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Growing Faith Like a Mustard Seed
August 4, 2026 · 35 min
Ask for faith, feed on Scripture, receive Jesus as the Word, and allow the Holy Spirit to turn belief into obedient works.
Series Russell Gray's Morning Muse August 4, 2026 · 35 min · Russell Gray's Morning Muse
Ask for faith, feed on Scripture, receive Jesus as the Word, and allow the Holy Spirit to turn belief into obedient works. ...more Show the full description Show less Ask for faith, feed on Scripture, receive Jesus as the Word, and allow the Holy Spirit to turn belief into obedient works.
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Faith Like a Mustard Seed: Designed for Exponential Growth 0:03 Welcome to the Morning Muse. I'm Russell Gray here to share with you some thoughts I'm having this morning about faith. I think everybody would agree that faith is pretty darn important, that you wanna have faith, you0:14 wanna grow faith, and that faith is really the secret. Of course, faith alone is not enough. James says faith without works is dead. And so the other part of it is is faith isn't0:26 something you create or manufacture. Faith is a gift. God gives you the gift of faith. You gotta ask for it. You Gotta put yourself in a position to receive it. But once you have it or once you go through that0:37 process, cultivating it, growing it, strengthening it, I think is something that needs to be considered and really practiced. And it's a delicate balance.0:49 In Ephesians chapter 2 verses 8 through 9, I read in the New King James version, for by grace you have been saved through faith. And that faith, not of yourselves, it faith is a1:01 gift of God, not of works, lest anyone should boast. So we don't wanna be bragging about how great our faith is, how much faith we have. I think that we can say that we have the gift of faith. I think every1:13 believer has to have the gift of faith. Right? I don't think that that is like some of the other gifts. Maybe some people have a gift of a lot of faith. I don't know. Right? I don't know how that1:25 works. I just know that I don't wanna be running around bragging about how big my faith is. And, specifically because Paul says here that it is not anything that I've done. It is only what God1:37 gives me. It's a gift. And so then you think about, well, how do you get it? Where does it come from? And Romans 10 17 says, so then faith comes by hearing and hearing by the word of1:49 God. Alright. So that makes a lot of sense and the follow-up to that is how will people hear if they don't preach and that really talks about the great commission. What we're supposed to go do is go into all the nations2:00 and preach the gospel and make disciples. But in this context, it's just I'm just looking at my own life, my own walk, and I'm trying to figure out, like, how do I how do I grow my faith? Well, faith comes by hearing and2:12 hearing by the word of God. So I wanna be in the word of God. But when you really think about the word of God, the Bible has more to say about the word of God than just the words on the paper. John chapter 12:24 verse 1 says, in the beginning was the word with a capital w, and the word, capital w, was with God, and the word was God and the word became flesh2:35 and dwelt among us and we beheld his glory, the glory of the only begotten of the father full of grace and truth. In other words, Jesus is the embodiment of the word.2:47 So if you wanna have faith, it needs to be grown, if you will, by feeding on the word of God. Faith comes by hearing and hearing by the word of God. And who is the word of God?2:59 Jesus. And so that I think is maybe the allegory in communion. Right? We're gonna eat Jesus. We're gonna consume him, consume the word. We're gonna ingest it. It's3:11 going to nourish us. I don't know. But that's kind of the way it seems to me. So the point is, I mean, right from the get go, it's it's asking for faith, recognizing that it's a gift,3:23 that it's going to come through hearing the word of God, and Jesus himself is the word of God. So Jesus is fundamental to having faith. And so there are people that can say they have faith in3:34 God like we see in James, even the demons believe and tremble, but they don't necessarily have faith in Jesus. In fact, they resist Jesus. That's why the name of Jesus is so polarizing3:47 because you've gotta pick. Right? Either you're going to be inside the will of God through a relationship with Jesus Christ or you are gonna be outside of the will of God. You can still believe in God, but are you really3:59 truly obedient to him? I did a muse on that previously. If the will of God is that Jesus should lose none that he's given and that those who believe in him will not4:11 be lost, then Jesus Christ is central to the will of God. You can't be in the will of God. You can't do the will of God if you don't believe in Jesus. And so I think that that just fundamentally has4:23 to be said. And again, maybe some of you were like, no. I'm already there. But for me, even though I was a Christian, even though I understood, I kinda thought I understood, I really didn't understand. And4:35 it's only now in these last maybe year or so of my walk, and I've been at this a long time, is really understanding the preeminence of Jesus. Maybe