Faith 2016.12.19

Our walk as Christians hangs upon one thing - Faith. Going to every service, all of the studying, even contributing all that we have, does nothing for us unless we have faith in God. Faith is our entire Christian walk.

We trust God and exercise that confidence in Him on a consistent basis. We believe in His Word and act upon it, no matter how we feel, because we know that He promises us a good outcome. And as His disciples, the outcome of exercising our faith is critical - When used, we move closer to Him, and when we do not, we lose ground and fall away from Him.

Now, lets not confuse what I'm saying with this common scripture:

And now these three remain: faith, hope and love. But the greatest of these is love.


1 Corinthians 13:13

Love truly is the greatest element in our walk, and is, in a sense, greater than faith because it can influence others powerfully.

But biblical love is built upon faith. We can't begin to love as the scripture says until faith in Jesus bridges that gap between us & God. It forms our basic relationship with God, so it's our foundation. And love for others flows from that relationship.

Faith is essential.

Every good thing that God wants to bring into our lives, comes through faith. No faith, no relationship. But with faith, we can have that ever-growing & eternal relationship, and the closer we grow to Him, our faith increases.

And 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.


Hebrews 11:6


So, if you're reading this, you have faith in God. But my question now is - How do you increase it?

Faith is increased when you use it.

Delving more into His Word, but also applying that knowledge into our own lives (confidence in the fact that God has always/does today/will continue to love, forgive, provide, protect, assist, rebuke, ...). It's like working out - You won't improve much if we keep benching the same weight, or running at the same speed for the rest of our lives. Pushing ourselves to squeeze in one more rep, more weight, new drills, faster & longer speeds... strengthens our bodies, so taking bigger & more frequent steps blindly into the "uncontrolled unknown" exercises & strengthens our faith, but also helps us to draw closer to Him.