 Okay, welcome back everyone. And I'll try keeping my video on for a bit. I have started recording the lecture of this, the recording of this lecture and let's see. I'll keep my video on and and if I need to I can turn the video off. All right, so let's resume from where we pause before the break. We, in our previous lecture, we tried to understand the interplay or the interaction between the sovereignty of God, the grace of God and our faith in God. So we just try to understand how all of these work together. And you know, we emphasize God is sovereign, God is gracious, but he requires all of us to come to him in faith. That's the norm. But there are exceptions and God will do the exceptions because he's sovereign. Nobody can question. And he would do things outside the norm. And minister extend his grace as he chooses to people. But he's still not being partial because he has made something available for every person. He's still impartial. Okay. Any further questions on that before we move forward to the next chapter? So we're going to go into chapter, we're going into chapter three now. And again, these notes are available in the coursework section that I've put out there. In chapter three, we are going to talk about faith and the ministry of Jesus. That means we want to start with Jesus himself. So the Bible says Jesus is the author and finisher of our faith. And so we just go right to Jesus and learn from him. And what we see in Jesus as the Son of God, the incarnate Son of God, when he came into the earth and he lived among us that he taught a lot about faith. And he also, and as you read in the four Gospels, he also engaged with people on the basis of faith. And that's something we're going to observe very carefully. And it is safe for us to conclude that Jesus will do the same thing today. Because the Bible says, and all of us are familiar with Hebrews 13, we're saying that Jesus is the same yesterday, today and forever. He's not going to change. He's not going to say, well, you know, I talked about faith and I engaged by faith with people in those days because, you know, they were not highly informed or whatever. And today times are different. And so today I will do things differently. He has not changed. He will not change. So it is safe for us to say that everything Jesus taught in the Gospels, he will teach the same thing to you and me today. If Jesus was to come to you and me today, he will teach the same thing. He's not going to change his teachings. He is the eternal Word. And he's not going to change the way in which he works. He's going to work the same way today. Now, our times have changed. Our, you know, our environment, the world in which we live, has changed. But Jesus will not change who he is and his teaching and the way he works. So as we go through observing Jesus in the Gospels, Matthew, Mark, Luke and John, just look at, you know, what did Jesus teach? How did he engage with people around faith? As you observe him, just keep this in mind, hey, today Jesus will do the same thing. If he came today and he spoke to you and me and he engaged with you and me, he'll do the same thing, not one thing different because he's the unchanging Jesus. Right? So, and just for our, you know, the purposes of learning and teaching, I have put these down as statements, you know, there are about 12 statements or something in this chapter. And we're just going to go through them statement by statement. But they're just, that each statement is capturing a certain aspect of what Jesus taught or did around the subject of faith. Right? So it's just statements that I've put, put down just for the purpose for our learning. Okay. So number one, the first statement. And if you're following with me in the notes, it is on page 21 in the PDF, the chapter three notes. So number one, we see that Jesus recognized and responded to faith in those who came to him. That means when Jesus came to him, he saw the faith that was in their hearts. He recognized it. Hey, this person believes me. This person believes he recognized faith. And he responded to that faith. He didn't ignore it. He didn't turn away from it. You could say that faith in their hearts got his attention. Did that person believes and just give some examples? You know, one is the Roman Sancturian. This is in Matthew chapter eight and worse, 10. Now the Roman Sancturian is interesting because he was a non Jewish person. So you remember that in his earthly ministry, Jesus primary focus was the Jewish people. And then after his death, resurrection and ascension, the gospel was expanded to the whole world. But here was a Roman Sancturian, a non Jewish person who came to Jesus. And Jesus commended him. And what he saw in him, he said, I haven't seen such great faith, not even in Israel. That means not even among the Jewish people. He says, I've seen, I see this man. He's got such great faith. So imagine a Roman Sancturian, a, you know, a non Jewish man. He was a soldier. He was, you know, he must have been a tough man. And he's