In Rom 10:17 says Faith comes by hearing & by hearing by the Word of God.
Every person who is born again is of the Spirit of God & already has faith...God has dealt to each on a measure of faith. Rom 12:3. If you are a believer, faith is not something you can have, or not have; you have it!
No one can pray for faith, nor is it right for any Christian to say they don't have faith. For every person has been given a measure of faith, & no one receives a greater measure then another.
The day we accept Jesus Christ as our Lord & Saviour is the day that God gives us His kind of faith in our spirit. This faith is a spiritual force that enables us to accomplish the seemingly impossible & to be an overcomer of every of adversity.
For whatever is born of God overcomes the world. And this is the victory that has overcome the world—our faith.1Jn 5:4 Know that those who are born again can never be defeated. Faith is based on knowledge of God's Word & His character. The Spirit of the world is in opposition to God. But when we determine to stand in faith, the world looses its controlling influence over us. While each of us have a measure of faith, however, we can live in ignorance of what we have. People are destroyed from lack of knowledge. Hos 4:6 & satan loves to keep us in the dark that we have the God-kind of faith in us. Every person is responsible for developing their measure of faith to its fullest. All we have to do to develop it is to turn the switch of faith on that is with our mouths. When I first started my relationship with the Lord I had a great hunger to know more things of God but sadly the Church I was worshipping in had little knowledge so I shopped around till eventually I found a Church where I could learn the revelation in the Word & that Church was Victory Life in Perth. Pastor Margaret Court teaches the importance of reading the Word for
yourself & when I did i saw that Without faith it is impossible to please God... Heb 11:6 seek God diligently, believe that He will reward you for it. Without faith we cannot live the way God intended for us to live. Clearly faith is essential for our walk here on earth. Rom 10:17 tells us that faith grows by hearing the Word of God constantly. The quickest way to grow in faith is to hear yourself saying the Word, meditating on it, muttering it, affirming it. Scriptural meditation is simply saying & thinking what God says. A bit like a cow chewing it's cud, you go over it again & again, meditate on it, speak it, again & again-until it gets down into your spirit & the Holy Spirit gives you a revelation of it's truth. Now it is not enough just to have a snack of God's Word on a Sunday if we want to live in victory every single day of the week, nor can we pray for our faith to grow, it is up to us to develop our spiritual faith muscle, to do this we must work out on God's Word every day. There are no short cuts. A low Word level is a low faith level. It may surprise you to know that it is news to too many people that hearing God's Word is the way to grow spiritually & increase the force of faith.
Many think that faith grows through tests & trials. We have to learn to know our righteousness in Jesus & know that nothing we could or could not do could affect our status as God's child. Tests & trials don't increase our faith they only prove our fear. FAITH COMES NOT BY ADVERSITY BUT BY HEARING. The time to develop our faith is not in the middle of a time of testing.
That's when we need to use the faith we already have. If we are constantly feeding ourselves faith when we don't need it, we will be able to release it when we do. What is faith like You may ask that God has placed in our hearts? One of my favourite faith Scriptures says For assuredly, I say to you, whoever says to this mountain, ‘Be removed and be cast into the sea,’ and does not doubt in his heart, but believes that those things he says will be done, he will have whatever he says. Mark 11:23 Notice it says what he says, that is the key, not whatever he prays. So the key is what you say not what you pray. What is the mountain your life? Sickness? Depression? A difficult marriage? Financial
hardship? Cancer? When you speak the Word of God in faith to that mountain, the Holy Spirit will act. All He is waiting for, are your words. God doesn't want us to put up with the mountains in our lives. If you are sick in your body for example don't let the mountain of sickness remain; Speak to it remind it that you are are a temple of the Holy Spirit, & that it cannot remain, for God's Word promises you redemption from the curse of the sickness. You are not lying when you say what God says. Keep speaking what God says about you. Keep the Word of God coming out of your mouth & going into your spirit. Faith is a force that flows out of the spirit & acts independently of the mind. Since the Word of God is spirit, alive & living, it is exactly the type of food our spirit needs to grow the God kind of faith in us will overcome the world. When God says we are to believe the things we say will come to pass, it implies we must have faith in our words. It's one thing to talk about having faith in God's word but faith in my own words... you may wonder what does that mean. It means for example that you may be very sick but don't believe in your words so you would be
speaking the wrong things, hitting yourself over the head, telling yourself that you are no good. When you start to speak God's word you must believe it not doubt it in your heart. Once you start to flood yourself with God's word you will notice that you do believe, that you do believe in your heart, & when when you start to speak it out (Aloud) you will find yourself growing in trust because they are God's words. Start by saying I believe the things that I say shall come to pass; I shall have whatever I say. I have faith in my words because my words are alive, & living, my words are tangible, & anointed because they are God's Words, & He & His Word are one, & I & my words are one. We need to believe the words we speak before we can believe the words God speaks.
There were two men who believed their own words because they were founded on God's Word, they were Joshua & Caleb. In Numbers 13 we read they were among twelve men that Moses sent out to spy the promised land before the Israelites went in. After forty days in Canaan they returned. Ten of the spies gave a wonderful picture of a land flowing with milk & honey. Two men even carried back a huge cluster of grapes on a pole! But these men also said they found strong enemies there; including giant men who made them fell like grasshoppers. On this basis, they were forgetting God's Word that He had promised them victory, they changed their good report into an evil report, concluding that the Israelites were not able to go up & possess the land. Joshua & Caleb, however, brought back good a good report silencing the people before Moses, who had been distressed that the land couldn't be taken.. Joshua & Caleb said,...Let us go up at once & take possession, for we are well able to overcome. Num 13:30 An evil report is one that contradicts God's Word. A Good report is one that believes what God says, despite the evidence of things in the natural realm that say the opposite. Joshua & Caleb, according to God were of a different spirit to those who refused to believe.
