What is Faith ( 1st part )

Faith is a “spiritual substance” on the inside of you that can either grow or wane. Here is the main verse from our Bible which will tell us exactly what faith is: “Now faith is the SUBSTANCE of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.” (Hebrews 11:1)
I believe this verse may be telling us that faith is literally a “spiritual substance” that operates on the inside of us and that it is capable of growing or waning.
However, other Bible Scholars do not believe that faith is an actual substance. Their argument is based off the Greek word for the word “substance.” This Greek word is “hypostasis” and it means: “A setting under or support (foundation), assurance, confidence, confident expectation, an assured impression and a mental realizing.”
Other good definitions on what faith is from some of the different Bible Dictionaries and Commentaries are the following: “The assurance of things hoped for, a belief or confident attitude toward God, conviction, trust, belief, reliance, and a trustworthiness towards God.”
But whether faith is a spiritual substance and/or more of a mental quality – it can still be actually increased or decreased as you will see in the following verses. And we are also given a certain measure of it by the Lord.
The Bible tells us that we have all been given a certain “measure of faith” by God in which to work with. Here is the verse that will give us this specific revelation: “… as God has dealt to each one a MEASURE OF FAITH …” (Romans 12:3)
The best way to understand faith and how it operates on the inside of you is on a scale of 1-10, with 10 being the most amount of faith you can have and 1 being the lowest amount of faith you can have.
Most people start out in their own personal walk with the Lord at the lower end of that range – in the 1-3 category. And that is just fine with God! One of the most amazing insights that I feel God has given me on this subject is the following analogy:
I felt like this really came from the Holy Spirit. He said to me: “If the Bible says that faith the size of a mustard seed can move a mountain, what do you think faith the size of a golf ball could do? Or faith the size of a baseball? Or faith the size of a basketball?” This means that your faith is capable of growing.
The mustard seed is supposed to be one of the smallest of all seeds. The above analogy tells us two things:
One – that your faith can literally grow in the Lord over time – from a mustard seed size – to a golf ball size – to a baseball size – to a basketball size, etc. Here is the verse that will specifically tell us that our faith levels are capable of actually growing in the Lord: “… because your FAITH GROWS EXCEEDINGLY …” (2 Thessalonians 1:3)
Two – look very closely at the above analogy. The Bible says that faith the size of a mustard seed can move mountains! This means that we do not have to have our faith levels up in the 5-8 category to get God to become very active in our lives. All we need is a very small amount of faith to get the show going with God.
In other words, on a scale of 1-10, all you need is a 1 amount of faith to get God to start moving in your life – and everyone has at least a 1 amount of faith when they get saved because the above verse tells us that God has given each one of us a certain “measure of faith.” God has to give each person a certain measure of faith, otherwise we would not be able to get saved, as the Bible specifically tells us that we are saved by grace through “faith.”
So when you witness to others, explain this analogy to them. Explain to them that they do not need to have great or large amounts of faith in God to get Him to become very active in their lives when they first enter into the real walk with the Lord. God will take whatever amount of faith you have to start off with and He will then start the building process with your life with just that small amount of faith!

Next: HOW TO INCREASE YOUR FAITH

THE FELLOWSHIP OF CHRISTIAN BROTHERS IN ACTION

Benefits of Faith.

The Bible teaches us that genuine faith is "more precious than gold that perishes" (1 Peter 1:7). Indeed such faith is going to be "tested by fire". You can expect difficulties and persecutions in your life of faith, as well as blessings. Therefore to encourage you to hold onto and develop your faith, we will consider some of the benefits of faith.

1. Faith brings salvation. (Ephesians 2:8,9). Whosever believes in Him has eternal life. (John 3:16), and shall not come into judgment, but has passed from death to life. (John 5:24). The just shall live by faith. (Romans 1:17)

2. Faith brings answers to prayer. "And whatever things you ask in prayer, really believing, you will receive." (Matthew 21:22). Since God tells us to pray for our daily bread (Matthew 6:11), faith is therefore a key to our material provision.

3. Faith brings all the benefits of salvation into our lives (Ephesians 2:8,9). This includes healing, prosperity, peace, love, joy (1 Peter 1:8), deliverance from demons and the curse, sanctification of the mind and emotions (the salvation of the soul) and any other benefit which the word of God promises to us.