saying, this man has great faith. So he recognized faith in the hearts of people. We see in Matthew chapter nine and verse two, the paralyzed man who was brought by his old friends. And the Bible says in Matthew nine, verse two says Jesus saw their faith. And he said to them, he said to the paralytic, you know, paralyzed man, son, be cheerful. Your sins are forgiven. This is Matthew nine verse two. Jesus saw their faith. How did Jesus see their faith? He obviously saw it. These four people, four friends made all the effort to carry their friend who was paralyzed all the way to the house where Jesus was. And when the house was full, they didn't get discouraged. They just got onto the to the roof and they made a way through the roof. So it can imagine it must have been a tiled building. And so they just, you know, moved all the tiles away and they let his friend in. Now, why would they go through all that trouble? Obviously, they believe that if they got their friend to Jesus, Jesus would heal him. And so the Bible says Jesus saw their faith. Same thing with a woman with an issue of blood. You know, she she'd been in that condition for 12 years. She'd been to all the doctors of her time. And as she was not well, she was didn't get better. But she made her way through the crowd. And again, here it says, Jesus told her daughter, your faith has made you well. Your faith. Same thing with a woman from Kenan. And again, here's a woman who was a non Jewish woman. When she came to Jesus on behalf of her daughter. So her daughter was troubled with demons. And she came to Jesus. And Jesus, you know, again tells this woman, Matthew 15, verse 28, woman, great is your faith. So these are just a few examples. And like this, you can see many examples in the Gospels. But the main point is this point number one, Jesus recognized and responded to the faith in those who came to him. And he will do the same today. He will do the same today. He sees the faith in our hearts. And he will respond to the faith that we carry in our hearts. He will. He's the same Jesus. Secondly, we see that in his ministry, there were times Jesus asked people, you know, he asked people if they had faith in order to receive. So he asked them, do you have faith? So we first put down two examples and first one is in Matthew 9, 2029, you know, two blind men come to Jesus and Jesus asked them, do you believe that I'm able to do this? And they said, Yes, Lord. So he's asking them, do you believe? Do you believe? So he's asked people, do you have faith? Do you believe? Or to the man who had a son who was troubled by demons in Mark 9, verses 23, 24, you know, this man, he's crying out to Jesus. And Jesus says, if you can believe, if you can believe, all things are possible to him who believes, that means in your situation, and his situation was bad, he had a son who was very troubled. And at that time he had brought his son to the disciples and they couldn't help him. And so obviously he's pretty discouraged. He must have, you know, felt let down, whatever. He was very discouraged at that moment. So he cries to Jesus and says, Lord, if you can do anything, please help me. Jesus turns it around to him and says, it's not about whether I can do anything. Obviously Jesus can. So he turns the thing around back onto the man and says, if you can believe. So you just look at the interaction. The man first says to Jesus, Lord, if you can do anything, please help me. So he's putting the, you know, the obligation on Jesus says, if you can do anything. Jesus turns around and says, if you can believe. So it's not a question of whether God can do. It's not a question of God's ability. He's saying, if you can believe, can you believe God? If you can believe. So it's all things are possible. He says, look, it's not about my, it's not a question about God's ability. It's a question about, would you believe? So Jesus turns it around, tells the man, if you can believe, all things are possible. It's a done thing. If you can believe, it's done. All things are possible. Right. Now we'll come back to the response and we will look at some of these things in detail. But that's the second point I want to highlight, which is Jesus asked people at times, do you have faith? Do you believe? And so you can, you know, if Jesus was here today, he would ask us the same thing. When we are in our situations of need, when we are in our situations of difficulty, and we want God to work powerfully in our lives to a miracle, change our situations, bring provision, heal. He's going to say, do you believe? And we have to be in that place, we will say, yes, Lord, I believe because I leave your word, you've given me a promise. Okay. I see the biggest question in the chat. I will come to that. We just go forward a bit if you come to that question. The third statement I want to make here is this, that Jesus encouraged faith, even in hopeless situations. So when things went, the situation went from bad to worse, what were Jesus' response? What was Jesus' response? We