A Lesson in Faith

I want to spend some time in this message for the next few minutes looking at one the most important subjects of our Christian walk…and that is the subject of Faith…and I can think of no better place to learn about Faith than in the 11th chapter of the book of Hebrews. If you will turn there with me we’re going to be looking at a few scriptures that I believe will help us to learn what faith is and what it is not…and how to get more of it. Verse 2 tells us “For by it (faith) the elders obtained a good testimony.” And I think if we want to have a good testimony, we need to learn how to grow in the area of faith.

And so the first questions that we might ask are, “Just what is Faith? And how do we obtain more of it?” Well, verse one explains very clearly what faith is. It says “Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.” According to this verse, faith is “substance”…it’s real…there’s nothing phony or fake about faith! It’s not your imagination…it’s not something you conjure up in your mind…it is genuine and it’s real! And, this scripture also tells us that faith is “evidence”. When a crime is committed, the investigators go to the scene of the crime and they begin to look for “evidence”. They are looking for something that will prove to them beyond a doubt how the crime was committed. 

And so the writer to the Hebrews here is telling us that Faith is proof! Faith is that confidence that comes from your heart so that you know without a doubt that what you believe will come to pass in your life will happen! And then, verse 6 tells us, “But without faith it is impossible to please Him, for he who comes to God must believe that He is, and that He is a rewarder of those who diligently seek Him.” Friends, according to this verse you cannot please God unless you first, believe that He is…you must know in your heart that God exists…AND you must believe that He wants to do good things in and through your life. But the condition for that promise is found right there in verse 6…in order for God to reward you and to do good things in your life…you must first “seek Him diligently’! You must DESIRE to know Him…you must build a relationship with God.

I remember when I first came to faith in Christ and I was in a charismatic church where they were teaching the “prosperity gospel”. Now I want you to understand that this is a false message…it is not according to God’s Word…and even though they throw a few scriptures in there to make you believe that it’s real and true, it is in fact a false doctrine! And they were teaching us that if you are not receiving the results that you believed would happen, then you were just lacking in faith. Friends, there were people naming and claiming all kinds of money and material possessions because of that false doctrine. People were becoming very disheartened and very discouraged trying to follow those teachings and the only ones who were getting everything they wanted were the preachers who were receiving the offerings from the people who believed they were giving to receive a financial blessing from God. 

And I remember wondering back then, “If a person does not have enough faith, then how does he or she get more?” From the way the scriptures was being taught, it seemed that you should be able to just reach into the air and grab yourself a handful of faith. And then they would quote the scripture found in Romans 10:17, “So then faith comes by hearing, and hearing by the word of God” and the way it seemed was that if you wanted more faith you had to listen to them preach what the Word of God said…and the way they were preaching it just seemed futile to me…that is until I got into the Word of God for myself and began to seek the Lord for answers for my own life. Then I began to understand that faith is not believing in what you will get…but faith is believing in a Person…and that Person is Jesus Christ. Faith is coming to the Father through Jesus Christ and knowing in your heart that He alone is Faithful, and He will do what He says He will do if we are walking in obedience and righteousness, seeking to please Him alone in our lives.

So it became very obvious to me when I wasn’t seeing the things that I was “naming and claiming” being produced in my life, that something was very wrong with this doctrine. Then I finally I found the scripture promise in Matthew 6:33 which says “Seek first the Kingdom of God and His righteousness and all these things will be added unto you.” Well that scripture sounded a lot like the one in Hebrews 11:6 where it says, “…He is a rewarder of those who diligently seek Him.” And so I began to realize that there really is more involved to growing in faith than simply naming and claiming whatever I wanted.

So here is what I learned:

1. I have to believe that He is…I have to know in my heart of hearts that God exists.

2. I have to know that my Father loves me wants to do good things in my life.

3. I have to know that in order for Him to bless me or reward me, I need to seek Him with all my heart, I need to walk in righteousness and I need to work for the betterment of His Kingdom more than anything else. In other words, my desires should become the same as His desires and those desires should become the motivation for my life.

4. I have to do these things on a consistent basis so that I will see and experience the faithfulness of my God because every time I see Him do what He says He will do, it always increases my faith to trust Him for even more. I learned that God is faithful to do what He says He will do, and I can trust Him.

And I learned that if I will do this, then God will keep His promise to always take care of everything I have need of. 

So we learn that faith is pleasing to God…so it would be to our benefit as children of God to do the things that God tells us in His Word to do in order to grow our faith in Him so that we can see the results in and through our lives.

I learned that faith is confidence in a Person, and trusting that no matter what He does in our lives, He will always do what is right and good on our behalf. That is how you grow in faith.

I want to pray for you right now that you will also grow in your faith and confidence in our Lord Jesus Christ:

Father, we thank you that you have promised us in Your Word that we are each one given a portion or a measure of faith…and You have also provided a way for us to grow in our faith so that we might learn to trust You more and more. Thank you for always being faithful to us and helping us to learn and grow and I ask you to help us to be faithful to study Your Word and spend lots of time in prayer so that we can grow and we can learn to walk in Your ways more and more each day. We praise You for always being faithful. In Jesus Name…Amen.