When Mountains Make a Splash: What is Faith? Pt. 4

[Continued from Part Three. Start the series with Part One.] 

H: Holds Great Power

While we’ve already seen that faith isn’t a magic formula, faith that is grounded in God’s character holds tremendous power. Jesus told many people He healed that their faith had healed them (Mark 5:34, for instance). He also said directly that faith was a catalyst for miracles:

“Have faith in God. Truly, I say to you, whoever says to this mountain, ‘Be taken up and thrown into the sea,’ and does not doubt in his heart, but believes that what he says will come to pass, it will be done for him. Therefore I tell you, whatever you ask in prayer, believe that you have received it, and it will be yours.” (Mark 11:22-24) 

As cool as it sounds, this is really hard to do. Sure I think God can throw mountains into the sea, but if I saw it happen, I would be surprised and amazed. I might even have a hard time believing my eyes. Note too that this promise isn’t a blank check for those who ask for the wrong reasons. 

This opportunity also comes with a warning: with faith, all things are possible; without faith, God will limit His activity and we may miss out on some blessings. This happened during Jesus’ ministry when He travelled to His hometown. The Nazarenes still saw Jesus as just an ordinary person and didn’t think He could do much. Unfortunately for all but a few people, while He was there, He fulfilled their low expectations. 

Faith holds great power because God holds all power. Yet how easy it is to forget this! Think of the last time you shared prayer requests in a group. I’m guessing you heard of a few relatives in the hospital, some people in rough situations like breakups or unemployment, and maybe the infamous imagination-sparking “unspoken”. When you prayed, how confident was the group that the next time you met, those people would be healed and those situations miraculously resolved? I want to inspire you to talk to God to change lives, not to go through motions or prove to yourself that you care. And after you pray, take practical action (like we talked about in Pt. 3) and let God use you to answer your own request.

So, what is faith? We’ve seen that it’s a decision to believe truth about God, not an excuse for avoiding facts. We’ve also seen that faith is

Focused on God,

Always Reasonable,

Involves Action,

Takes Courage, and

Holds Great Power.

Believer, take confidence in the God who has the authority and power to do anything He wants. Be bold in asking and even expecting Him to use this power—He’s already promised it! And don’t be surprised when He moves mountains.  

Big Beliefs Mean Bold Action: What Is Faith? Pt. 3

[Continued from Part 2]

I: Involves Action

In the last two articles in this series, we’ve established that faith isn't a feeling or a sense of optimism. The Bible clearly teaches justification by faith and not works (Ephesians 2:8-9). Still, we all know that ideas have consequences. Beliefs determine behavior. If you believe that you can please God with your own righteousness, you’ll try to get into heaven by doing good works. If you truly believe that Jesus is Lord, God’s promised Messiah raised from the dead, you will begin to act in accordance with His lordship over your life.

This principle is how Scripture can say both that “one is justified by faith apart from works” and that “faith apart from works is dead.” (Romans3:28, James 2:26) One version of the law of non-contradiction states that “It is impossible for the same thing to belong and not to belong at the same time to the same thing and in the same respect.” (Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, emphasis mine) Since Paul and James are talking about different kinds of works, there is no contradiction.

The passage in James mentions Rahab, the prostitute who helped the Israelite spies when they came to Jericho. (Read the story in Joshua 2!) She told the men that the entire city had heard about the Lord’s miracles and was afraid. So why was she saved when the rest of the city was destroyed? Her actions proved that she believed that God would follow through with His promise to give the Israelites the land. Her faith was not an abstract fantasy; it involved taking bold action.

T: Takes Courage

Not only does faith require action; it sometimes requires bold, risky action. Hebrews 10 pits fear and faith as opposites: “But we are not of those who shrink back and are destroyed, but of those who have faith and preserve their souls.” (Hebrews 10:39) 

The next chapter tells of saints who did outrageous and even impossible things through faith. For some, God came through with impossible miracles in their lifetime, such as Noah, Moses’ parents, and Rahab. Yet many of them, as both verses 13-6 and 35-40 point out, actually suffered for their courageous faith and weren’t rewarded—at least not yet.

It takes courage to give everything for an unseen future. Martyred missionary Jim Eliot is often quoted as saying, “He is no fool who gives what he cannot keep to gain what he cannot lose.” When God makes promises, He keeps them. God does reward those who seek Him, and He has prepared a much better city for us. Yet that doesn't exempt believers from suffering in the meantime.

So believer, don’t be afraid to take action based on God's truth and promises. Whether you see people raised from death or you face death yourself, know that you were created for an eternal country of glory, and keep “looking to Jesus, the founder and perfecter of our faith.” (Hebrews 12:2)

And the plot thickens... take a shortcut to the conclusion in Part Four!