see that he encouraged people to have faith. And things went from bad to worse. So he didn't change plans. So guys, faith works, when things are easy, but when things are really difficult, sorry, you know, try something else, he didn't do that. Yeah. So look at some examples. You know, we mentioned J.R.S. This is in Mark chapter five versus 35 to 36. Mark chapter five was 35 to 36. You know, J.R.S. comes to Jesus. He's a ruler of a synagogue, which means he's a very religious man. He's a leader of the synagogue local assembly of believers there. And he comes to Jesus. And he says, you know, master, you know, I've got my daughter who is, she's about to die. So please come to my house, just lay your hand on her. And I know she will live. So Jesus is making his way with J.R.S. to the house. And there's a lot of people, a lot of people around him, there's a crowd. And while you're journeying, about making the way news comes, some people from J.R.S. house come to him and say, you know, J.R.S., it's gone bad now. She's dead. She's dead. So don't need to trouble Jesus about this. In other words, they are saying, case is closed. It's gone. She's gone. So don't bother Jesus. It's very interesting to see Jesus' response. Mark five verse 36 says, as soon as he heard the word, as soon as he heard the word, which means there are no second thoughts about this, Jesus didn't have second thoughts on how to respond to such a matter. As soon as he heard it, he told J.R.S., fear not. Only believe. Don't be afraid. Only believe. That means things have gone from bad to worse. The girl was almost dead. Now she is dead. Jesus saying, fear not. Only believe. So would Jesus have the same thing today? In similar situations? The answer is yes. He hasn't changed. So today, in our life situations, when things go from bad to worse, what would Jesus tell us? When things go from little hope to no hope, what would Jesus tell us? Fear not. Just believe. Same thing in the case of Lazarus. Lazarus died. His sisters, Martha and Mary, sent a message to Jesus saying, Lazarus is dead. Please come. Now the news probably, actually, they may have informed Jesus prior to his death. We don't know. And, you know, initially Lazarus was sick. The one whom Jesus, Jesus friend was sick. But Jesus waited. He was in Bethany, a different town. By the time he's dead, Jesus saying Lazarus is dead. I'm going to go make him out of sleep. And so three days later, actually, it's on the fourth day, four days later, Jesus reaches hometown of Martha and Mary and where Lazarus tomb is. It's been four days. Four days late. He's been in the grave four days. And Jesus knows or knew what, you know, the Father wanted to do in that situation. So he tells them, you know, move the stone. And Martha says, you know, how can he do that? You know, he's been dead four days. This is in John 1139. But notice what Jesus says in John 1140. He says, did I not say to you that if you would believe, you will see the glory of God. So here's a very hopeless situation. What did Jesus teach them or tell them? Even in this situation, if you will believe, you will see the glory, which is the work of God, the demonstration of who God is and what he does. You will see the glory of God. If you will believe, you will see the glory. So on both these engagements, Jesus had the people around faith point number three, we can conclude that Jesus encouraged faith, even in hopeless situations. So that's what we do for ourselves. And that's what we do when we serve people. When we are in situations that go from bad to worse. Encourage yourself, have faith, because that's what Jesus will tell you. That's what he'll tell me. It's if you're not only believe. And that's what we do when we work with people, when people come to us, and they tell us, you know, things have gone worse. Things have really bad. What should we do? Encourage them to believe, because that's what Jesus would do. He would say, if you believe, you will see the glory of God. Fear not, only believe, keep believing. That's how people also minister, they're going to do what Jesus would do. And that's what Jesus would do. He would encourage faith, right? I'll do one more point. Number four, after this, we will take questions. Okay. Number four, the fourth statement we want to make is this, that Jesus encouraged people to act their faith. So that's another thing we observe in the ministry of Jesus. He encouraged people to do something that was in line with what they believed. So there would be many times in his ministry, Jesus would tell people, you know, for example, he told the man with the with their hands, stretch out your hand, stretch out your hand to the man who was so to the 10 lepers, and I've just put some examples that the 10 lepers, you know, they, they were, they, they cried out to Jesus saying, have mercy on us. So they're crying out to Jesus, obviously, they are expecting something, but he tells them, go show yourself to the priest. So he's basically telling them, act your faith, go show yourself