I'm just a slow learner, but for you4:47 other slow learners out there, I'm sharing in the hopes that it encourages you to really focus your faith on Jesus, the Christ of God, the son of God who came and died that you4:58 might be able to enter in to a relationship with the holy father. And how do you do that? Well, in John chapter 14 verse 26, Jesus says, but the helper, the Holy Spirit, whom the father will5:10 send in my name, in my name, there's that name again, In my name, he will teach you all things and bring to your remembrance all things that I said to you.5:22 And, of course, many of the things that they remembered, they wrote down, and that's how we ended up with the New Testament, which they didn't have when Jesus spoke these words. But I think it's it's more than just the5:33 written word. I think the holy spirit continues to minister and have the word come alive when you read it. At least that's the way it works for me. So I encourage you to do what I have found to work for me,5:45 which is always to pray when you open up your bible that the holy spirit would open the eyes and ears and your heart and mind to understand what you're reading and what it means to you. And that has really helped me in5:57 my bible study and I hope that encourages you. And in John chapter 15 verse 26, Jesus says, but when the helper comes whom I shall send to you from the father, the spirit of truth who6:09 proceeds from the father, he, the Holy Spirit, will testify of me. And so if you're going to believe in Jesus Christ, the Holy Spirit6:21 is who's going to reveal that to you. I believe there was a time where Jesus asked Peter, you know, who do you say I am? And he says, well, you're you're the Christ. You're the Messiah. You're the son of God. And he6:32 said, flesh and blood didn't reveal this to you, but my father in heaven through the Holy Spirit. So the idea again here is that you've got the Holy Spirit, you've got the father, and you've got Jesus Christ.6:44 And the Holy Spirit testifies of Jesus Christ, gives you faith to believe in Jesus Christ who is the word of God. And if you're gonna believe the word, then faith comes by hearing and hearing by the word. So they're all6:55 interrelated, and I have to say I didn't always understand that. So hopefully, this is enlightening to you. And so how do you get the Holy Spirit? Well in Luke chapter 11 verse 13,Faith in Action: Works Perfect Faith 7:07 Jesus is saying, if you then, being evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your heavenly father give the Holy Spirit to those who ask7:19 him? And so asking is super important, and I pray every day that God will grow my faith. I pray every day specifically for abundant, transformative, powerful7:30 faith, and along with a whole host of other things. But it always starts with faith. And I have to say that as I've begun to pray that prayer, God's been answering the prayer, and I have it7:42 all journaled. I write my prayers out, and because I do that, I can go back and look and see how my faith has grown in response to asking and spending time in the7:54 word. And so that practice, that discipline, that desire, it's not work. I mean, I get up every morning and I look forward to it. I look forward to sitting in this chair. I look forward to inviting the Holy8:06 Spirit to fill me and open up my eyes and ears and heart and mind of understanding, and then I open up the word and I spend time in it, and I really enjoy it. And so I know not everybody's like that. I do believe8:18 that God gives you a passion for it. So if you're not there yet, you probably are. If you're listening to something like this, you're probably already there. I'm guessing you are. But just in case you're not, just in8:27 case you're not, just encourage you to just keep doing it, and then what'll happen in time is you'll get hungry for that meal, if you will, to feed on the word of God. You'll you'll get hungry for it, I think.8:39 And, let me know. Let me know what your experience is. Feedback at russell gray dot com. So in Romans chapter 8 verse 9, Jesus says, but you are not in the flesh but in the spirit, if indeed the spirit of8:50 God dwells in you. Now if anyone does not have the spirit of Christ, the spirit of Christ, he is not his. And of course, we want to be him because his is the only name Peter9:02 said in acts. The only name given among men by which we must be saved. And so it's very very important. And so being filled with the spirit very very important. So I think we understand that we wanna be9:14 filled with the Holy Spirit. Then I think the other thing is just understanding when we pray. To me, I perpetually, as I said, pray for more faith. I just can't get enough.9:26 And in Luke chapter 17 verse 5, the apostle said to the Lord, increase our faith. Well, Jesus is explaining some hard things to them and like, wow, Lord, this is hard for us to believe. It's9:38 hard for us to accept. It's hard for us to understand. Please increase our faith. And so I think they led. Even the apostles who were with him and watched his miracles and learned directly from him firsthand. Can you9:49 imagine? They're asking, please increase our faith. How much more should we be praying constantly that God increases our faith? And I can tell you I'm happy that that's a prayer