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Faith Proven
By Rocco T.
"If you have faith as a mustard seed...nothing will be impossible for you" — Matthew 17:20
Oswald Chambers was such a Godly man and had such discernment and so much desire to please God alone, said
"Faith by its very nature must be tested and tried"
How is your faith today?. There are many days in life and may be many areas in your life where you have abundant faith in the Lord. What about the rest of your life? Do you have abundant faith in every area of your life? We need to, because we are called by God to live a holy life. In order to live a Holy life, we need to utilize our faith in God in every area and not just some. Everyone is at different stages in our Christian life and some of us have more faith in certain areas and less faith in other areas. This is not to excuse the fact that I don't have as much faith in God as I should in certain areas. It is just an observation of where I need to improve.
First we have to ask the question "What is Faith". Faith is not simply believing in God. The Devil believes in God. Believing in God is the starting point but true Faith is believing That God is who he says he is, that he will complete in you what he has said that he would, which is your Salvation.
Faith not only allows us to receive him and his gift of salvation but it must be present in every area of our life as we continue to walk and live for him after being saved. It must be present when we go through the trials of life, to prove that God has control. This is not to prove it to God but to prove it to us so that we can have more faith. So that we can be used more by God for his glory. Everything in our life that we do for ourselves must vanish. All that we do must be for the Glory of God.
Faith must be present in times of loneliness, to know God is with you even in those times where you look around and don't find anybody. When you think nobody knows your problems or your trials. When everybody has given up on you, this is when we MUST have faith. This is when Faith is proven. You can say you have faith in God, but it's easy to have faith when your not in a trial, when your on one of those grassy hilltops of life and nothing is deeply pressuring you. But do you have faith when your in the Valley of life? When there seems to be more darkness around you then light.
If you need more faith in this area, then pray to God and give him every area of your life and he will give you more faith. Of course this does mean that if you are praying for more faith and serious about that prayer that God must send you through more trials because it is in our trials where we find Faith.
Do you have Faith while in temptation when sin is right before you? It is easy to say that you have faith when your in the light of day, but when your in the darkness of night. When you're all alone by yourself, when nobody is looking, do you have faith? Faith enough that God's promises are true. Faith enough to believe God when he says that the devil is lying to you when he is enticing you with the present temptation of sin. Faith enough in what God says that "He will not allow you to be tempted beyond your strength"?
You see, Everything we do in our Christian life comes down to having Faith or more of it. It is essential to us when we try to live out this life. Problems arise sometimes because Faith and sin cannot live together, they are like oil and water, they do not mix. You cannot say that you have faith in God and continue to live in a life practicing sin. You are only lying to yourself. You either have enough faith in God's promise that he will "Always give you a way of escape" or you don't.
There is one thing that will kill your faith. Sin, this is why Jesus states so strongly in Matthew 5:29,30
"If your right eye causes you to sin, pluck it out and cast it from you; for it is more profitable for you that one of your members perish, than for your whole body to be cast into hell. And if your right hand causes you to sin, cut it off and cast it from you; for it is more profitable for you that one of your members perish, than for your whole body to be cast into hell."
What did Jesus mean by this verse? Are we really suppose to gouge out our eye or cut off our hand to stop sinning? Of course not!
Jesus was talking about how Serious sin really was. It is serious enough that you Should cut off your hand if it causes you to sin. It's serious enough that you should cut out your eye if it causes you to sin. But here is the problem, cutting out your eye would not stop you from sinning. Let's say you have a problem with lust and you then decide you must gouge out your eye to stop sinning. Later the lustful thoughts come back and then instead of looking lustfully, you are still able to imagine lustful thoughts in your head. So the idea of cutting out your eye will stop you from sinning is simply not what Jesus was telling us.
Jesus was telling us through this passage that whatever in life has a hold of you, no matter what sin it is. You must give it up, or will destroy your relationship with the Lord. This problem is also a problem of faith. But you say, "I have plenty of faith and this sin problem has nothing to do with it". O but it does have to do with faith. If you let sin reign in your body, it WILL kill your faith. In order for you to be pleasing to God, You must give up everything in your life. You must deny every desire, relinquish all control of your life and give that control to God. In order to do that, you need to have enough faith in God that he will fill that void that your allowing sin to fill right now.
Do you have enough faith in your heart that God will fill that void? Do you believe God and his word that says there is no happiness besides him. You may partially believe that, but do you believe it enough to put down whatever sin is in your life and trust in him that he will get you through the temptations. But you say, "This is too hard for me to resist, I can't resist any longer" I can only say this to you "Give Me Five More"
You see, everything in our life comes down to faith, whether it is our salvation or God taking care of us or even sin itself. If only we had that mustard seed of faith. It would grow in us to be a beautiful tree that would cover and permeate every aspect of our life. God's promises are true and righteous, If only we have the Faith to let him conquer our lives. We would see it grow.
Faith that is not proven, is not faith at all
by Rocco T
Original Article
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