to the priest. Now you can imagine these lepers, they have disease on their body. Nothing has changed. They cried out to Jesus. Nothing has changed. Jesus telling them, go show yourself to the priest. Now, why is that in those days, the priest had to check and certify that the leper was clean, and only then the leper integrates back into society. So that's the process. He said, go ahead with that process. They ever looked on, on at themselves, their hands and look, I'm still diseased. But Jesus said, go to the priest. And the Bible says, as they went, they were cleansed, this is in Luke 17, verse 14, as they went, that means they started acting their faith. And then the miracle happened. So in our lives too, many times we need to start acting our faith, start doing something that expresses what you believe. It says as they went, why did they go? Because Jesus said, go show yourself to the priest. So as they went, they experienced the miracle. So like this, there are several examples in the ministry of Jesus, as he was interacting with people, he encouraged them to act their faith. And so Jesus will do the same thing today. As he engages with you and me, he's going to encourage us, act your faith, start doing something that shows that you believe God. You know, whatever you can, in some situations, they may not be much, but in some situations you can, you can start expressing doing something that expresses your faith in God. And you know, and those initial steps are, you know, are like, that's where you're doing it because you believe it in your heart, whereas your mind may not understand. You know, you can imagine these lepers, they're looking at their own body, they're still diseased. But they're making their way to the house of the priest, to where the priest lives. And as they journeyed, they became clean. Same thing today, he expects us to act our faith. And as we act our faith, we will see him demonstrate his power. Okay, so four simple things so far that we've observed in the ministry of Jesus. One, that Jesus recognized and responded to faith in people who came to him. Number two, people asked, Jesus asked people, do you have faith? Number three, he encouraged faith, even in hopeless situations. Number four, he encouraged people to act their faith. I'm going to pause here and take questions so far on the things we've mentioned, if anybody needs me to clarify something, we'll be happy to do that. Alright, so we'll start off with Divya's question and then others can come in with their questions. So the Divya's question is, will our faith supersede God's sovereignty? So the answer is no, right? Our faith does not control God. If I can override God's sovereignty, it means that I can control God with faith. And that's not true. Right? So God is sovereign. So my faith doesn't override his sovereignty. My faith is aligned to his promise. Our faith is always aligned to the promise of God. Faith is always aligned to what God has said. So faith will not override God's sovereignty. So we will talk about the parameters of faith. That's one lesson we will do towards the end. That means there are boundaries within which faith operates. And one of the things is faith cannot override God's plan. You know, so for instance, God has determined a time will come when Jesus will return. Now he has determined that time. I cannot say I want Jesus to come today. Sorry, I cannot have faith like that. Right? That timing when Christ will return is something God in his sovereignty has decided. No amount of my believing or my trying to convince God to come today will make him come today. He will come in the time that he chooses. So we cannot override what God has sovereignly kept in his control by faith. But our faith works alongside what God has planned and purpose. Right? So that's why we base our faith on the word of God on the promise of God. And what God speaks to our hearts and we work together with God. Okay? Yeah, go ahead. Go ahead. Why I asked that question was, I was wondering about the Canonite woman who asked for healing of her daughter. So when if Jesus ministry was for Jews alone, why was you know, their diversion that made me wonder actually. Hmm. Understand, understand. So one of the things about the ways in which God works is that God has God has planned things for different. We use the word dispensation. Dispensation means an age, a time period in which God has is doing something. But what we see is in the Bible that people in one age or dispensation are able by faith to get a taste of foretaste what God has actually planned for another dispensation or another time period. So that's what happened when the when the Gentiles like the Roman sectarian and the Canonite woman came to Jesus. See, at that time, God's plan was the program of God was Jesus will minister to the Jews. But God had already planned that in the next dispens or in the next period of time, Jesus would be made available to everybody to the whole world. But he gives a foretaste of what is to come. So that's why