SO YOU THINK YOU HAVE FAITH? (STICK WITH ME HERE)

DOC LYNCH

SO YOU THINK YOU HAVE FAITH (STICK WITH ME HERE)

Perhaps. Perhaps not.

FAITH is more than just believing in something or someone. Many people confuse FAITH with acknowledgement.

Look at it this way. I believe that George Washington existed and was the first President of the U.S. That’s pretty much indisputable, right? I’ll agree with that inasmuch that we know that from written testimony, books, letters, historical record, etc. But I never actually met him because he lived and died about 200 years before I was born. So…I essentially have to believe what others have written and testified to, of whom many of those are long dead as well, and many of them never knew him personally either. I really have to exercise a lot of FAITH in a whole lot of areas in order to be completely sure everything about him is a true account, and that he ever actually even existed. While that is a form of FAITH, it is NOT the BIBLICAL definition of FAITH.

The BIBLICAL DEFINITION and TRUTH about FAITH is as follows:

Hebrews 11:1 (AMP) – “NOW FAITH is the assurance (the confirmation, the title deed) of the things [we] hope for, being the proof of things [we] do not see and the conviction of their reality [FAITH perceiving as real fact what is not revealed to the senses].”

So, let’s apply the type of FAITH we did about George Washington, only now about Jesus Christ.

The difference here being that we now have to go about ten times farther back in history to about 2,000 years ago. We still have a huge amount of data including eyewitness historical accounts, as well of course what we know from the Gospels. However…no one alive the last 1900 years (save for a few accounts) has ever met Him in the flesh, but there have been millions that testify to Him having been alive and real over these last millennia right up to the present age, including myself. It takes some FAITH of sorts to believe that, even if one is just accepting the facts of there having been a “historical Jesus”. The “Historical Jesus” needs not get bogged down in any truths or ideals concerning Him as being recognized as a deified miracle working prophet/Son of God/Savior. It just merely needs to believe he existed.

However…if we want to go further and believe and accept who He really is, then we have to start applying a supernatural definition of FAITH, not only as it pertains to ironing out a workable plan for understanding who Jesus really is, but how that changes our lives. We can believe in Jesus the way the world does, and even religious people do, in the same way we believe in George Washington. It’s nice to know perhaps, but neither really changes us as people in a dynamic supernatural way. We need to eventually apply the foundations of FAITH to our lives: 1. See (hear); 2. Believe; 3. Act (On the Word).

Romans 10:9-10 (AMP)
9 Because if you acknowledge and confess with your lips that Jesus is Lord and in your heart believe (adhere to, trust in, and rely on the truth) that God raised Him from the dead, you will be saved.10 For with the heart a person believes (adheres to, trusts in, and relies on Christ) and so is justified (declared righteous, acceptable to God), and with the mouth he confesses (declares openly and speaks out freely his FAITH) and confirms [his] salvation.

REAL FAITH has assurance built into it. It confirms what we are believing for. What we HOPE for.

There is another slight conundrum. Hope as understood by the unenlightened and Holy Spirit stunted, is not biblical hope. It’s a wish. A fantasy. A nursery rhyme story. A pipe dream (wishes that go up in smoke). Hope in the natural are just dreams we have usually centering in a fantasy better future life. Marrying the spouse of our dreams. Building the home of our dreams. Becoming a rock star or famous actor perhaps. Most of those go unfulfilled. Empty dreams is never true hope.
TRUE HOPE as defined in the BIBLE is always attached to FAITH, and it is FAITH that translates those hopes into an actual reality. WHEW! Wrap your brain around that for a second, or at least try to.

*Stay with me here. This has the potential to change your life.
Look at the last part of the verse again.

“FAITH perceiving as real fact what is not revealed to the senses”.
In other words, even if your hope is distant in reality, and there is no way that it is ever going to materialize according to your present moment senses, which is that there is no PHYSICAL (the senses are physical and natural, not spiritual and supernatural) proof that it could happen because of the elements missing to accomplish it (money, job, people, etc.), FAITH, true supernatural FAITH, that comes as a benefit of knowing Jesus and having the Holy Spirit, ASSURES what we are hoping for becomes a reality. It says it gives us the “title deed” to what we are hoping for even if it has not manifested yet. By FAITH we KNOW that it will.

Romans 10:17 (AMP)
17 So FAITH comes by hearing [what is told], and what is heard comes by the preaching [of the message that came from the lips] of Christ (the Messiah Himself).

When Joan and I bought our home, we claimed it as ours and prayed it in by FAITH even before we made an offer. A few months later it became ours. Joan and I have applied that principle of FAITH over every part of our lives. It has NEVER failed.

So, as FAITH believers we never hope, we believe for something. We REALIZE it as ours even before it materializes. We trust in Jesus not our senses. Thomas didn’t believe Jesus was alive until he was able to put his fingers in His nail holes. Jesus rebuked him for his lack of faith. He said he only believed because he saw with his eyes. Jesus said blessed are those who believe WITHOUT SEEING! That’s me! It’s you too if you REALLY believe!

So, THAT is the FAITH it takes to believe in Jesus. While we cannot see Him with our eyes, we do so by FAITH, and so do we for everything we have hope for in this life and the next.

I’m Pastor Doc Lynch of Revival Life Church, 21 Executive Center Drive, New Milford, CT 06776. Around here we are strong FAITH BELIEVERS, from everything from our personal health and and material lives, to those whom we come in contact with. We live by FAITH in our Lord Jesus Christ and He has NEVER failed us yet.

Visit us on Sunday at 10 a.m.

Reviving the Church!
~Pastor Doc Lynch~