4. Faith is a spiritual force through which our ministry for Christ becomes effective. (Mark 11:23; Matthew 17:19,20). Faith is a major key to ministry success. It brings to you what you need for your ministry, and by imparting it to others through your life and your ministry of God's Word, you enable them to receive the blessings of God's grace mentioned above.

5. In particular, faith is the major key for an effective healing and deliverance ministry. Jesus Christ "the same yesterday, today and forever" lives in the Christian (Hebrews 13:8, Galatians 2:20), and through the Christian wants to reveal the power of salvation to men in a way they can see and feel. In this way, our evangelism concerning the Kingdom of God will not be in talk, but in power (1 Corinthians 4:20).

How to Develop Faith

We see how important faith is. Yet some people despair here, thinking that they don't have faith. Yet faith comes (Romans 10:17), it can grow and develop. If you are not full of faith today, that doesn't mean you will be that way all your life. You can choose to be a person of faith!

Here are some keys to developing faith.

1. Listen to the Word of God as much as possible. "Faith comes by hearing, and hearing by the Word of God" (Romans 10:17). Constant attention to the Word of God produces faith, especially if we attend to it with an open heart and mind. The book of Proverbs encourages us to constantly keep the Word in our hearts and to keep our attention on it (Proverbs 4:20-22). Health is one of the benefits promised.

What we listen to affects what we believe. If we listen to the TV more than to the Word, we will believe the lies of the world more than we will believe what God says. Constant attention to lies produces deception. Eventually the mind will accept something if that thing is heard often enough and persuasively enough. That is why we should keep hearing the Word of God, through preaching, Christian tapes, confession of the Word, daily fellowship with godly Christians. This will cause us eventually to believe the truth from our hearts.

2. Realise that every believer has been given a measure of faith by God. (Romans 12:3). We just have to use and develop what God has given. We must put it into action.

3. Pray in tongues and be full of the Spirit (Jude 20). We will look at this later. If you have been baptised in the Spirit as the disciples were in the book of Acts, you should pray and praise in tongues often because through this you "edify yourself" (1 Corinthians 14:4) and "build yourself up in your most holy faith". Praying in tongues is a key to being full of the Spirit. Since faith is a fruit of the Spirit, all things things are related together.

4. Obey God and the conviction of the Holy Spirit. It is as you walk that you gain strength. God will not reveal greater things to you until you are faithful in the things He is showing you NOW. Therefore obedience to the Spirit and what He is showing you through the Word or through your conscience is important in the development of your faith. You cannot have living faith without taking some practical steps of obedience. Act on what God is saying!

5. Give thanks. Give thanks for the results before you see. Don't complain - that shows you doubt God's love and God's answer to your situation. Give thanks in all situations (1 Thessalonians 5:18).

6. Develop a life of praise and worship. Praise drives the powers of darkness away and brings the throne of God into your circumstances. Praising God is an act of faith and helps your faith to grow. It is commanded (Hebrews 13:15). Worship is admiring God through the Spirit. If you can perceive who is God, His power, faithfulness and love your trust and faith in Him will grow.

7. Spend as much time as you can with people of faith. The spirit of faith on them will touch your life also (Proverbs 13:20).

8. Speak the WORD. By saying with your mouth you exercise your faith, you hear the Word and you build it into your life. God's Word is anointed and has power when it is spoken to change the spiritual atmosphere (Joshua 1:8; Romans 10:10). Confession of God's Word (saying the same thing as God's word) brings you into the place where the Lord will move to fulfil it (Hebrews 3:1). The angels hearken to the voice of God's Word (Psalms 103:20)

9. Seek holiness, purity of heart. "Pursue peace with all men, and holiness, without which no one will see the Lord." (Hebrews 12:14). It is with the heart that man believes (Romans 10:10). To the extent that the heart has uncleanness, unforgiveness and other bad conditions within, the man will lose the spiritual perception of the Lord which enables his heart to believe. Purity and faith feed each other.

10. Remember that faith works by love (Galatians 5:6). The centurion (Matthew 8:5-13) and the woman of Canaan (Matthew 15:21-28) were both motivated by their love for another in coming to Jesus. And both were described as having great faith. Let us believe God for others to be blessed, in a spirit of love, and as we give of our selves God will give blessings to us also (Luke 6:37). This is related to the idea of "seed-faith". Express your faith by planting a seed in terms of some form of giving. God will release a multiplied harvest in return if we endure and do not faint (Hebrews 10:36).