he, you know, even these people pulled into their time what God had prepared for a later period by faith. So we see the same thing today. Now, we are in our time period. And the Hebrew six, we are tickets, Hebrew six and verse six says, no, we taste of the powers of the kingdom to come. That means, you know, we can receive a foretaste not everything, but a foretaste of what God has planned for the age to come. This is in Hebrew six, verse five, sorry, Hebrew six, verse five, they, they tasted the good word of God and the powers of the age to come. That means there is the next age to coming, but we taste of it, we get a little taste of it. So that's a little bit of, you know, insight there on how God works. So that was what was happening at that time. Okay, thank you best. So let's pick up the other questions. We have a question there from John. When we pray for someone with faith, you don't get an answer. Does that mean we do not have enough faith? So that's a difficult question to answer. But here's what I want us to keep in mind that many times, it may not be an issue of faith, but it may be other factors that are around it. For instance, there is the issue of forgiveness. You know, Jesus taught us, you know, he said, you have faith in God. But then he went on to say, when you pray, when you stand in prayer, forgive if you have anything against anybody else, so that your heavenly Father will also forgive you, your trespasses. So in connection to faith, forgiveness is important. Or we could put it like this. Unforgiveness in our hearts is an hindrance to faith being fruitful. What are the things that keep faith from being fruitful? One, unforgiveness. We also see hate, hating somebody, which of course, this is maybe maybe connected to unforgiveness as well. Because Hebrew Galatians chapter five and verse six says, faith works through love. Or the converse is true. Faith is hindered by hate. So if I say I have faith, but I hate somebody like I really don't, I just hate them. That hate is going to prevent my faith from bearing fruit. So when we are ministry to people, or sometimes even in our own lives, we need to ask God, God, are there things that are hindering my faith from producing? What is it? Right. And we see some of these hindrances to fail. And we will have we have a chapter coming up. We will mention some of these things so that we are aware that we must keep these things out. Because we want our faith to produce. So the answer to the question is, you know, we may not always know. Because that person may not want forgiveness, or that person may carry hate in their heart to somebody, or that person may, there may be other things that may be an hindrance there to faith, keeping faith from producing. So to answer John's question, it may not always be not enough faith, it could be other hindrances to that faith from producing. And so, you know, there's no one answer, but we need to help people, you know, put aside those things. And sometimes the Holy Spirit will reveal to us as we're ministry to people, or even in our own hearts, God will say, Hey, you need to be careful, you need to get that out of your heart, and so that you know, God can work. And that's one thing, you know, I think we must all learn to do to keep a pure heart before God. And say, God, I don't want anything in my heart that's going to hinder your work coming through my life, or keep pure heart before God, keep it clean, faithful produce. Okay. Isaac, we're going to take up Isaac's question. It's faith, a one of gift, that when he gives to us day, so when we need it in situation amongst, I mean, when we need healing, we get faith to receive, we need provisioning other faith to get it. So, Isaac, what we are dealing with in this course is your personal faith, our personal faith. So this is something we carry in our hearts. Right? So God gives a measure of faith to us Romans chapter 12, verse three, God has given to each one of us a measure of faith. So God has put faith in your heart. The moment you and I were born again, and we receive Jesus into our lives, God has put faith in our hearts. So what we are going to learn what we are learning is how to develop that faith, nurture that faith in our lives. And we're all on a journey, we're all growing. And so we're learning. So this is something we carry in our hearts. So this is something we can exercise any time when we need to, but we need to nurture our faith. Right? I mean, if you want to use an example, you know, if we, we all have muscles on our bodies, okay, your muscles on our arms, we all have it. But I can't go to the gym today. I mean, right now the gym's all closed, but and I can't just go over there and try to lift, you know, 100 pounds, you know, put 50 pounds on each side of the barbell and try to pick that off the ground. I have muscle, but I just can't go and pull off 100 pounds or 150 pounds off the ground like that. What needs to happen? I need to develop my muscles. Is it possible? Yes. But it's going to take a little bit of time. I