that I've been praying, and I'm happy to10:01 tell you that God's been answering it. So I'm very very encouraged. And that's because faith is powerful. It's very important. And this 1 really spoke to me. So I spent a little bit of time in this study. So Luke chapter10:12 17 verse 6, which is right after verse 5. So the apostle said to the Lord, increase our faith. And in verse 6, the Lord said to them, if you have faith as a mustard seed, you10:24 can say to this mulberry tree, be pulled up by the roots and be planted in the sea and it would obey you. Okay. I'm gonna guess. I don't know. You know, you always have to be careful. I've never seen anybody do that.10:34 I've certainly never experienced that. Is it hyperbole? Is it metaphor? I'm guessing so. But I think the point that he's making is that if you have faith as a mustard seed. So what I hone in on is the mustard seed.10:46 And I think the 1st time when I would read this, I think to myself, oh, well, you know, the mustard seed. Mustard seed is very small. So if I just have a little tiny itty bitty amount of faith, then I can do amazing10:57 things. But I'm not convinced that's what this is saying. What happened is I did another muse and you can go back and look it up where I talked about the kingdom of God. What is the kingdom of God? Right? If I'm gonna11:08 build a business, if I'm gonna have a kingdom business, if I'm going to want to do things and to expand the kingdom of God, what is the kingdom of God? And the kingdom of God, Jesus said, 1 of the11:20 things he said it was, it was like a mustard seed. So I looked at what is a mustard seed. Mustard seed is very very tiny, but it grows very very big and it grows very very big very fast. And the other examples he gave11:31 when he was talking about the kingdom of God, he said the kingdom of God is like a mustard seed. The kingdom of God is like yeast or leaven. The kingdom of God is like seed that is scattered. And so to me, the11:43 1 thing that all those things had in common was growth. So the kingdom of God is growth. So if you have faith as a mustard seed, what is your faith doing? It's growing. And it doesn't11:55 just grow linearly and this is also very important. Just like I don't think the kingdom of god was designed to grow linearly. It was designed to grow exponentially. And so if I'm building a kingdom12:07 business, it needs to be built on an exponential model. So it needs to be a business that is going to interact with people in such a way that they can see, they can feel,12:19 and are attracted to Jesus and the Holy Spirit and the heavenly father. A desire to enter into relationship with God. So you have to have that. And I think a lot of people who are Christians attempt to12:31 have businesses that are like that. But the other piece that I think had been missing a lot for me anyway was the idea of growth and not linear growth, but exponential growth. So if you plant a mustard seed,12:43 it grows very quickly into a big tree, big bush. These things grow 6, 8 feet tall. They're very, very big. They're not technically a tree. They're like this big big bush, but they're big. And then they12:54 produce lots of seeds, and every single 1 of those seeds has the capability to grow another tree with another thousands or millions or however many of seeds each tree has.13:06 And so you can imagine that a few growth cycles, 1 seed becomes many seeds, many seeds becomes many trees, and many trees become many more seeds, become many more trees, become many13:18 more seeds, and you've got this exponential compounding growth. And so when I think about my business model, the business model that I believe the lord gave me and the 1 that I'm constructing right now even as I'm13:29 recording, which is not an easy task. Sometimes I'm overwhelmed. In fact, that's what actually led off this study is I'm looking at this vision and this mission that I believe God has given me, and I'm looking13:41 at it. I'm like, man, lord, this is this is hard. This is big. How am I gonna do this? And I thought to myself, I need more faith. And so I began studying how do I grow my13:53 faith and that's where all of this came from. And so if you have faith as a mustard seed, it should be growing. It should be compounding. It should be growing exponentially. And as you do that, you're14:05 gonna be able to do mighty things. I'm believing God for that. We'll see. You continue to listen to me over the months and years that come, and we'll see if this model that God gave me, if this vision, this desire14:17 that God gave me actually comes to fruition. I wake up every day and I move forward in faith because I think that faith that isn't put into action is meaningless. James says again, I think it's James 114:28 22, faith without works is dead. So trust to me, as I've said many times on this show, is that trust is faith in action. If you say you have faith but14:40 you're not willing to act on the faith, how really strong is your faith? Right? You demonstrate your faith through trust by stepping out. And that brings me to the next thing, James 2 17. I said 1 22. I got it wrong.14:52 It's James 2 17. Thus also faith by itself, if it does not have works, is dead. In other words, it's powerless. You can have faith, but it's not moving anything. It's not15:04 accomplishing