What Faith is not

Faith is not religion. Many times people say "We have our faith". What they mean is this: "We have our religious ideas and doctrines, our traditions, our ways of doing things passed down through the generations. Don't you try to change them." This is not the Biblical idea of faith.

Faith is not mental assent. It is not agreeing with your mind, "Yes, that is true." Many professing Christians believe mentally that the Bible is the Word of God, but this faith does not change the way they live. It is not a faith that can save. (James 2:14)

Even demons have that kind of faith. They know and believe that God exists (James 2:19) - and tremble. They have no loving confidence in God.

Faith is not a way to manipulate God. It is not a power by which we make God do what WE want when otherwise He would be unwilling to do that thing. It is not a kind of magic through which we make God into our servant!

Faith is not hope, nor positive desire. Hope is good, and relates to the future. Faith, however, takes the promise as done NOW. Many people have hope and are anxiously looking for results, but they lack the settled confidence and present assurance which faith has.

What Faith Is

In the general sense of the word, to have faith is to believe in something or someone, to fully trust, to be so confident that you base your actions on what you believe. To have faith is to be fully convinced of the truthfulness and reliability of that in which you believe.

Faith in God then, is having the kind of trust and confidence in God and in Christ that leads you to commit your whole soul to Him as Saviour (Justifier, Cleanser, Healer, Deliverer) and Lord (Master, King).

The NIV translation says, "Faith is being sure of what we hope for, and certain of what we do not see." (Hebrews 11:1 NIV).

The NKJV of the Bible says, "Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen." (Hebrews 11:1).

Faith is a spiritual substance. When you have this spiritual substance in you, it communicates to you a certain inner knowing that the thing you are hoping for is certainly established, even before you see any material evidence that it has happened.

Faith is a spiritual force. Faith in God is a response to God's Word which moves God to act. Jesus said in Mark 11:23, "For assuredly I say to you, whoever SAYS to this mountain, 'Be removed and cast into the sea,' and does not doubt in his heart, but BELIEVES that those things he SAYS will be done, he will HAVE whatever he SAYS." Words mixed with the real, pure faith can and will move mountains or any other problem that we face.

Faith in God must be from the heart. It is not merely intellectual. It is spiritual. "For with the heart one believes unto righteousness, and with the mouth confession is made unto salvation." (Romans 10:10)

Faith causes you to know in your heart before you see with your eyes. "For we walk by faith, not by sight." (2Cor 5.7)

Some say, "Seeing is believing." Once you see the thing hoped for already existing in the natural order, you don't need faith.

Hope is a condition for faith. Hope is "a positive unwavering expectation of good". Hope is for the mind (1 Thessalonians 5:8; Hebrews 6:19), an anchor for the soul. It keeps us in the place where we can believe, but it is not in itself "faith". Yet, without hope there are no "things hoped for", and therefore there cannot be faith.

Through faith we can know we have the answer to our prayer before we see anything change in the natural order (1 John 5:14,15). Jesus said, "Therefore I say to you, whatever things you ask when you pray, believe that you receive them, and you will have them." (Mk 11:24). God expects us, even commands us, to believe that our petitions are answered by God AT THE MOMENT WE MAKE THEM. We must believe that the response is immediately sent WHEN we pray. Faith is like the confirmation slip in our hearts that the goods are on the way. We have that confirmation slip instantly from God. We sense it in our hearts. The manifestation of those goods, the answer received, comes later as long as we are patient and do not throw away our confidence. (Hebrews 10:35-39; Hebrews 6:12)

Faith is like a cheque. All you have to do is hold on to the cheque, go to the bank to present it and you can confidently expect the money to appear in your account after a certain time. If you throw the cheque away the money will not be put in your account. God is trustworthy and always has resources to back his promises.

Living faith always has corresponding actions. We talk what we really believe, and we act according to what we really believe. The heroes of faith like Abraham were considered men of faith because they acted on what God showed them. They acted on their faith. (Hebrews 11:17-38, James 2:21-23).

To live in faith means to do and say what you believe is right, without doubting.

Faith is a rest. It is compatible with inner peace. It is not "trying to believe". To say that you are "trying to believe" God is to say that you don't believe Him. The man who is "trying to believe" may be sincere, but he does not have faith in that area yet.