need to train myself. You know, I have a proper nurturing of those muscles, feed myself, train my exercise myself, feed and exercise and rest, you know, you develop that. And then eventually I come to the place where I can lift that. But the mistake all of us make is, you know, we go to the gym one day and suddenly say, okay, I'm going to lift 150 pounds. It's not going to happen. Then we come back and say faith didn't work. No, faith works. But you need to know how to get it to a place to work. And just like our muscles, you can't go to the gym one day and say, I'm going to lift 150. So what must we do? We must over time develop, build faith, strengthen our faith. And like we saw in second Thessalonians chapter one verse three, faith grows. So faith can grow. So our response is to keep nurturing and growing our faith to the place where it's going to be able to do the things we want done. But let's not make the mistake of walking into the gym at random and expecting to be able to lift huge weights. So to answer your question, I said, we're talking about the muscle God has given you. All of us it's on our body. It's in our heart. It's in our heart. It's there. But it has to be nurtured. It has to be developed over time. And we are on that journey. We're all doing that together. And we're going to learn how to engage our faith. Sorry, Isaac, we couldn't hear you. Could you repeat, please? I say your answer is well. And the exercise of our feet increases our feet. Well answered. Thank you. Isaac, we couldn't hear you. So if you don't mind, can you type it in the chat? Would that be okay? Oh, okay. Fine. Thank you, Isaac. Let's go to the next question. Abu Bakrae Tobloba. Okay, I hope I pronounced your name correctly. Abu Abu Bakrae, Bakrae Tobloba. Okay. Is it necessary to act on the fate of the person I'm praying for or my fate is enough to heal or set the person free? So Abu Bakrae, that's a good question. So let me say this, you know, the norm is both of us must be in faith, the one praying, doing the praying or doing the ministry and the one coming to be ministered to. That's why we preach the word first, because that word is going to help people and encourage people's faith because faith comes by hearing. So we normally we tell people, you know, sit down, hear the word first, take some time to listen to the word, because the word is what is going to generate faith. And then when we pray, both of us can be in faith and pray. That's the norm. Right. So and then the person doing the receiving has to act in faith. Sometimes God may want the person ministering to act in faith as well. But both must be in faith in order to minister. But there are exceptions. The exceptions are sometimes the person coming to be prayed for may not be in fact, or the person praying for doing the praying may not be in a great place of faith. And still the miracle will happen. Now I remember one case. And this happened sometime back. I was I was when I was living in the US. I used to serve in an African American church. And this was in in New Jersey. And then I was also serving with the Hispanic people, the people from Central America. Actually, a lot of them were from Ecuador and they were there. And I remember one particular service. And this was towards the end of the service. And I was actually tired. We were praying for many, many people, I mean, people one after the other. So by the time we came to this particular person to pray for, I was actually tired. And I was actually speaking through an interpreter. Her name was Maria, we would call her sister Maria. And she was interpreting into Spanish. And this mother came, the mother was carrying a child. And I think it was the child must have been about two years old. Now sister Maria knew the child because sister Maria was working in the hospital, Robert Wood Johnson Hospital in New Brunswick, New Jersey. And she knew the mother, she knew the child. She knew what happened. She knew that by that time they'd already spent about $18,000 running the tests to find out what was wrong. The child had some growth on the head and so on. And the mother had covered the child with a cap, you know, the head with the cap and so it was covered. But she knew all of that. They came forward, she came forward, carrying the child and we prayed. Now to tell you the truth is at that time when I was praying, I was very tired. I was just doing what I know I'm supposed to do, which is, you know, command the tumors to go, you know, curse them by their roads and tell them to go. And I was just doing that. But if you ask me that I feel great compassion, or did I feel great faith in my heart or anything, actually, no, I was actually tired. Maybe Sister Maria was the one who had great compassion and great faith. I don't know, she was interpreting. But if you ask me, I can tell you that, you know, I was I was just praying I didn't feel anything at that moment. I didn't feel anything great. But we prayed and afterwards, you know, we finished praying for all the people were there