anything if you don't put it into action. So in James 2 22, he says, do you see that faith was working together with his works And by works, faith was made perfect. Who's he's talking about? Father15:15 Abraham in verse 21. Was not Abraham, our father, justified by works when he offered Isaac his son on the altar? He acted on faith. And then in15:27 Romans 4 2 and 3, Paul picks up on the same thing saying, for if Abraham was justified by works, he has something to boast about but not before God. For what does the scripture15:39 say? Abraham believed God and it was accounted to him for righteousness. So there's a balance. There's James saying that Abraham, his his faith was made perfect because he15:51 acted on it. But Paul is making it clear that he wasn't justified by his works. It's not the fact fact that he did the work. The work was a reflection of the faith, and so there's a nuance there. But IPractical Ways to Cultivate Faith 16:02 think it's important. Like, what comes 1st, the chicken or the egg? Well, I think faith comes 1st, but then the validation of the faith is you actually act on it. And of course, Jesus said in John chapter 14 verse 15, if16:14 you love me, keep my commandments. You're gonna act out on what I call you to do. Love God, love your neighbor, make disciples. And then when you go to build your business, when you go to make your investments, when you16:25 go to live your life, everything should be on that purpose. Love God, love your neighbor, make disciples. And then, if the things that you're doing don't do those things, then you have to ask yourself, am I living my16:37 life on purpose? Am I doing what god actually created me to do? And just have to understand that your adversary, the devil, prowls about like a roaring lion seeking whom he might devour. I think you could16:49 almost rewrite that. Not that I wanna modify scripture, but if you think about it, right, your adversary, the devil, prowls about like a roaring lion thinking whom he might distract, who he might distract, who he might17:00 derail, who he might get working on things that don't matter, neglecting the things that do. And so that's why these muses to me are so important for me. It's just I wake up every day and I remind myself what is the main17:11 thing. What is the main thing I'm supposed to be doing? And when I think about it, then I think, wow, that's gonna take faith. And so inside of the main thing is the next main thing or as Gary Keller would call the 117:23 thing. What is the 1 thing I can do that will make everything else I need to do either easier or unnecessary? Grow my faith. Because if I have faith, then I can take more action. If I can take more action17:34 on purpose, then I can accomplish more according to God's plan and purpose. I want to walk in the works that Ephesians says that God created from the foundation that I might17:46 walk in them. We all have that. God created us for a purpose and specific works. We are his workmanship created for Christ Jesus for good works that he prepared beforehand that we may17:58 walk in them. And so when it comes down to like this practical kinda bringing this home, like how do we grow our faith? So the 1st thing is hearing, reading, meditating, obeying, spending time in the18:10 word of God. John 17 17 says, sanctify them by your truth. Your word is truth. Jesus praying over his disciples, which I think by extension includes us. Colossians 318:22 16 says, let the word of Christ dwell in you richly in all wisdom, teaching and admonishing 1 another, which I hope I'm doing here today, in Psalms and hymns and spiritual songs,18:34 you don't wanna hear me sing, singing with grace in your hearts to the Lord. So I'm gonna sing in my heart but I'm not gonna use my mouth because, God did not give me the gift of singing. I like to sing but not too18:46 many people like to listen to it. So I'll spare you. James 1 22, but be doers of the word and not hearers only. Because if you're a hearer only, he says, you're deceiving yourself.18:58 Are you really in the word? Are you really of the faith if you're not acting on the word? Be doers of the word and not hearers only deceiving yourself. Matthew 7 verse 24 says, therefore, whoever hears19:10 these sayings of mine, Jesus speaking, and does them, I will liken him to a wise man who built his house on the rock. And I like to talk a lot about 1st Corinthians 3 chapter 1119:22 where it says, where Paul's writing, there's only 1 foundation, and that foundation is Jesus Christ. Right? There's he's he's trying to break down sectarianism and all of the schisms and isms that that were19:34 dividing people. It's like, hey. There's 1 god. There's 1 lord Jesus Christ. There's 1 salvation, there's 1 purpose, and we're 1 body on 1 1 mission, which is to love God, love your neighbor, and19:46 make disciples. And anything that's divisive of that might not be from God. So just be careful. And so how do you discern? Well, when you know the word. When you're filtering19:58 everything you're looking at through the word of God, then you can recognize a counterfeit. Had a pastor many many years ago talk to me about how they trained FBI agents to recognize counterfeit20:10 currency. And what they would do is they would study the real thing so that he knew the real thing so