3 Things About Faith

The phrase “and they did not believe” came up several times as I was reading the Bible this morning. When I read phrases like that, I become nauseatingly aware of my disbelief. I felt prompted to pray the only thing I know to, “Holy Spirit, help me.” If I’m honest, I find myself whispering that prayer a lot these days. Thankfully, my reading ended on a different note, and my nausea subsided. Blessed is she who believed that there would be a fulfillment of what was spoken to her from the Lord — Luke 1:45. This verse was a miraculously pregnant Elizabeth speaking to a newly, also miraculously, impregnated Mary.

I’ve been thinking about faith recently. Hence my recurring “Holy Spirit, help me” prayer. I am not struggling with God’s existence, the work of the cross, or the glorious things to come. It’s not even about the ability to hear the Lord, I know his voice. My struggle is believing what I hear — believing what I hear to the point I stop trying to reason, stop trying to control, stop trying to help God finish what he’s started. We are called to listen and obey, hear and do. Sometimes the obeying part is very active. Sometimes the obeying part is waiting and simply watching the Lord work. I know both responses have their pros and cons, but doesn’t waiting seem to be the worst.thing.ever?

As I’ve asked the Lord about the things he has spoken, and the Holy Spirit for constant help, there are three things about faith that keep coming up:

1. Faith is a Gift from God

Paul writes that Faith is a gift from God (Ephesian 2:8-9; Romans 12:3). He readily gives us measures of faith that we cannot achieve on our own. The Holy Spirit loves helping us–that his name “The Helper” (John 16:7).

If the Lord is speaking something to us, promising something, leading us in a direction, he has the measure of faith necessary for us to respond. Let’s keep asking him about it, keep talking and walking with him about it. He wants relationship with us.

Consider this story in Mark 9 about the boy with an unclean spirit,  And Jesus asked [the boy’s] father, “How long has this been happening to him?” And [the father] said, “From childhood.  And it has often cast him into fire and into water, to destroy him. But if you can do anything, have compassion on us and help us.”And Jesus said to him, “‘If you can’! All things are possible for one who believes.”  Immediately the father of the child cried out and said, “I believe; help my unbelief!”

2. Faith is the Evidence of Things Not Seen

The author of Hebrews writes, Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen (Hebrews 11:1). What is the evidence of things unseen? Faith. Often times the only evidence of God’s word, promise, and workings is our faith. If there is a gap between promise and fulfillment, our faith is the substance filling it, standing between them.

I don’t want the gap between promise and fulfillment to be empty. I want to fill it with my faith, the faithGod freely gives me. That faith points back to God’s faithfulness, his trustworthiness. The next verse (Hebrews 11:2) says, For by it (faith) the elders obtained a good testimony. Want a good testimony? Let faith be the evidence of what God has spoken, is doing — of the impossible!

3. Faith Pleases God

The author of Hebrews also writes about Enoch (among many others) in Hebrews 11. Enoch had a testimony of faith that pleased God. Listen to what is written, Without faith it is impossible to please [God], for he who comes to God must believe that He is, and that He is a rewarder of those who diligently seek Him (11:6).

God delights in our faith. When we look to him instead of our surroundings, we are inviting him into the details of our lives. When we choose to look to him instead of our understanding, our ability to manage, our ability do something, that is faith. That is seeking God out instead seeking other things. If we seek him, we will find him. Faith pleases God.

I hope you are encouraged today — blessed instead of nauseated!

Blessed is she who believed that there would be a fulfillment of what was spoken to her from the Lord — Luke 1:45.