be close to service. And then right after service, I was going my way and Sister Maria was getting into the car to drop this woman and her child. They were going to go and take her to the metro station. And she was going to go somewhere. But in the car, Sister Maria put her hand on the head of this baby. And the tumors are all gone. It was hardly like, you know, within the hour, right? By the time we closed the service, and they got into the car, the tumors disappeared. And of course, they went back to the hospital to, you know, meet with the doctors and so on. But the point was this that if you ask me, did I have great faith? I would say no, I just didn't feel anything. It must have been the mother's faith who came with the baby. It must have been Sister Maria's faith was translating the Spanish and she was praying in Spanish. You know, it must have been something like that, but got the miracle. So to answer your question there, a boobah cray. The norm is both must be in faith. But there are exceptions where God just works. And he is sovereign. And he will work the miracle. Right. And there's many, many examples like that. Okay, so another question here is from Pema Dadu. What is the significance of Jesus saying your sins are forgiven you to the paralytic man in Matthew nine verse two? So that's a good question. You know, why did Jesus tell this man? I mean, obviously he came for healing. He was paralyzed. But why is Jesus telling him your sins are forgiven? And we don't see Jesus doing this all the time. In some other cases, he healed first. And then he said your sins are forgiven. But in this case, he's saying first, your sins are forgiven. And then he's healing the man. Why? Now, the scriptures don't give us the answer. But here is an inference or something I think is valid to state. Many times, a sense of condemnation, forcing prevents faith from producing. So obviously, these people have great faith. They come all the way. But it is likely that this young man had a sense of condemnation in his heart. He must have, you know, we don't know his story. But maybe he is lying there paralyzed, but he's regretting things he's done in the past. And he has not, you know, undersk, he doesn't have a sense of being forgiven. So what does he carry? He's carrying a sense of guilt, shame, condemnation. And those things hinder faith from producing. Did they have faith? Of course they had faith. Jesus saw their faith. But something had to be dealt with. Guilt, shame, condemnation. So the first thing Jesus tells this man is your sins are forgiven. So you can imagine at that moment, he was released from that sense of guilt, shame and condemnation, his faith was now free to receive. The next thing Jesus says is take your bedwalk. So although the scriptures don't state that, from our understanding of scripture, that would be a valid statement to make in response to Matthew nine verse two. Okay. All right. So we are going to pause now. I know it's only time up. There's one more question from Rebecca. At the time of difficulty, how do we stand in faith? Right. So, Rebecca, it's a very good question. And we, you know, maybe we'll keep it for later because there is a chapter coming up on, you know, how to have strong faith and how to stand in faith through time. So we will, you know, we will address that in detail because it's an important question is something we all face. So we will address that in detail in a coming class. Okay. So let's pause here. We will continue this next week. I want you to just take some time to soak in the things you are learning. For some of us, this may be new. For some of us, it may be something we already know. And it's just a reminder of things. So just refresh yourself in it. And most importantly, begin to use it in your personal life, begin to use it, because that's the only way faith can grow. Right. We have to use faith just like our muscle, just remember faith muscle, you have to use your faith if you want faith to grow. Okay, I want to I'm going to ask somebody to please close us in prayer. We're already over time. So somebody could just do a quick prayer for us and we can dismiss Roslyn. Would you like to dismiss us in prayer? Please. Wonderful. Jesus, thank you, Lord. Daddy, we come before your throne of praise. Lord, thank you for the wonderful word that you have taught us this morning. Lord, help us to grow in faith. Daddy, we thank you, Lord, even as we grow in faith, help us to apply the words that we learn each and every day. Lord, we also thank you for the wonderful pastor that you have given us. We pray your blessing over him. Lord, we thank you and we and I pray your blessing over all the students that are in this session. Lord, we thank you and we bless you. In Jesus' mighty name, we pray. Amen. Amen. Thank you, everyone. It's good to have you all in class. Enjoy your next hour. Enjoy your weekend. Grow strong in Jesus. God bless. Bye now. Thank you. God bless you all. Thank you. Thank you, pastor. God bless you. God bless you. God bless you.