well, so intimately in such great detail that anything that didn't conform or match the real20:22 thing, they immediately recognized as false. They didn't have to study everything that was false to understand it. They just had to study what was true. And then when they learned what was true, they could immediately20:33 recognize anything that wasn't true. And I thought that was a such a great lesson. It was actually 1 of the sermons that I heard very early in my Christian life that encouraged me to be someone that just loved the word20:45 of God, that wanted to spend time in the word of God, that really wanted to understand the word of God. And here I am 40 some odd years later, still delving into the word every single day and gleaning more and more20:56 understanding and more lessons. I don't know that if I lived 1000 lifetimes, I could ever fully extract all of the value and wisdom and insight that's available in the word of God.Fellowship and Final Exhortation 21:07 So I hope that you are a consumer of the word of God that you spend time in the word which is time in communion with Jesus by the power of the21:19 holy spirit which testifies of him which is both him, Jesus Christ, the savior, but also him, Jesus Christ, the word. And so I when I think of the Bible, I think of21:31 Jesus, especially the New Testament, but the entire Bible. Jesus said, I didn't come to make the bible go away. I didn't come to negate the law and the prophets I came to fulfill. So it's comprehensive in my opinion.21:43 That's the way I see it anyway. And so in Psalm chapter 1 verse 2, in Psalm chapter 1 is like 1 of my favorite because it talks about prosperity and the man who will prosper. And it opens up with the man of God.21:55 His delight is in the law of the Lord, and in his law or word, he meditates day and night. Joshua chapter 1 verse 8 says, this book of the law remember, that's all they had back then. They didn't have the New Testament.22:07 Jesus hadn't come yet. There was so many things that had yet to be revealed. We get the benefit of seeing the full revelation, But Joshua at his time didn't. So what they had was the book of the law that22:18 Moses gave them. The book of the law shall not depart from your mouth, but you shall meditate in it day and night that you may observe to do according to all that is written in it. For then, you will make your22:30 way prosperous and you will have good success. Well, today, if you're in business, if you're investing, if you live in a capitalistic community like the United States of America, and we're trying to22:42 preserve a constitutional capitalism so we can continue to act out on our faith through commerce and be abundant and excellent in what we do, exchange value for value. The22:53 scripture says, if you don't work, you don't eat. Doesn't mean there's not charity. But if you're capable of producing, you're supposed to be fruitful, you're supposed to be productive, you're supposed to work, and23:03 there's honor in work. Whatever your hands find to do, do it heartily as to the Lord. Be excellent. Be productive. And of course, when you do those things and you do them inside of God's purpose and plan and mission for23:15 your particular life, God's promises your way will be prosperous and you will have good success. So there's a lot of reasons, practical reasons in this life, especially when you live in a place like the23:26 United States of America. I mean, is the United States perfect? No. Have we lost a little bit of our spiritual underpinnings? Absolutely. But I do believe there's a revival going on right now. I do believe that people23:38 are beginning to realize that you really can't have financial freedom unless you have political freedom, and you cannot give a people political freedom unless they have morality. Right? John Adams, 1 of the founding23:49 fathers said that our constitution, our system of government, the freedom that our constitution secures for us, our god given rights only works for a moral and religious people, a24:01 self governed people. If you don't have morality, if you don't have a sense of accountability, if you aren't able to do things that aren't harmful to other people, if you use24:13 your freedom for selfishness and selfish gain and you abuse people, then the law is going to have to constrain you if your conscience won't. So there's just no way to live in a24:25 free and prosperous society without morality. That's why I created the Christian Capitalist Show to be part of the voices. I encourage you to get your mouth on a microphone, encourage people, share, multiply,24:37 magnify the lessons of your life. You know, wherever you are in your walk, wherever you are in your journey just like me, I'm sure some of you, perhaps many of you listening to me right now, way ahead of me, way way24:48 ahead of me. But there's also gonna be some of you out there that aren't as far along. Maybe I've learned some things. God has shown me some things. My life experience has, developed some things in me that you find value25:00 in. And so that's who I share for. And maybe for some of you that are ahead of me, I'm reminding you of things that you knew once, but maybe had slipped your mind. I know when I have people share with me, I learn a lot25:10 from young people. I'm an older guy today, but