miraculously gave Abraham and Sarah a son, Isaac. The covenant was then passed to Isaac, and then to his son Jacob, and then to his descendants, who are the people of Israel, even to this day. Throughout the Old Testament, Israel is referred to as God's people.
No other people groups were his people. How is this relevant to us today? Part of the covenant was that God would bless all the nations through Abraham, so that includes all of us. This was fulfilled when God himself came to earth in human form. A human who was a descendant of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob.
This descendant was Jesus. So how did this bless all nations? Jesus made a new covenant. This covenant wasn't just for the Jewish people but for all people. Jesus spent three [00:16:00] years talking about the terms of the covenant. So when he says things like, you've heard it said such and such. But I say to you, he was laying down the new covenant.
We learned how covenants had a sacrifice. Jesus died a horrible death on the cross as a sacrifice for us. As he was both human and God, he was able to represent both parties. God has done his part in making this covenant and extends an invitation to all of us to join him in it. We're told to count the cost of entering into a covenant with God.
The cost is that we're no longer our own. We belong to God and make him king of our lives. We no longer live our own way, we live for our covenant partner. He promises to be our God and we promise to be his people, separated to him. God is faithful to his people. With a covenant like this, you use your strength to cover the other's weakness.
What they are missing, you make up for. [00:17:00] The definition of wholeness we're using in this series is nothing missing and nothing broken. With a covenant that God has with his people, he uses his strength. on our behalf so that we're not missing anything. God's faithfulness to his people brings wholeness. I started this talk by telling you about the faithfulness of my Grandad to God and to his marriage to my Nan.
Can you think of anyone you know who has a fantastic marriage? The reason I ask is because the closest illustration we have to the covenant God wants to have with us Marriage is an excellent marriage. In the Bible, the covenant relationship of God with his people is portrayed as a marriage in which the Lord is the husband and the people of God are his bride.
In the New Testament, marriage is meant to reflect something of Christ and his church. Earthly Christian marriage is symbolic of a higher spiritual truth. So a good marriage is meant to be entered into by [00:18:00] choice, by both parties. It's meant to be based on love, where each person is committed to pouring out their love.
and resources to the other person. It's meant to be for life. This is a very different image to what many people have about the Christian life where it's seen as just having to try to be good to please an angry God. It's not like that at all. God wants each of us to be his and he wants to be ours but he won't force it because his kingdom is based on love and you can't force love.
The opportunity to be his people is open to all of us, but we have to accept the invitation. So what will you do with that invitation? Is faithfulness about hanging on with gritted teeth? Hopefully by now you're getting the picture that being a Christ follower doesn't mean we have to try to be faithful through lots of self effort and self improvement.
That's not it at all. The Christian life is about a loving, faithful relationship with God, not a self improvement program. [00:19:00] In the verses before the ones that talk about the fruits of the Spirit, it says this, So I say, walk by the spirit and you will not gratify the desires of the flesh, for the flesh desires what is contrary to the spirit, and the spirit what is contrary to the flesh.
They're in conflict with each other, so that you are not to do whatever you want, but if you're led by the spirit, you're not under the law. In other words, if we choose to hang out with God and cooperate with his spirit in us, The good fruits that we've been talking about over the last few weeks, including faithfulness, will automatically develop in us.
But instead of cooperating with God, we can choose to give in to our old desires, and that produces a different kind of fruit. That fruit is also described in Galatians, it says, The acts of the flesh are obvious, sexual immorality, impurity and debauchery, idolatry and witchcraft, hatred, discord, jealousy, fits of rage, selfish [00:20:00] ambition, dissensions, factions and envy, drunkenness, orgies and the like.
I warn you, as I did before, that those who live like this, will not inherit the kingdom of God. I know which fruit I'd rather have in my life. So what does faithfulness look like in everyday life? Here are some examples for you. So our oldest son Josh, who's just finished a master's at uni, told me a story about how God's faithfulness helped him.
He said that a while ago he was feeling really stressed about all the work he had to do for uni. He had, he feared failing and not doing well. He said, So he prayed about it, and he had this strong impression that he was focusing on the wrong thing. He felt as though God was saying to him to focus on him, on God, that even if he failed, God was still on his side.
God was still for him, as in the definition of faithfulness said, God is faithful in his affection and allegiance. [00:21:00] That the consequences of failing in his studies were not as dramatic as he feared they would be, He says that he had, has had peace since that time, and just this great awareness of God's presence, even when doing simple things like the washing up.
