Faith
“Now
faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.” –
Hebrews 11:1
There are two kinds of faith. Natural faith is what we all have. We can see a bridge, and not wince at the
thought of going over it. We trust the
bridge to hold our vehicle up, and we cross it. This is natural faith. Natural faith is also the faith in which we
are saved. It is the ability to believe
that God is who He says He is, and Jesus is who He says He is. It is God’s will that all be saved, and all
have received this natural faith.
But divine faith is a spiritual gift of the Holy Spirit. It is an extraordinary trust in God to do
what seems impossible to most. It is,
like all the other spiritual gifts, the manifestation of the unseen Holy Spirit
at work, and is “given
to each one for the profit of all” (1
Corinthians 12:7). Faith is a benefit to all when it is shared, showing others
that God can be trusted. It is a complete persuasion, a deep rooted
conviction of belief. It is defined in
Hebrews 11:1, which says “Now
faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.”
One of the greatest stories of faith in the
Bible I believe is the story of Abraham and Isaac. Abraham was a man who was full of faith,
completely trusting God to fulfill the promise to him of descendants more
numerous than the stars, even if it meant raising Isaac, his only son, from the
dead.
In Genesis 22 we read of Abraham’s trust in
God, as he took his only son Isaac, a donkey packing wood for an offering, and
his young servants to Mt. Moriah. As he
leaves his young servants behind he tells them in verse 5 “Stay here with the donkey; the lad and I will go yonder and worship,
and we will come back to you.” ‘We will come back to you’, he told
his servants. Abraham had full faith in
God to deliver his son, somehow, someway.
As they got to the top of the mountain to
offer up the sacrifice Isaac asks his father where the offering was, and
Abraham again speaks in faith and says in verse 8, “My son, God will provide for Himself the lamb for a burnt offering.”
I don’t think for a moment that Abraham was just trying to calm Isaac or trying
to appease the young boy’s questions. I
also don’t think Abraham feared that God would kill his only son. He had faith that since God had told him that
he would have descendants as numerous as the stars that God would find a way,
if it was necessary to kill Isaac, to raise him up again and cause children to
still be born from Isaac. This is supernatural
faith, extraordinary faith, divine faith, that only God can give. His faith was so great that this very example
is retold in Hebrews 11 among other stories of great faith.
Paul and Silas were two men filled with
great faith. Sitting in a prison cell,
bound in chains, they were not disappointed in God’s care over them. They didn’t sit there looking at their
circumstances, they lived in faith that God was not done with them. At midnight they were singing hymns and
praise to God. Could God be trusted to come
through? Ask the prison guard about the
earth quake and how that even he was saved as not a one of the prisoners tried
to escape when their chains were broken.
In 2008 God sought to grow my faith through
several events. One of which was through
the testimony of a strong woman of God in my church who told of being delivered
from depression. I myself had been on
depression medications for years, and though the depression had ended, my
doctors told me I “wouldn’t do as well” if I were to go off of them. In addition, I was fully aware that
depression runs in my family, and feared I was not going to be spared. But this sweet woman of faith gave her story
of God delivering her from depression medication at the altar of our church
years before. It did not fall on deaf
ears, as God spoke to my heart saying “what I did for her – I’ll do for you.”
I trusted God, and acted on faith. Gradually I began to go off the medication,
and then as he will always do, the enemy entered in and threw a lot of trouble
my way. He used those closes to me to
put me through trials that I felt too weak to handle. But in faith, I believed God for what He had
said, “what I did for her - I’ll do for you.”
One of the requirements for faith is to be unwavering (James 1:6-7), to
stand strong in the face of the enemy when he attacks, and rest assured that
God is God and no one else is in power. One
Wednesday night at church, as we were giving praise testimonies and asking for
prayers, I sat there with my heart breaking, crumbling to tears. I finally stopped being a silent warrior, and
stood. I declared to the entire church,
but more so to satan himself, that he would lose because My God would be
trusted. I was not backing down, and I
was not giving up on the God who told me He would deliver me. I never took another pill – and I never
will.
Isaiah 26:3 is one of my favorite verses,
and one I leaned on when going off my depression meds. It says “You
will keep him in perfect peace whose mind is stayed on You, because he trusts
in You.” Another equally strong
verse for those who are going through this trial is 2 Timothy 1:7, which says “For God has not given us a spirit of fear,
but of power and of love and of a sound mind.”
Even more recently my daughter began to
have nightmares. They would linger in
her thoughts during the day and she really hated sleeping because of these horrible
dreams. God showed me long ago that He
can guard our minds when we sleep as well as when we are awake. I began to pray with her before she went to
sleep. She put her faith in Him, and hasn’t
had a nightmare since.
A week ago today, after fighting a cough
that had gone on for over three weeks, God came to my rescue again. I’d been given antibiotics, cough pills,
cough syrup, two different inhalers, a nasal spray, and basically everything the
doctors could think of to give me. Yet
the cough continued, sometimes to the point that I’d have coughing fits and not
be able to stop. I’d be having
conversations with my clients and have to mute my phone while I coughed uncontrollably. Last Sunday I stopped taking all the meds and
had a talk with God. I simply said, “God,
you created this temple and you live in it.
If it is going to be healed, you will be the one to do it, and you will
get the praise – not some medication.” My
God is trustworthy. Today I give praise
to God Almighty, who has never failed me. I coughed for a few days after that,
and then the cough stopped. I just wish
I’d have leaned on Him sooner.
I don’t give these examples to boast of
having anything that isn’t available to all God’s children, and given by God as
He wills. Luke 1:37 says “For with God nothing will be impossible.” The key word in that verse is “with”.
Divine faith is not from ourselves, but it is a gift from God.
Faith is a gift that must be
exercised. I say exercised because it is
like a muscle. You don’t overnight begin
to believe God for the extraordinary any more than a weightlifter suddenly goes
from lifting a sandwich to lifting a 1,000 pound set of weights! God will encourage us and strengthen us as He
grows our faith through the opportunities He places in our lives. If you want
more faith, ask God for it. He will help
you, giving you opportunities to grow your faith in Him.
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