that doesn't mean that I know everything. Trust me. I I don't. I I don't know everything. In fact, I make a lot of mistakes, but I love getting around people. I've been25:21 hanging around with some young people, good godly men that encourage me. Guys that are, you know, 40 years younger than me, but they're in the word and they're filled with the holy spirit and they challenge me, and25:32 I love that. So it's great. Of course, another way to grow your faith is your prayer and asking. In Luke chapter 11 verse 9, Jesus says, so I say to you, ask. Ask. And he promises it will be given to25:44 you. Seek, and he promises you will find. Knock, he says, and it will be open to you. Colossians 1 9 says, for this reason, we also, since the day we heard it, do not cease to pray for you and to25:56 ask that you may be filled with the knowledge of his will. What is his will? That people would come to know Jesus be saved and that he would not lose any until the last26:08 day. They would be raised up in the last day. Jesus himself said that is the will of God. And so when you are inside the will of God, you are going to be about proclaiming Jesus26:19 Christ, his salvation to the lost that they might come into a saving relationship with Christ filled with the Holy Spirit, have their faith fortified in the word by the26:31 spirit that they will be edified to the point where they will obey his commandments which are to love God, love your neighbor, and make disciples. And now you have this exponential perpetual mustard seed26:43 type growth. Every person whose life falls into the soil and they lose it, the old life and the new man is born again as a mustard seed, and it grows up and it26:55 scatters more seed and that seed multiplies exponentially, that's how the kingdom of God is propagated. And we all get to be a part of it. Philippians 1 9 says, for this27:07 I pray that your love may abound still more and more in knowledge and all discernment. 1st Thessalonians 3 10, Paul writes night and day praying exceedingly that we may see your face and perfect27:19 what is lacking in your faith. So ultimately, Hebrews chapter 11 1 describes faith. Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen. So we wanna see. We27:30 want proof. We want there to be something beyond us having to trust God. But if we had that, then we wouldn't need to trust him. So there's gonna be a little bit of a gap. But27:42 think of all the things that people believe. Things they've read in history books, things they've heard about what has gone on in the past, and they take it at face value. They believe it.27:54 Things that scientists have reported seeing at the subatomic level, things that the scientists say they see going out into outer space. People that have done experiments and28:06 done deep research, and they publish papers, and they say, this is what we saw. This is what we witnessed. This is what we experienced. This is what we discovered, and we accept that as fact. There's so28:18 many things in this world that we just accept without verification, without really seeing it for ourselves because a credible witness told us. And the most credible28:30 witness we can have to the reality of Jesus Christ and his salvation in the word of God is the Holy Spirit. The purpose of the Holy Spirit is to confirm to you his28:42 word and the word is self reinforcing. And so your faith can become self reinforcing too. And then I think the last 1 and this is I'll be honest with this is when I've struggled28:54 with. It's the reason that I have this desire to create fellowship a Christian capitalist because I felt like I couldn't really find a church home that ministered to me as a capitalist, as a business29:06 person, as an investor. And maybe that's changed, but I've ventured out a couple of times and I just haven't found that right fellowship. And I'll be honest with you, I haven't put enough effort into it. So I was29:17 convicted when I did this study when I thought, Lord, how can I grow my faith? And I was pretty happy like check check check check check. I'm doing a lot of things right. So that made me feel good right up until the29:28 point God humbled me by reminding me that there's a big piece that I've been leaving out. And so I've gotta go to work on fixing this. Right? So I've gotta step out in faith and believe that if29:40 I seek, I will find. And in this case, what I need to seek is a fellowship. I need to seek a group of people that I can get together with. Why? Because in Hebrews chapter 10 verses 24 and 25, it says, and let29:52 us consider 1 another in order to stir up love and good works, not forsaking the assembling of ourselves together as is the manner of some, and I'll confess it'sThe Weight of Faith as Gift 30:04 been my manner, but exhorting 1 another and so much the more as you see the day approaching. And I would say if you study end times prophecy, think about what the conditions30:16 of the world are gonna be. Just do the passage of time. It's a safe bet. We're getting closer to the end. We don't know and the bible's very clear, you know, nobody should be kinda picking the time or the hour or trying30:28 to predict, but I think it's a safe bet that every day that we live, we're getting a little bit closer. And when it says, as you see the day approaching, if you