If God is for you, who can be against you? The Bible tells us that we're God's image bearers, which mean we have inherent value just by being human. It also means that we're to rule the earth on God's behalf, following his ways. So just as God is faithful to us, we're to be faithful to him and to others.
Just as God's faithfulness and commitment to us make us feel loved and secure, and makes up for our own weaknesses, that's the effect that passing on his faithfulness produces in others. Bethany, who's a uni student who goes to the same church as us in Liverpool, was telling me about her mum's faithfulness and unwavering commitment to her over the years.
Bethany's suffered from severe migraines for years, and when she gets migraines, she's unable to do [00:22:00] anything. She missed school and sixth form on many occasions because of them, and it was her mum who stood up for her and advocated for her in school. It was her mom who looked after her and believed the amount of pain she was in.
It was her mom who drove five hours to Liverpool through snow, when Bethany had such a severe migraine at uni that she was hospitalized, I asked Bethany how her mom's unwavering commitment and faithfulness faithfulness to her made her feel and she said it made her feel so loved. When we are faithful to others, it can help them feel loved and protected.
We all need someone in our corner. How much more does God's love have that effect on us when we fully grasp it? Our son Josh gave me another example of how his friend's faithfulness affected him. When he was writing his dissertation, two of his friends kept checking in on him to see if he was okay. They also proofread his 10, 000 words scientific project report and gave him feedback.
One of his friends wasn't [00:23:00] even interested. Josh said he felt relieved to have other people check his work, and felt like someone was in his corner. They helped him get out of his head, as by then he wasn't able to see what was what after working on the same thing for weeks. I relate to that. In my own life, there are several women who've come into my life over the years who I've connected with.
They've all made commitments to God at some point in life, but things have been difficult for them. And when we meet up, they always want to meet up again. But they've got so much going on that often doesn't happen. Now knowing how God is faithful to me, even when I'm not faithful to him, I've kept praying for them and sending them encouraging messages over the years, letting them know that I'm still here for them.
A few weeks ago, one of them sent me a message full of all the difficult things that have been happening in her life, but at the end she said, thank you for not giving up on me. Sometimes being faithful to God means turning down work or opportunities. [00:24:00] Years ago a company approached Matt asking him to do some work for them.
He turned them down because it was a porn website, and whose values were obviously incompatible with serving God. Passing on God's faithfulness means keeping our word. It means doing what we say we'll do, turning up when we say we'll turn up, which in turn means saying no to something so that we're not overloaded.
It means no to over committing. Obviously, there are some times when there are things beyond our control that happen, which means that we can't do that. But on the whole, We should be people that stick to our word. To finish, I have some questions for you. I've talked about what faithfulness is. My question to you is, what do you think the Bible says faithfulness is not?
Also, do you have any examples from your own life of how the faithfulness of God or the faithfulness of people has affected you? Because God's faithful to his word and to his people, if you are one of God's people, [00:25:00] does that mean everything will go smoothly and you won't have any problems? If you're a Christ follower, in what areas do you need God's covenant strength and faithfulness now?
And are you faithful in your commitment to him? If you're not currently a Christ follower, what do you think about God's offer of being in a covenant relationship with him? Will you take it up? Will you take him up on it? I'm going to leave you now with these beautiful verses about God's faithfulness from Exodus.
They say, the Lord, the compassionate and gracious God, Slow to Anger, Abounding in Love and Faithfulness, Maintaining Love to Thousands, and Forgiving Wickedness, Rebellion and Sin.
Matt Edmundson: Welcome back. Faithfulness, great talk.
Sharon Edmundson: Oh, it's very weird seeing you take notes as I'm speaking. Why is that weird? I don't know, you just don't normally do it, do you, when you're
Matt Edmundson: talking? That's true. Sitting around the [00:26:00] kitchen table, just taking notes as you talk. Yeah, it's not going to work out well, is it?
No. So I was definitely taking notes on that one because it's a great talk. We're going to get into faithfulness. I want to start off with the question you asked at the end. What does the Bible say that faithfulness is not? Because that was actually in your original notes. It
Sharon Edmundson: was.
Matt Edmundson: And you obviously took it out.
Sharon Edmundson: I did, I think because you suggested because it was getting a bit long. It's like you need to stop somewhere. Yeah. Yeah.
Matt Edmundson: Yeah. So what, how would you answer that? I
Sharon Edmundson: think faithfulness isn't putting up with what the Bible would call sin, which is where we're missing the mark, our rebellion, all that kind of stuff.
