THINK TOGETHER
What is faith? What is something that you do by faith?
READ TOGETHER
Faith is trusting in something or someone. Who do you trust? (Your parents, your teachers, your doctor, your pastor, your friends) What is something that you do from faith? (Sit in a chair? Fly in a plane? Jump into your mom or dad’s arms?)
Habakkuk was a prophet in the Old Testament that had to learn about faith in God. Habakkuk saw that his people, the Jews, were going to be attacked by the wicked Babylonians. They would be forced into slavery and become exiles in a foreign land. Habakkuk didn’t think this was fair. Why would God use the wicked Babylonians to attack his own people? Why would God use people who are less righteous to punish people who were more righteous? But then God said something to Habakkuk that would change everything. Here it is:
Habakkuk 2:4. “Behold, [the wicked person’s] soul is puffed up; it is not upright within him, but the righteous person shall live by his faith.
You see, Habakkuk thought that people were righteous because of what they did. If they did good things they were righteous, but if they did bad things they were unrighteous or wicked. How many good or bad things you do determines how righteous you are. But Habakkuk failed to understand that we are all unrighteous. We all do bad way more than we do good, and so God doesn’t keep score or give us grades on how good or bad we are. There’s only one way for God to score us as righteous. There’s only way for God to call us good. Faith!
Because we can’t do enough good things to be counted as righteous we have to have faith in Jesus that he was good enough and did enough good things. Jesus was always righteous. He always did what God wanted. That’s why he COULD die for us on the cross. That’s why he DID die for us on the cross. He died for us because he was righteous. Now we too can be righteous when we have faith in Jesus. When we trust in what he did for us instead of what we can do for God.
Because of Jesus I have his righteousness, instead of my own.
With Jesus I can live in faith, trusting him to love me and care for me every day.
DO SOMETHING TOGETHER
Listen to the song I Will Trust My Savior Jesus by CityAlight together.
PRAY TOGETHER
Jesus, I know that I am not righteous. Thank you for being righteous for me and for giving me your righteousness by simply trusting you. Amen.
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