The evangelist Dwight L. Moody once said, “Faith that fizzles in the finish has a flaw in the beginning.” For many Christians, faith is a concept, not a reality. It is easier for them to talk about faith than to walk by it, but the Bible says it is impossible to please God without faith. What kind of faith pleases the Lord? Faith that can be tested and can be stretched…mountain-moving faith!

“And Jesus answering saith unto them, Have faith in God. For verily I say unto you, That whosoever shall say unto this mountain, Be thou removed and be thou cast into the sea; and shall not doubt in his heart, but shall believe that those things which he saith shall come to pass; he shall have whatsoever he saith” (Mark 11:22-23).

To survive in today’s world, you need faith…but the right kind of faith. Not flawed faith that “fizzles in the end.” That isn’t really faith at all, is it? Hebrews 11:1 says, “Now faith is the assurance (the confirmation, the title deed) of the things we hope for, being the proof of things we do not see and the conviction of their reality—faith perceiving as real fact what is not revealed to the senses” (Amplified).

Romans 12:3 says, “…God hath dealt to every man the measure of faith.” You have received a measure of faith! If you want to develop your faith, you have to exercise it. What does that mean? “So then faith cometh by hearing, and hearing by the word of God” (Romans 10:17). Can you develop your faith simply by going to church and listening to good preaching? Yes, you can increase your faith that way. But relying solely on your sense of hearing will not turn your faith into mountain-moving faith. You must hear the Word of God with your heart!

Hearing the Word of God is not the same as listening to it. Hearing goes beyond the physical act. It engages the heart—and it begins, not with the ear, but with the eye. If you want to develop mountain moving faith, you must be in the Word every day. You must read it and let God speak to you through it. From there, you begin to latch onto truths that impact you, and you step out in faith. I encourage you to take steps to strengthen your faith today.

Recently, we hosted International Holocaust Remembrance Day at the Friends of Zion Center in Jerusalem. Our keynote speaker was Rena Quint, a Holocaust survivor. As a child, Rena endured unimaginable suffering. At the age of nine, she lay down under a tree, choosing to die there rather than in the stifling, disease-ridden barracks of the Holocaust. She had spent most of her childhood in ghettos, labor camps, and death marches, with little water to drink, covered in filth. Her entire family—her mother, father, brothers, aunts, uncles, and cousins—were murdered in the Holocaust. Many people do not realize that in Poland alone, 99 out of every 100 Jewish children were killed.

On this International Holocaust Remembrance Day, our Friends of Zion Center was filled with Holocaust survivors, many from Russia, Ukraine, Poland, and other parts of Europe. They all have one thing in common: Friends of Zion is caring for them. Every week, Holocaust survivors gather at Friends of Zion to sing, share meals, and comfort one another. Thanks to you, all of this is made possible.

The only community center in Jerusalem dedicated to Holocaust survivors was built by Friends of Zion. These survivors—once children during the Holocaust—are now elderly, and many rely on Friends of Zion for essential care. They sleep in beds we provide, eat meals we supply, and receive life-saving medications through our support. I recently visited the home of one such survivor to deliver her medicine. With tears in her eyes, she said to me: “A friend in need is a friend indeed.”

For more than a decade, we have cared for Holocaust survivors—not only in Israel but also throughout Ukraine. I first encountered this heartbreaking reality when I saw an elderly Holocaust survivor—her concentration camp number still tattooed on her arm—digging through a dumpster in the dead of winter. She had to be close to 90 years old. She was homeless. At that moment, I made a pledge: we would help every Holocaust survivor in Ukraine. And we have been doing it ever since.

A few years ago, I shared my personal story—how I was named after my great-grandfather, Rabbi Michael Katz-Nelson, who was burned alive in a synagogue along with 2,000 other Jews. The cantor of that synagogue was the grandfather of Israel’s ninth president, Shimon Peres, who later served as our International Chairman.

After hearing my story, the Chief Rabbi of Israel said to me, “You are a Jewish man, but you have never had a Bar Mitzvah.” He arranged for Rabbi Yisroel Goldstein—who survived a deadly attack on his synagogue in San Diego, losing several fingers in the process—to officiate my Bar Mitzvah at age 70. This was a deeply moving experience for me.

It was then that the Spirit of God spoke to me: none of the children of the Holocaust had Bar Mitzvahs or Bat Mitzvahs. They were in concentration camps when they should have been celebrating this sacred rite of passage. So, we sent out a message across Israel, inviting every Holocaust survivor who wished to have a Bar or Bat Mitzvah to come to Jerusalem—all expenses paid. They stay at Friends of Zion at no cost, and we hold a special ceremony for them at the Western Wall, followed by a joyous celebration.

I share this with you to express my deepest gratitude because you have been a light and a source of hope for some of the most precious people on this earth…people who have endured unspeakable suffering.

The little Old Testament book of Hosea doesn’t just tell us of God’s love for Israel; the prophet lived it out in a way that would be difficult, if not impossible for many. Hosea was instructed to find a wife, and not just any wife, he was to marry a prostitute, the basest of women. Hosea was to love with a God-like love a woman who perhaps would not reciprocate his affection. The prophet was to enter into a one-sided marital relationship. Jehovah wanted Hosea to love the wife he would choose with the same love that He had for Israel. This was to be about Hosea’s unconditional love for her.

Ready to fulfill God’s instruction, Hosea set out to find God’s choice for him. He settled on a woman named Gomer—not a name we hear a lot today. Oddly, it means “complete.” Much to Hosea’s surprise and chagrin, he fell deeply in love with this woman. They married and had three children together. But one day the ordinariness of being a wife and mother got the better of Gomer, and she abandoned her family only to return to the life of prostitution. Like many men—and women—today who have been betrayed by a spouse, Hosea took up the reins of parenthood and raised the children alone, all the while desperately lonely for the wife who had abandoned him.

God allowed this for a time, but one day He instructed Hosea to go out and search for Gomer who by then had been abandoned by her lover and had sold herself into slavery. He searched all the back alleys and houses of ill-repute until he found his beloved wife—even though still an adulteress. How was it possible for Hosea to love Gomer that much—to love her desperately? We find the answer in Hosea 3:1, “Love her as the Lord loves.” The account of Hosea and Gomer is a remarkable illustration of God’s great and gracious love, an outstanding biblical example of sacrificial love.

Hosea had finally found Gomer—dirty, unkempt, ill, and wretched, a mere shadow of her former self, yet he still loved her. He offered far more than she might have been worth on the auction block—fifteen shekels of silver and thirteen bushels of barley (see Hosea 3:2.) I like to picture Hosea wrapping her in his cloak to protect her from prying eyes and then leading her home. Once there, he gave her specific instructions (verse 3): You shall stay with me many days; you shall not play the harlot, nor shall you have a man—so, too, will I be toward you.

Was it easy for Hosea to offer that kind of forgiveness to the one who had so betrayed him? Marriages are destroyed by far less than Hosea endured. But God had a lesson for Israel: He loved them with an everlasting love. It was a mirror of God’s constant love which reaches far beyond our sinfulness all the way to the Cross where Love hung between heaven and earth. God loves you so much that He was willing to send His Son to die so that we could become part of His family…and that love never changes no matter what we do. I encourage you to rejoice in God’s love for you today.