So if I guess for the example of a marriage, if you're in a marriage with somebody and they are doing all sorts of things they shouldn't be doing, it doesn't mean that you put up with those because The Gospels very much doesn't just say that those things don't matter. It's the complete opposite of that.
It's saying actually these [00:27:00] things do matter and they're very serious. So I think that was one of the main things that I had in mind. Did any more come to mind for you?
Matt Edmundson: Very good question. What is faithfulness not? So it's not putting up with, like you say, sin or nonsense. Cause I've heard.
Like people who have been in abusive relationships, for example they stay in that relationship because they want to be faithful to their marriage vows, their spouse. I appreciate that very quickly. We've just got into a very gray, dark area. And it's certainly not very simple, but I don't think that's what faithfulness means.
And I don't think how would I not describe it? I don't think faithfulness is without doubt. I don't think faithfulness is without question. I don't think faithfulness is always, I don't think faithfulness is always clear. I don't think faithfulness always knows what the next step is. I don't know, I could go on.
Are these answering your [00:28:00] questions?
Sharon Edmundson: Yeah yeah.
Matt Edmundson: Yeah, have I missed one? Have I missed like I'm probably
Sharon Edmundson: not that I can think of, but it's like I said at the beginning, as soon as you start on these concepts, they like each point becomes massive and you could end up discussing each thing for a long
Matt Edmundson: time.
You could, you really could. So in that talk, then you obviously mentioned Covenant. Let's just talk about that a little bit because I think for people listening, if they've Maybe it's the first time to crowd, maybe first time really to any kind of church thing. It's not a word we throw around these days, is it?
Sharon Edmundson: It's something that in the past I've studied quite a lot and when I studied it, I was like, wow, this is mind blowing. Yeah. Just I think because of the strength of the commitment that God shows through covenant to his people, it's just wow. It's like I said, it's not just sign on the page and maybe I'll wiggle out of it.
It's like the point where God comes as a human willing to give up his life for us. Yeah. And it's [00:29:00] As well, the whole thing of Covenant it's throughout the whole Bible, but it's easy to miss from focusing on the individual bits as if you give an analogy of a wood, say if you spend so much time focusing on in each individual tree or oh, that's an oak tree and that's a whatever tree, you can miss the fact that it's actually part of a bigger picture.
Yep. And I think that's like when I started on faithfulness, I was thinking, oh, yeah, just, like I said, and then I was like, Oh my goodness, this is actually part of Covenant. So it rang bells from what I'd studied in the past. And it's actually, I've forgotten so much of this. But it was very life changing when I first studied it.
And it's like, how easy is it to forget all this stuff? Yeah,
Matt Edmundson: no, it is totally. You're right. It is very straight. It's not very straightforward to forget. It's, I think life just happens, doesn't it? And it has this ability where You, I think you, I don't know. It feels like you can go on autopilot. Do you know what I mean?
[00:30:00] Yeah, I don't know if you've experienced this guys, but you can just go on autopilot and you have lots of good intentions. We probably reset the start of the new year. And before you know it, the next New Year's arrived. And before you know five years has then gone past since actually that encounter, that was quite life changing in many ways.
Sharon Edmundson: And I think partly as well. God is so huge, and my brain's very small, and it feels a bit like, when you grasp something new, it's like something else pops out, and it's I can't quite hold it all in my head together, because it's just massive.
Matt Edmundson: Yeah. Yeah, it is. It is. It's a big deal. So let's get into it then.
And so what were some of the things about Covenant that were a big deal for you, that when you were studying faithfulness, that reconnected? So let's maybe start with the basics. Let's start with what is covenant? Why was it so impactful to you? And why in this talk?
Sharon Edmundson: Yeah, so in the talk, I mentioned certain aspects of the covenant making [00:31:00] process.
So there was the whole, the bit before the covenants made, like you're agreeing what the terms are for each party okay, I'm agreeing this. And we agree in that. Then there were other parts where covenants people would swap, like representative for each party would swap cloaks and they would swap weapons.
And it's very symbolic of saying Where you've got needs, I will provide for you and where you've got enemies, I will fight on your behalf. But then when you come to all this stuff in the New Testament about Jesus and it talks about Paul in one of his letters says, when I'm weak, then I'm strong.
And it's that whole concept of our covenant Partner, God, covering our weaknesses with his strength. So it's like that whole thing of, Oh, I don't need to worry if I've not got it all together. And I've not, I'm not this and I'm not that. I don't have to be all those things because God makes up the gap.
