Real-izing Faith

I can believe that my Awesome God is capable of many wonderful deeds, but still not expect him to do any of them for me. My faith in His abilities does not necessarily mean that I hope to receive anything from Him. Faith is knowledge of a possibility. Hope is the knowledge that only time or space is separating me from the realization of the possibility.

Faith is not emotional. Our souls attach emotions to our faith as we use it to respond to situations we face. Faith is spiritual, emotions are soulish. The order of authority in our beings should be that our spirit declares values and purposes and objectives, our souls make the decision to follow those directives, and control our bodies in achieving them or realizing them.

The order of authority that our beings typically display is our flesh wants something, our souls make the decision to follow the values and purposes and objectives of our bodies, and our spirit grieves over it and drives our soul to repent of the sin it committed when it achieved the fleshly goal. It has not entered into the heart (soul) of man what God has prepared for them that love Him.

Faith is spiritual. God has revealed to us by His Spirit the things that He has prepared for those of us who love Him. 1 Corinthians 2:14: “But the natural man does not receive the things of the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness to him; nor can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned.”

We are called to acknowledge Him in all our ways in order to have His direction in life. That is walking by faith. It is not just having faith, but adding hope to it and walking by it.

I believe that Jesus died to pay for sins. When I take the next step and believe that He died for my sins, I have added hope to my faith and I am therefore walking by faith.