The Kept Faith

“I have fought a good fight, I have finished my course, I have kept the faith:”-2 Timothy 4:7

When I was young, my parents spent a great deal of time and energy trying to train me to keep my room clean.  There were many glorious battles won and lost on this front.  At the time, I didn't understand what the big deal was, but now that I am older I see the value in a kept home.  They understood this long before I did, and worked to teach me.  Like many young people, I was not always the best student, and I am certain I am not the only one.  The issue was, as with many youngsters, that it took diligence and commitment to keep the room.  It didn't just happen.  You had to put your stuff back once you used it, take out the dirty clothes, take out the trash, make the bed, etc.  This was something that required constant attention and commitment, which was not easy for me.  I was not persuaded of the value of a clean room.  I just wanted to play.  Plus, as long as I kept track of all my stuff, what difference did it make if it was in a drawer or not?  If I could locate it, didn't that mean that I had kept it?

We can be tempted to take the same ideology when it comes to our spiritual life.  When you receive the gift of the Holy Ghost, and you are brought into an understanding of the faith, this is a precious thing, and it should be kept; but not in the way that a teenager keeps his room.  Simply because you can locate it does not necessarily mean that you have “kept the faith.”  You may walk into a kid’s room, as my parents once did, and demand that they clean the place up, they reply “why?  I know where everything is?”  In their immature way of thinking they perceive that simply because they can locate their stuff amidst the wreckage, it means that they have kept it.  It is not lost, therefore it is kept.  This is the logic.  We are the same way when we let the devil creep in and diminish our joy, rob our peace, and cause our devotion time to dwindle down to nothing.  If pressed upon, we can drum up some testimony, and simply because we can accomplish this we believe we have “kept the faith.”  However, if you were to look inside and really examine yourself, a more accurate description would be “I can locate the faith…..somewhere in there.”  Somewhere amongst the worldly desires, and pleasures of this life; somewhere amidst all the: I want’s, I need’s, and I love’s….somewhere in there is the faith.  A kept faith is like a kept house.  It takes diligence, perseverance, and commitment.  You have to be persuaded of the value of it.  You have to daily communion with God through reading and praying, asking him to prune your life.  You will have to remove some things from your life, and you will have to put some things away, wait on the Lord, until one day you may be called upon to take them out again.  You have to “keep the faith.”  It must be done day in and day out, this is not because God is cruel, but because he knows that this is what is best for you. 

Paul fought a good fight, finished his course, and kept the faith.  He tending to it daily and he lived it to the letter.  This was the chief joy in his life and it landed him home in heaven.  Some may look on at sanctified people who: read, pray, go to church, preach to the lost, witness, and minister, and they may think that they have boring lives.  They may think it easier to just let the whole thing go and do what you please, but really and truly it is far more enjoyable to serve God and keep the faith, than to serve yourself and constantly have to work to find the faith.  There is no greater joy than the joy of the Lord, and no greater calling than the one he has for you.  Keeping the faith is keeping His will first in your life, and when you do that you are blessed; exceedingly and above all you will ever ask or think.