So it's partly that [00:32:00] and partly that strength of commitment.. And there's another bit in Romans where it talks about It says that if God has given us all things, if God has given us Jesus, how will he not also give us all things? So he's already given us the most precious, important thing.
So anything else we need it's yeah, of course you can have that. Yeah. Yeah, so it was just like, wow, that's amazing.
Matt Edmundson: And it's super powerful stuff, isn't it? Because I think one of the things that we don't talk about in the modern world it's covenant. I don't, it's a word I rarely hear in the world as it stands.
I hear the word contract.
Sharon Edmundson: Yeah.
Matt Edmundson: I hear the word agreement. I hear binding contract, because it's a binding contract is more important than a contract. Obviously isn't. But do you know what I mean? I hear these sorts of phrases, very legal terms, but covenant. The Bible split into two covenants, isn't it?
The Old Covenant, the New Covenant, and covenant just means Testament or Testament means covenant, same thing, New Testament, Old Testament, New Covenant, Old Covenant, same thing. [00:33:00] And so the New Covenant, which the Bible says, which is established on better promises, is obviously talking about the life of Jesus.
Now, the reason this is important is because I think because in the West, we don't know what a covenant is really, it's easy, then to not fully grasp The topic of faithfulness because we've never experienced maybe the faithfulness of a covenant or we've never stuck yet. We've never stuck or been faithful to a covenant.
If that makes sense.
Sharon Edmundson: Yeah. And like I said that marriage is seen as like symbolic of this is what that covenant looks like. But I think for many people, because there are so many broken relationships, you may not necessarily have actually seen that in action. So the thing that's meant to be there to show us a little bit, give us a little glimpse, actually, people have not had that glimpse.
Yeah. Yeah.
Matt Edmundson: Yeah, it's very true. Very true.
Sharon Edmundson: But again, I feel like just even like doing this [00:34:00] talk, it's oh there's so much here. And you're like, I can see little bits of the picture, but I can't quite grasp all of it because it is so big. Yeah, so it's made me want to study it again to try and understand again.
Matt Edmundson: That's a good thing. That's what you want to happen.
Sharon Edmundson: It is. There are so many things that are in that box.
Matt Edmundson: Yeah, no doubt. No doubt. So this idea then of covenant and the reason why we keep using this word important is because it is. Like you said, the idea of marriage was meant to model that, although when we got married, we didn't exchange weapons.
Sharon Edmundson: No, we didn't. Missed one there.
Matt Edmundson: Totally missed that. Not
Sharon Edmundson: sure I had any to swap.
Matt Edmundson: Maybe we should redo our vows and exchange weapons. It's an idea. Yeah. But it's an interesting one, isn't it? Because I think to be committed to something unto death. is a hard thing to grasp because it I think there's lots of questions that come up in your head.
What if this happens? What if that happens?
Sharon Edmundson: Yeah.
Matt Edmundson: But this [00:35:00] is when you flip that around and go actually, God is faithful to his word. And he has sealed this in a blood covenant. So the only way out of this, in theory, then would be for the death of God. That I think is mind blowing. Do you know what I mean?
That actually, God is so committed to this that it is the only way out of it would be for him to die. Which is all a bit radical, isn't it really?
Sharon Edmundson: Yeah. Just trying to get your head
Matt Edmundson: around that and what that means is quite tricky. And trying to mull that over, it's almost a bit like, can God make a stone so heavy you can't lift it?
But it's that kind of question, that kind of reasoning, which makes you actually start to get to grips with God is faithful. He is covenant faithful to his word, to his promises and to his people. And fundamentally, bringing it back to wholeness starts, with that understanding. Now is it easy [00:36:00] to understand? No, is it easy to believe?
Not always, and this is why we call it the walk of faith, isn't it, in many ways, but it's fundamental, isn't it, to this whole topic.
Sharon Edmundson: And I think with the whole wholeness link was that for me, the thing that came out to me was where I'm lacking. God actually brings that wholeness to me and the whole linking that back again to swapping clothes, it, there's verses in Corinthian, yeah, Corinthians, which talks about God made him who had no sin, Jesus, to become a sin for us so that we could become the righteousness of God.
So it's like swapping, Jesus swaps his float of righteousness and swaps it with our sin, all the stuff that we, the rubbish from our lives. And again, it's just very powerful imagery when you think of the whole covenant thing.
Matt Edmundson: Yeah, it is. A Whole Covenant, Whole, we talked when we started the series on wholeness, the first episode, we talked about this concept of substitution.