study and look for the signs of the times, I think a lot30:40 of the signs are existing in the world that we're living in today. Now does that mean, you know, that that we're at judgment day, that Jesus is coming back, that all of the things that are prophesied are gonna happen30:51 soon? I don't know. Might happen in my lifetime, might not. But I think we're closer every day that we live. And so every day that we live, the more that we see the day approaching, God is saying to us, that31:03 we should be assembling together and exhorting each other even more. So this is a little bit of an exhortation, I think. I mean, I'm thinking about the things that excite me and that make me wanna be a better Christian,31:14 to make me believe and grow my faith and spend more time in the word and take action and trust God by stepping out in faith. And I share those things with the idea. I hope that they encourage you to do the same thing. I31:25 can't imagine that the world will be worse if we're all, individually working to grow our faith and then to step out in faith and do the things, the good works that God has called us to do to the best of our ability. Are31:37 we gonna make mistakes? Hundred percent. You know, if if God could only get things done through perfect people, if you look at everybody that he did everything through in the bible with the exception of Jesus Christ,31:47 right, there was nobody perfect. Everybody was flawed and yet somehow, someway, God was able to work through these flawed humans and accomplish his divine objectives. And I believe that that31:59 continues to happen to this day. So my job isn't to be perfect. My job is to show up. Right? Isaiah cried out when god said, who am I gonna send? And Isaiah said, here am I, lord. Send me. I may not32:10 be perfect, but I wanna go. And that's how I feel. I feel like right now, I may not be perfect. In fact, I know I'm not perfect, but I do wanna go. After the things I've been through in my life, this season in my life,32:22 the 1 thing I know is that life is short and that none of the stuff that you have, none of the stuff that you create, none of the stuff that you're working on really matters32:34 outside the context of serving God's purpose, which is to love God, love your neighbor, and make disciples. Right? There's a lot of work that needs to be done, a lot of business models, a lot of demographics, social32:45 circles you can operate in, people whose lives. But if you forget the main thing and you wander off and you think, well, I've achieved this or I've achieved that and you haven't done the main thing,32:57 I think you just have to ask yourself what am I really what am I really doing? What am I really doing? That's why I think the lord says, don't lay up for yourselves treasure on earth. Lay up for yourselves treasure on33:08 heaven. Does that mean you can't have treasure on earth? I don't think so. I think you can. And I think that the reality is is that if you're a productive person, you're gonna create abundance. If you're excellent in33:18 what you do, you're gonna create abundance. But the idea is what your heart set on. What do you love? What do you serve? What are you excited about? I have to check myself on that all the time. All the time.33:30 It's very very tempting. And so we just have to encourage each other and I think that's the the role of fellowship. So I'm looking forward to finding a fellowship to be a part of. I'm looking forward to perhaps creating33:41 1. If I can't find 1 that works, maybe that's what God's calling me to. I don't know. I still have a desire to create fellowship or Christian capitalist. I formed it. Looking for leaders. If it's something you think33:51 you'd be interested in, please send me an email feedback at russell gray dot com and say, hey. Look. Just put me on the list. I wanna be involved in some way shape or form. I'm a business person. I'm an investor. I34:03 am interested in the economy. I'm interested in being productive financially. I'm interested in creating in the world, and I wanna do it in a kingdom way. And I34:15 wanna be around people who are using their business and their money to grow the kingdom, specifically to add more souls to the kingdom, to introduce more people to Jesus Christ.34:27 If that's what you feel God is calling you to do, send me an email at feedback at russell gray dot com and I'll put you on a list and at some point, we'll have a conversation and I will look very much forward to that.34:39 Meanwhile, I pray that the things that I've shared with you, the things that I've learned, the things that I'm doing, and the things that I intend to do, all encourage you to cultivate and grow34:50 a stronger faith. And I think when you have faith as a mustard seed, it's not that it's small, it's that it grows. And if it's not growing and compounding, then I think that's something that you can go to work on. I35:02 know it's something that I work on, and I pray that encourages you. So until next time, may you be blessed to be a blessing.In this video 0:00 Faith Like a Mustard Seed: Designed for Exponential Growth7:00 Faith in Action: Works Perfect Faith16:00 Practical Ways to Cultivate Faith21:00 Fellowship and Final Exhortation30:00 The Weight of Faith as Gift
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