Pearls of Great Value

Faith

“for we walk by faith, not by sight.”   2 Cor. 5:7 ESVi)

“Now faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen.  (Heb. 11:1 ESVi)

 

Reading through Hebrews 11, the faith chapter, it’s astounding to my mind, the impossible things these people hoped and believed for!Here are some of my favorites:

    By faith,(from Hebrews 11):

•We understand that what is seen has been made from things that are not visible.

•Enoch did not experience death and he was not to be found because God took him away.

•Noah, after being warned about a flood which had never before been seen, built an ark

•Abraham, left home and family when God called him, not knowing where he was going

•Sarah, when she was barren and old, by faith received power to conceive. It says, that even though she was past the age, she considered the One who had promised was faithful.

•Abraham, by faith, when he was tested, offered up his promised son, Isaac. He considered God to be able even to raise someone from the dead.

•Moses, left Egypt behind, not being afraid of the King’s anger, to go to a land not yet his. By faith, he sprinkled blood on the door posts, so that the destroyer of the firstborn might not touch them.

•By Faith,the walls of Jericho fell down, (without a physical battle) after being encircled for seven days

•Three men in a fiery furnace did not burn

•Daniel, overnight in a lions den, survived without any harm

 

 I mean, how is it possible to be in such faith?!Through much reading and meditating, I finally realized faith just has a different view on things. Literally. It totally doesn’t take into account the facts surrounding it in the natural! To make a bold statement, Faith actually does not see naturally, at the fleshly carnal level,at all. (Carnal, meaning, earthly minded, living according to the senses.) Romans 8:6 tells us, to be carnally minded is death, but to be spiritually minded is life and peace. 

What Faith does do, is this:

 Faith sees into the heavenly, into the eternal and it glimpses the blooms and fruits that are in abundance there.  Faith then fights and strives to bring that which it sees (in the spiritual realm) into the natural. It doesn’t stop until it sees those blooms and fruits being manifested in your life. Faith is the visual in your heart, this deep knowledge, that God and eternity is a reality that is more real and powerful than anything and anyone in the natural. This is the truth: That which I see with my natural eyes is fading, while that which I perceive with my spiritual eyes is eternal. So this is what faith in your heart does: it reaches into the eternal, grasps on to that reality and pulls it into the here and now. Faith does not, I repeat, does not live in the fleshly, earthly realm. It can’t. It lives and thrives in the spiritual realm.

 

So how do I get great faith? Well, I believe faith doesn’t come to us by accident. It’s not like I’m just going to wake up tomorrow with great faith. The Bible in 2 Cor. 5:7 says, we WALK by faith. Jude 20, tells us to BUILD ourselves up in our most holy faith. Col 2:6, Therefore, as you received Christ Jesus the Lord, so walk in him, rooted and built up in him and ESTABLISHED (to strengthen, to render constant) in the faith. These verses call for action. They call for us to exercise our faith muscle until it’s not weak anymore, but strong in the Word. Romans 10:17 says, “So then faith comes by hearing, and hearing by the word of God.” This is the area, the most important one, in which we can grow strong faith muscles: hearing the Word. Meditating on it. Spending time, a lot of time, hearing from God, and then making it a point to obey Him in whatever He calls us to do. This has been an area in which God has been prompting me to grow in, so yes, I am preaching to the choir! I pray for us to have a heart that is enlightened to hear His voice, to be full of willingness to obey, and to pursue being an unwavering believer. May we become strong in faith!

‭“Examine yourselves, to see whether you are in the faith. Test yourselves. Or do you not realize this about yourselves, that Jesus Christ is in you?—unless indeed you fail to meet the test!”(2 Cor. 13:5 ESVi)

 

“Fight the good fight of the faith. Take hold of the eternal life to which you were called and about which you made the good confession in the presence of many witnesses.”(1 Tim. 6:12 ESVi)