And actually, [00:37:00] that was the verse we looked at, who knew no sin was made sin for us that we in him, we might become the righteousness of God. And it's if you haven't watched it, go back and watch the very first I almost said episode. Go back and watch the first live stream we did on the topic of becoming whole.
It's on the website, www. crowd. church. You can go and find that. And we talk a lot about this concept because it is so radical and so important to being whole. I don't think you can be whole without understanding what that means. And I don't think, for listening to you talk, I don't think actually we can be whole without understanding.
We don't have to be able to fully grasp it. I don't think we have to be able to.
Sharon Edmundson: I definitely don't. Yeah. And it's not like we've not got questions.
Matt Edmundson: But fundamentally, you have a belief, because we've been married a while. And I figured this out, that God is ultimately faithful.
Sharon Edmundson: Yeah.
Matt Edmundson: So how do you reconcile that?
And this [00:38:00] is a question we like to ask on Crowd, the awkward questions because we say that God is faithful to his word, faithful to his people, faithful to his covenant, faithful to his promises. Doesn't always look like it.
Sharon Edmundson: No, that's the I think the whole thing of suffering comes in here because I think we have the expectation of if God is on my side and he's for me and all that why have I got all these things going on?
And I think it is a really difficult question because it's not just mentally but emotionally because the stuff we go through just really gets to us. Oh, this is one that people I think have mulled over, talked over, have lots of answers. Yeah, I think I'm definitely not going to give all the answers to that now, but I think part of it is that God's, like his promises, they are, they span from the beginning until the end of time.
So the show's not over yet. [00:39:00] So there is that sense of we're in this middle ground when everything's not as it will be. But at some point God promises that he will make everything as it should be, how it was intended in the beginning. And also that a weapon is not used. When we talked about swapping weapons are not used in peacetime.
They're used because of war, because of stuff that comes against you. So there is that sense of, while we're on earth, there is going to be that battle stuff's going to happen. And I don't think we're always going to know why. I'd love to know why, but I
Matt Edmundson: don't. It would make life a little bit easier in a lot of ways.
But I think, It's not that difficult times don't happen. It's just that God is faithful in those difficult times.
Sharon Edmundson: Yeah, and that he promises. There's Psalm 23, which I think, even if you're not necessarily familiar with Christianity, you may have heard where it talks about the Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want.
And there's a bit in it, which talks about even when I go through the valley of the shadow of death, I won't fear because you're with me. And it's when this stuff is crowding [00:40:00] in all around and you're just like, it's even those times God's there, we might not be able to see him or feel him, but he promises to be there.
Matt Edmundson: Absolutely. Yeah, absolutely. God is faithful. And it's, listen, sometimes they're just darn easy answers. No. And sometimes we don't, in this side of eternity, we don't always understand why. But I think God does. And I think at some point, Paul said it this way, he said, we know in part we prophesy in part, but in time we just don't know everything right now.
We know in part, but in the fullness of time everything gets revealed, doesn't it? And we start to see things in eternity. And this is why eternity is such a powerful thing. 'cause the things can take me a while to figure a few things out. Yeah. And and so I quite, I find it quite difficult sometimes, but at the same time, you've got to just go, I don't always understand why.
And I'm, it's not that I'm okay with that, but I can move on not understanding why, [00:41:00] because God is faithful.
Sharon Edmundson: Yeah. And I think whatever worldview that you have, or you believe to be the truth, it's like nobody in any of those worldviews has all the answers, all of it, no matter. What your beliefs are, there are things that you don't actually know.
And I think it's for me, it's what, where does most of this stuff, where is the evidence leading? And I'm not going to know everything, but I've got enough to think actually, yeah, I believe this is true. Yeah. And it's reminded me actually something that I did want to put in the talk.
Which I've found fascinating. I've been watching YouTube videos by a biblical archaeologist called Joel Kramer. I think it is more recent stuff, which is just so well done. Yeah, you love it, don't you? I do. But I love all this, where you've got with the Bible, you've got the archaeology, you've got the historical stuff, you've got poetry.
It's just so rich. But anyway, he did a YouTube video about Babylon, ancient Babylon and [00:42:00] talks about how it used to be this amazingly prosperous city full of like amazing buildings and all sorts and then God prophesied against it in these prophecies in the Bible because of the evil things that they're doing.
