Jim Van Gelderen: This is Jim Van Gelderen, and I am podcasting from Cleveland, Tennessee. We are just starting our War of Special Forces, and we’re looking forward to a great week. Have a great start here today in chapel.
I believe God was working in hearts.
I want to talk to you about something that’s kind of fresh with me. On November first, which was Saturday, I knew that was going to be my father’s 101st birthday if he were still living. He went home to be with the Lord when he was 72.
It’s been quite a while that he has been gone, but I often reflect around his birthday on how his life had such an impact on mine and many, many others.
One of the reasons Cleveland, Tennessee, is significant is that my dad spent about four years here as a student at Bob Jones College. Bob Jones College, at the time, was here in Cleveland, Tennessee. I’ve never been to Cleveland other than driving down Interstate 75, so I’ve been struck a little bit being here that this is a town my dad lived in that I’ve really never been to.
As I reflected on my dad’s life, I again am impacted by the fact that he was impacted by people, and they were impacted by people. As you go generationally back, all of us are products—or could we say influenced by—other godly Christians, of whom we owe a tremendous debt of gratitude.
There is one debt we don’t fully realize and may not ever realize, but perhaps in heaven we will, when we begin to grasp how our lives have been touched by godly Christians who were touched by godly Christians who were touched by godly Christians, and so forth.
I think of the verse in 2 Timothy 1:5. The Apostle Paul says to Timothy, “When I call to remembrance the unfeigned faith that is in thee, which dwelt first in thy grandmother Lois, and thy mother Eunice; and I am persuaded that in thee also.” There is some generational faith there: first a grandmother, then a mother, then a son.
Timothy was a preacher that God used in that first century. He impacted others who impacted others, who obviously impacted people all the way down to the present day. All of us are products of that kind of thing.
As I reflected on my dad’s life, I realized that he deeply impacted me with his faith, but he was impacted by other people’s faith—his mother, who was impacted by other people. It goes backwards. Faith is one of those interesting things.
It’s not something that we can physically see. It’s not substantive. It’s not like blood that you can physically give to someone.
It’s something that has to spiritually be born in a heart.
Obviously, the Word of God is the key: “Faith cometh by hearing, and hearing by the word of God.” But often it’s believers who believe the Word and illustrate their confidence in the Word of God who stir us to do the same. As we hear the Word of God preached, as we read it and study it, we are stirred in our hearts to believe God.
Many times we have the examples of other people of faith, and their steps of faith stir us.
As we read the Bible, we are stirred to do what they did—to believe God enough to obey Him, depending on His strength, not ours. That’s a wonderful thing when we have that kind of faith. I want you to think both ways, and I know I’ve talked about this some before: think of those who’ve gone before you and how they’ve impacted you.
My father took many steps of faith. He left the denomination of his youth in his twenties, a decision that could have ruined him. Shortly before he died, he said, “Jim, when I left the denomination of my youth, I thought it was going to ruin me, but it made me.”
He believed God. God led him. He took a step of faith.
It was a tough situation, but God delivered him remarkably, and that framed his life to be a man of faith. That impacted me.
Other steps of faith he took over the years impacted me, but he was impacted by a woman of faith—his own mother. She did not come from particularly the greatest of situations. Her mother was not a Christian for much of her childhood.
Her father was a lay preacher, but there were some issues there. I don’t know all the ins and outs of it, but she made decisions to believe God, to follow God, and she had remarkable answers to prayer throughout her life.
She didn’t have the easiest marriage. I didn’t know my grandfather very well. He was a very sweet man, but he was not very spiritual, and so she was kind of on her own in the spiritual journey that she had.
She took steps of faith herself, but she was influenced because she didn’t get a lot from her own home. Hers came from outside the home, probably like Timothy’s situation.
His grandmother probably started it in the family line, but probably received it from other people. Someone preached to her or talked to her, and she got saved. So it was with my grandmother.
Many preachers would come down to Miami, Florida, in her married days. They would preach down there, particularly in the wintertime. She heard some great preachers, and God stirred her faith.
One of the key ones was S. D. Gordon, who wrote a book called Quiet Talks on Prayer, and it really stirred her about prayer. She became a prayer warrior, and it was what marked her life. I think even my own life is marked by her prayers.
I believe her prayers are still being answered.
I have a great debt of gratitude to the people who touched my father and stirred him to be a man of faith, and who stirred my grandmother to be a woman of faith. I could start naming names, but some of them wouldn’t mean anything to you. Dr. Bob Jones Sr., a great evangelist of yesteryear, was the president of the college my dad attended.
God stirred my dad through his faith-filled, strong preaching. John R. Rice was a blessing to my mother and later to my father—an evangelist of yesteryear who preached courageously and with great power, preaching the Word of God.
All of us can be thankful for this. The first thing is to be thankful for those who have gone before you, and realize that we’re all blessed by people of faith whom God has used in our own hearts to challenge us, to teach us, to encourage us, to exhort us, and to leave us an example of what it means to walk by faith.
Now let’s come to the real takeaway. With Timothy, at that point, he was kind of the end of the line. But in a certain sense, he became the beginning of the line.
That’s how it is for each one of you. Many young people may have folks who came before them—preachers, pastors, parents, youth pastors—who really encouraged their faith. However, now you, as you walk with God and become a man or woman of faith, will impact others.
Sometimes it will be in your family, sometimes outside your family, and then those people will influence others. If the Lord tarries His coming, there will come a day when people will be impacted by you and really not know that you were the one who impacted someone who impacted them, who impacted another, and finally got to them.
Your faith makes a difference. Your unbelief makes a difference. All of us struggle at times with doubting God.
Those are key battles in your life. Don’t get discouraged. Fight back.
Fight the good fight of faith. In other words, get back to a point where you’re resting and putting your confidence in the Word of God and the character of God. That’s how you learn to trust God.
Sometimes, friends, the Christian life is hand-to-hand combat as we’re battling. It’s a battle of faith. Fight the good fight of faith, because our faith is under attack.
When you get hit with the temptation to doubt God or unbelief, don’t cave in. Don’t be passive. Recognize you need to get in the battle.
Get your Bible open, get on your knees, begin to meet with God, and fight that thing through until you’re back on the ground of faith, because your faith matters.
It’s going to touch other people who will touch other people, who will touch other people. Your life is not an island. Every young person hearing me, every old person hearing me: you have people you touch and influence.
You either challenge them to believe God, or in a certain sense you discourage them from believing God by your unbelief.
Be challenged and be thankful for the folks who have come before—men and women of faith who’ve touched you. Be thankful for them, but at the same time, one day will people look back and be thankful for us because we believed God? We fought the good fight of faith.
We dealt with the attack of doubt and unbelief and didn’t just lay down and give up, but fought to believe God again on our knees, meeting with God, knowing the reality of His presence, spending time in His Word, claiming His promises, and getting back to the ground of faith so that others will be touched, who will touch others.
Just as the Apostle Paul encouraged Timothy with the unfeigned, sincere faith that was in his grandmother and mother, we can be encouraged about folks who’ve come before us. But would you be a man or woman of sincere faith, unfeigned faith? Because if you are, you will touch the next generation and stir them to be a man or woman who surrenders to God and depends on His grace.
