We Are Nazareth
Day 6—How Do We Make Faith Ours?
Are We Nazareth?
This year has been trying to say the least. Yesterday marked a full year of asking God alone for provision for my family of five (plus a pup). And still, I find myself glancing at the bank account, feeling that wave of anxiety. Why? Because I’m human—and still learning to depend completely on God.
But that’s not the kind of Nazareth I’m talking about today.
Many of you are genuinely inviting God to lead and sustain you. You’re walking through hardship with faith. Yet when I look around—the church here in Georgia, the workplaces I’ve been in, the tone of our culture, and yes, even social media (which tells all truth, right?)—the West feels a lot like Nazareth.
The Nazareth Problem
The hometown of Jesus almost had an unfair advantage. They knew His family, His trade, His voice—but not His authority. Familiarity blinded their faith.
“He could do no mighty work there… and He was amazed at their unbelief.” (Mark 6:5–6)
Nazareth was full of knowledge about Jesus but empty of belief in Jesus.
They didn’t deny His existence—they just didn’t expect His power.
That’s the danger of a comfortable church culture made possible by freedom of religion.
We can quote Scripture, sing songs, and applaud sermons—yet live as though God is a memory, not a present reality.
But I don’t want to be too hard on these people—or on you. This passage reminds me that our human ability to manifest faith or God’s power is impossible. It is His calling, His gift, His anointing.
Faith Without Dependence
In Matthew 17, the disciples failed to cast out a demon they once had authority over.
Jesus called their generation faithless and twisted—not because they lacked knowledge, but because they lacked reliance.
I love watching my three little girls. They teach me so much. I’ll open the door for them, offer to help them into the car, and they’ll say, “Let me do it! Let me climb in! Let me open the door!”
Aren’t we the same with God? We try to do what only He can do.
Faith isn’t about a formula or how much you know—it’s about a relationship of dependence.
Jesus said faith as small as a mustard seed can move mountains—not because the seed is strong, but because it’s alive and connected to the soil of God’s power.
Our generation doesn’t lack knowledge, talent, or resources. It lacks living faith—faith that actually expects God to act.
Faith Without Love
Paul took it deeper:
“If I have all faith, so as to remove mountains, but have not love, I am nothing.” (1 Corinthians 13:2)
Faith without love isn’t faith—it’s performance.
You can believe for miracles and still miss the heart of God.
You can defend truth and forget mercy.
You can speak powerfully but live without compassion.
Love gives faith its purpose.
Love keeps power from becoming pride.
Love turns authority into compassion.
Without love, even mountain-moving faith becomes hollow religion.
And as 1 John 4:19 reminds us, we love because He first loved us.
God is love. His common grace is evident everywhere, but if you’re not pursuing Him—the Source of love—you’ll react instead of act, burn out instead of thrive, and build unnecessary agendas instead of letting the Spirit move.
Becoming the Anti-Nazareth
Nazareth shows what happens when people grow too familiar with God to believe He still moves.
But I’m confident the Spirit is raising a generation that will believe again—not for show, but for surrender.
The anti-Nazareth believer is one who:
Expects God to act because He’s alive, not because life is easy or comfortable
Loves people enough to pray bold, immediate prayers and take risky steps of obedience
Chooses intimacy with God over information about Him, spending daily time in His presence
Faith in this generation won’t look like hype—it’ll look like hidden dependence, exercised in public.
It’ll look like loving the one person no one else sees.
It’ll look like praying when logic says stop.
It’ll look like believing that Jesus still does what only He can do.
A Prayer for a Faithless Generation
Father, forgive us for taking You for granted—and for not even taking You.
For having access but not being obsessed.
For living a verbal faith instead of an active one.
For treating Your presence as an optional inconvenience.
Do what only You can do.
Make us zealous, lead us on Your path, and draw us into Your presence daily.
Root our faith in You.
Do what You long to do in our homes, our cities, and our generation.
We believe—help our unbelief.
In Jesus’ name, amen.
Never Finished Challenge
Ask the Holy Spirit to show you one place in your life where you’ve stopped expecting God to move.
Pray over it until faith and love collide.
Then take one small act of obedience that says, “I still believe.”
Journal it.
Date the moment God answers (because He always does), and write it down every day.
You’ll find that you start looking for God to move instead of wondering if He is moving.
Read: Mark 6, Matthew 17, 1 Corinthians 13
Reflect: Where have I grown familiar with God instead of dependent on Him?
What Does Today Say About God?
Faithful.
He will do it.
I know we have songs, people, and moments that say that. But I’m thirty-six years old, and I can testify from daily experience—He most definitely will do it.
Why?
Not because I deserve it, but because He is faithful.
His very nature exudes perfect faith. And when we step into dependence on that perfect faith and reflect it, it transforms those around us and ourselves.
What a Father.
What a Friend.
What a King.
Thank You, Jesus.
That was such a powerful message. It really speaks to the heart of what faith and dependence on God truly mean. Many times we know about Jesus, but we stop expecting Him to actually move in our lives just like the people of Nazareth. But as Scripture reminds us in Hebrews 11:6, Without faith it is impossible to please God, because anyone who comes to Him must believe that He exists and that He rewards those who earnestly seek Him.
Faith is not about head knowledge, it’s about trust, surrender, and relationship. When we start depending on our own strength, we lose sight of the One who gives us strength. Jesus said in John 15:5, I am the vine; you are the branches. If you remain in me and I in you, you will bear much fruit apart from me you can do nothing.
I pray we all become anti-Nazareth believers, people who expect God to move, who live in love and dependence, and who never lose the wonder of His presence.