I can't remember the backstory, but anyway, and there's a prophecy, which basically says this city is going to be completely destroyed. And it says it's from Jeremiah 50 and it says, so desert creatures and hyenas will live there and the owl will dwell there. It will never again be inhabited or lived in from generation to generation.
And in this video, he shows you the outline of where the ancient city of Babylon was. And to this day, nobody lives there. But the animals that are mentioned in Jeremiah here, and this, there's another another section of the Bible also talking about that, which mentions a couple of other animals. They are all living there, and I'm just like, wow, it's amazing.
Matt Edmundson: It is interesting. Again, [00:43:00] God is faithful to his word and we were starting to stray a little bit into the curse of God, which is, I think that's a whole topic for a whole other day. Yeah.
Sharon Edmundson: The verses I ended with actually did then. It's like the flip side of this, but again, it was like, I can't just end on that because then that's another whole thing to talk about.
Yeah, you've really got to pare down and choose what you, yeah, you
Matt Edmundson: have big old thing to get into that side of things, that's for sure. But it's totally true, God is faithful to his word. Now, Andy's put here in the comments love, it bears all things, believe all things, endures all things.
Let me put that in that little screen there. Love, it bears all things, believe all, which is from 1 Corinthians 13, if my theological memory, my Bible memory is correct. I think that's 1 Corinthians 13. And that talks about how love is faithful. Yeah. Believes all things, bears all things endures all things.
Yeah. And that, I think, that's a good description of what faithfulness is really from a biblical point of view. It
Sharon Edmundson: comes out of [00:44:00] love. Yeah. It's part of love. Yeah.
Matt Edmundson: Yeah. And they work together, don't they? That love is not fleeting. Love is faithful. Yeah. And that was,
Sharon Edmundson: sorry, that was one that I think I mentioned it, but one of the things that I noticed when I was looking up all the verses about faithfulness, that they often in the same verse, it paired it with love, right?
And it was like, Oh, yeah, that's actually really cool. Because you don't want it to be, you don't want faithfulness to be paired with something negative in a sense, do you like I'm going to be faithfully horrible to you?
Matt Edmundson: Some people have taken that to a whole new extreme, I feel. But no, I think you're right.
Can love exist without faithfulness? It's a really this we're starting to get very deep now very, very deep in our thinking. But it's an interesting thing, isn't it that love, I think, requires in some respects, faithfulness, which is why I think when Paul's talking in those verses, love endures all things, bears all things, etc.
He is reaching into definitions of other things like love is gentle, and [00:45:00] he's bringing it all together, because all of these things that we talk about, like with faithfulness, actually, love is faithful, because you can't, I don't think you can separate the two, I think, yeah, you're aware. We've done all right.
We've been married 26 years. You've not killed me yet, which is a miracle, ladies and gentlemen. But, love, marriage is good because of the faithfulness. We've been through a few things. I've been around the block a few times. And the fact that faithfulness, I think, gives the foundation in some respects to love, doesn't it?
Sharon Edmundson: Yeah. And yeah, and faithfulness does mean saying no to certain things, because
Matt Edmundson: you never say no to me.
Sharon Edmundson: That wasn't really what I was meaning. Yeah, to be in this relationships, have a relationship that works to be separated to each other. Yeah, if we're being separated to God, it means that I say no [00:46:00] to dating other guys and it means no to just living life as an individual because we become one.
So you have to be considerate of the other person. Yeah. Yeah,
Matt Edmundson: that's true. It's true. Yeah. You're right. So being faithful, being loving is knowing what you're saying yes to, and by consequence know what you're saying no to. The opportunity cost, as we like to call it in modern economics, the opportunity cost.
And I think it's, so if I think, I've not really thought this through, if I work that round the other way, when God said yes to his people, when God said yes to being faithful to his word, he said no. to a whole bunch of other things, didn't he? And which is an interesting question or an interesting thought to go, I wonder what those were on which I will ponder, because I don't really have any answers.
Miriam says God is awesome. Yes, he is. Do you like my t shirt, Miriam? Sorry, I've got to just got [00:47:00] my Zoe May t shirt here, which says Created Awesome.
Sharon Edmundson: Zoe's our daughter for those who don't
Matt Edmundson: know. Yeah, sorry. Yeah. So Zoe made this t shirt that says Created Awesome on it, which I like to wear.
And I like to tell people, you're awesome. But Miriam said here, God is awesome. My firm foundation. That's an interesting phrase, isn't it? My firm foundation, how that ties in with faithfulness, because again, those two, we, the Bible uses a lot of this kind of language, doesn't it? The foundation which we are stood on is firm.
In other words, it is faithful. It's not going anywhere. And so when you start to, unpack it, you start to see a whole bunch of this stuff, don't you? It's a beautiful thing. It's a beautiful thing. What else did you not talk about in your talk that you wanted to talk about in the non talky
Sharon Edmundson: that was most of it.
I did, I realized I threw in this comment at the beginning of how I think that faith and faithfulness are connected because of that word that in the Greek can be translated as faith or faithfulness. I think my thinking [00:48:00] on what that was, that faith, biblical faith is taking God at his word for what he says about who he is, what we are, who we are, what our purpose is, like all the different aspects of life.
And we can only have faith in that because actually he is worthy of that because he is faithful to what he says. So to me, that was the kind of link. Yeah. Yeah.
Matt Edmundson: Very good. And the clue's in the title, isn't it? Faith. Faithfulness. Full of faith. And I think that's an interesting one when you talk, when you think about, again, the reverse side of this.
Because often when we talk about faith, we're talking about, how much I believe God. How do I believe God and his word and his promises? And that can go down the unhelpful path, which is my faith not big enough? Is that why I'm going through what I'm going through? Which I think rarely is the answer, if I'm honest with you.
But we assume that if I have enough faith, then I will, God will move. [00:49:00] In some respects, that's true. But the Bible then tells us the faith that we have to have is the size of a mustard seed. In other words, it doesn't, it's not what you think it is, but if I then turn that around, and God is faithful to his people, then the faith that God has in his people, and so it's a really interesting thought, isn't it?
Because I am believing in God. But God is also in a lot of ways, believing in me that I will do the right thing. Do you know what I mean? And I will be the person that he has called me to be and he has given me gifts and that he is entrusting. The Apostle Paul put it this way, when he talked about the gospel, he said the gospel has been committed to my trust.
It's like God has trusted me with this and you and that I find quite fascinating. Again, we're getting quite deep.
Sharon Edmundson: Yeah. I've not really thought about this. This is oh, okay. I need to give that one some more thought, I think.
Matt Edmundson: Yeah. Sorry, folks. Going [00:50:00] deep tonight. Want to go deeper. But yeah, talking and thinking about how does God grow his faith in us?
How does he trust us with various different things? I was talking to someone the other day about, the talents. Yeah, you might not know, but there's a story in the Bible which Jesus uses a parable where he gives three, there are three men. One has one talent, one has five, one has 10, I think it is.
And talents was like this chunk of money, basically. I
Sharon Edmundson: think it was a master, wasn't it, giving it to his servants in the parable.
Matt Edmundson: In the parable. So one guy was rich, one guy was middle class, one guy was broke, or didn't have a whole great deal, basically. And the master goes away and then comes back.
And the guy that had 10 talents, he'd more, he doubled it, basically, and when I've gone and invested wisely, here's the 20, the guy that had the five, he'd done the same thing, invested wisely, here's the five, the guy that had the one was just scared, and just hid his talent, hid his gifts, didn't really do anything with it.
And the parable was [00:51:00] eye opening, because Jesus says, the master took what little that guy had, and gave it to the guy that had plenty.
Sharon Edmundson: And
Matt Edmundson: it's quite an in some respects, it's quite a fearful thing. But it's quite an extraordinary thing in the sense that God has entrusted with us a measure, a gift, a talent.
Now, the guy with one might look at the guy with 10 and go why have I not got 10? And I think the point of the parable was not why have you not got 10, but what are you going to do with the one that you've got? Yeah. And actually the one that, you know, with the 10, when the master gave him more.
When the master had more to give, he gave it to him. I trust you with that amount of wealth. I'm entrusting you. And I think sometimes, we've got to prove ourselves in the small things before we can hit the big things, if that makes sense. I
Sharon Edmundson: think it ends with that. Doesn't it? It says who is faithful with little will be given much.
Matt Edmundson: Yeah, it does. Yeah. So start off with something small. [00:52:00] I always remember they used to say to us at Bible school, how can you believe God for a new house when you can't even believe him for a pair of socks, and it was that, don't get me wrong, I'm not saying we should all stop praying for new pairs of socks or new houses, but the principle in effect is I think trusting God in the small things leads to a growth in the big things.
But I think that the other thing is, It's true as well that actually, as we grow in the smaller things, God releases us into the bigger and bigger things. And I think it's quite a remarkable thing, this sort of two way street of faithfulness that we grow in our faithfulness to God. And it's not that God grows in his faithfulness to us, but God entrusts us more and more as we grow in that faithfulness.
Yeah. Does that make sense? Yeah. Have I got that right? Or are you going to slap me later? No.
Sharon Edmundson: As if I'd do that.
Matt Edmundson: As if. That's what happens in our marriage, ladies and gentlemen, when I theologically I'm incorrect. It's not true. It's not true. Before you start writing [00:53:00] in. Yeah, dropping you in there. You're a wonderful wife. I love being married to you. Wow, look at the time. That's flying by.
Sharon Edmundson: I can't actually see it.
Oh,
Matt Edmundson: it's four minutes to seven. Yeah. So next week we are carrying on the conversation about the fruits of the spirit. And I would love to tell you who's speaking, but I genuinely don't know.
Sharon Edmundson: You know who it is? I have no idea
Matt Edmundson: either. Shall I find out? We're great,
Sharon Edmundson: aren't we?
Matt Edmundson: Yeah. You chat away on camera.
I'm going to find out.
Sharon Edmundson: I don't know what to say now.
Matt Edmundson: Just tell everybody why they should subscribe.
Sharon Edmundson: Subscribe. It's great. I could talk about What's The Story. I'm not sure if, as part of the website, we have got a section called What's The Story and it's interviews with different people about their faith journey.
And I think cause I like stories. You like stories. Most people, we like stories, don't we? We do like stories. We I think we tune in a bit better when there are stories going on. Yeah. Yeah, there's loads there. Have a listen.
Matt Edmundson: Do have a listen. You can find out more information at whatsthestorypodcast.
com [00:54:00] or just go to crowd. church and it will be there. Now I'm looking for the schedule. I know, I'm
Sharon Edmundson: not,
Matt Edmundson: I don't know. I'm getting very confused. So next week. Dave Connolly is speaking on gentleness. So yes, that's what's coming up next week. We've got Dave Conn talking about gentleness. So make sure you like and subscribe because it's really good.
Make sure you like and subscribe to crowd wherever you're watching this from wherever you're joining us, because it's going to carry on where it's going to be quite epic. And yeah, if you're listening to the audio version of this podcast, Or the audio, no, the podcast version, which is the audio version of this live stream.
Now we get that very warm welcome to you guys as well. I know that the podcast side of things is growing. And so we have two podcasts, this one, the live stream one, and the one that Sharon mentioned, the What's The Story podcast. All of which, more information can be found on the website, which if I press this button here.
It should come up on the screen, [00:55:00] www. crowd. church or on social media at Crowd Church. Make sure you send us obviously any prayer requests that you have because, man, they have been coming in the last few weeks, which has been great, hasn't it? Yeah, and we sit and we pray for you guys, or sit, stand, whatever, we pray for you guys.
And so it's always good to pray with you. Just get, Andy, can you be trusted with a little before we trust you with more? Yeah, absolutely. Before we trust you with more. So yes, hope you've enjoyed joining us tonight on Crowd Church. It's been great to talk about this. Thanks for doing the talk.
Sharon Edmundson: You're welcome.
Matt Edmundson: Because to be fair, it was a little bit of a battle.
Sharon Edmundson: It was.
Matt Edmundson: Yeah, you had to push through on that one.
Sharon Edmundson: I definitely did. It
Matt Edmundson: was worth it though. She's a legend, isn't she? Big love for Sharon in the comments. She's a legend. But yes, thank you so much for joining us. It's been great chatting to you.
Do come join us next week as we carry on. Dave Connolly talking about gentleness. You're not going to want to miss it. But that's it from me.
Sharon Edmundson: Thanks for joining us.
Matt Edmundson: Yep. That's it from Sharon. All right guys, God bless you, have a great week. Bye for now. Bye. [00:56:00] Thank you so much for joining us here on Crowd Church.
Now if you are watching on YouTube, make sure you hit the subscribe button as well as that little tiny bell notification to get notified the next time we are live. And of course, if you are listening to the podcast, the live stream podcast, make sure you also hit the follow button. Now. By smashing the like button on YouTube or writing a review on your podcast platform, it helps us reach more people with the message that Jesus really does help us live a more meaningful and purposeful life.
So if you haven't done so already, be sure to check out our website, www. crowd. church, where you can learn more about us. As a church, more about the Christian faith and also how to connect into our church community. It has been awesome to connect with you and you are [00:57:00] awesome. It's just a burden you have to bear and hopefully we'll see you next time.
That's it from us. God bless you. Bye for.