Num 14:24 says they were totally convinced that what God had promised He would preform. Like David when he faced Goliath & declared openly that his God would deliver the Philistine into his hands (1Sam 17:4) Joshua & Caleb likewise knew that the enemy awaiting them in the Promised Land would be delivered into their hands, for God had already said that the land was theirs. They had to go forward in faith & trust that God would fight their battles for them. A solid faith confession, in which we say what God says & not what our circumstances say, will always bring the desired victory. it may not be instant but as the faith confession continues, the force of patience will grow to under gird our faith till the evil report finally becomes the desired good report. Joshua & Caleb never said anything contrary to their belief that Israel would possess the Promised Land. But because of the unbelief of their fellow Israelites they had to wait forty years, but they did finally receive what they believed. Their patience was tested, but they never changed their 'good report' to an 'evil report' just because it looked as if was not going to happen. In Jos 1:6-9 God told Joshua to be Strong & of good courage & to be very courageous. To be courageous is to have the ability to meet danger without giving way to fear. Faith is the opposite of fear, & a large part of being courageous is to step out on God's Word alone & speak it in faith at all times, no matter of the circumstances.
After forty years it was only those who agreed with God that finally entered the Promised Land. Those who doubted His Word died in the wilderness of their own making, just because they refused to believe, speak or act on the Word of God that He had given them. This just the same in our lives. God has already spoken about our 'Promised Land'. The Bible speaks of how we can claim all the promises that our ours because of our wonderful new status as sons & daughters of God. He is not speaking anything new today, apart from a greater revelation through His Spirit of what He has already spoken through His written Word. When our circumstances say something contrary to God's Word, we have to choose what we will believe-a good report based on what God says or an evil report which is totally opposite to God's Word. God's good report of our new life in Christ is found in the Bible. we are what the Word says we are, regardless of how we feel or think about it. among other things: * God Word says are the Righteousness of God therefore we are righteous-despite what we think about our unworthiness.
2 Corn 5:21 For He made Him who knew no sin to be sin for us, that we might become the righteousness of God in Him. * God's Word says we are forgiven, therefore, we are forgiven despite our feelings of guilt & self condemnation. Rom 8:1 There is therefore no condemnation to those in Christ Jesus. * God's Word says we are healed, therefore we are healed-despite what our bodies tell us to the contrary.
1Peter 2:24...By whose stripes you were healed. * God's word says we are over comers & have victory in our lives through our faith-even though we may look as though we are defeated. 1 John 5:4-5 For whatever is born of God overcomes the world. And this is the victory that has overcome the world—our faith. Who is he who overcomes the world, but he who believes that Jesus is the Son of God? All this & so much more describes who we are in Christ. Whatever you find in the word of God you can claim it as being personally for you. It is then up to you to take hold of it.
Let me explain it this way somebody could give you a title deed for a block of land that you have never seen, but you know that you have the land because you have the deed in your hand. It is just the same with the Bible. The Word of God is your title deed to all that is rightfully yours even though you may not be able to see it. I believe that our failure to confess God's Word out of our mouth has time & time again has stopped the power of our tongue creating what is good for our lives. Many, many times we speak of our fears, but how often do we speak of faith? Some theologies tell us that confession with our mouth is childish & foolish, so we keep our mouths firmly shut. & when we do speak we are so engrossed in our fears, guilt & emotions that we fail to confess faith. To confess God Word is not, as some claim, a name it & claim it theology. It is, after all, God's Word we speak. We are not lying when we say what God says about us. Now some people have named & claimed things, but not by speaking out in faith. It is in the motive of the heart. If your motives are not right, & if you
are not looking at Jesus, you will not receive anything. If your eyes are focused on Jesus & you have the right heart attitude towards Him He will bless you. You may ask why do we need to speak God's Word aloud. Surely it is enough to think it in our mind? Let me put it this way God did not think the world into existence; He spoke it into existence! It is when the Word is expressed that it has creative power. When we speak God's word out aloud it strengthens our faith, Faith comes by hearing &hearing the Word of God. So when we speak it aloud we hear it first hand. We generally only speak what we believe, & what we believe is directly governed by what we hear. 2 Corn 4:13 And since we have the same spirit of faith, according to what is written, “I believed and therefore I spoke,” we also believe and therefore speak, The mind is a battlefield of conflicting thoughts that gravitate somewhere between faith & fear. Faith & fear are complete opposites. where there is faith there cannot be fear, & where there is fear there cannot be faith.
Faith will always bring out the desired positive result. It is so important to build our faith into our thinking by hearing lots of God's Word. Again, & I can't stress it enough Faith comes by hearing, & by hearing by the word of God. Rom 10:17 I know faith works because it was by faith that my whole life was changed. It was by faith that I was set free from the devil & his cohorts & it was by faith that I was redeemed from fear. Victory only came when I took God at His Word & spoke & acted on His Word. I believed I was free from all fear even when it didn't seem like that on the inside, I just had to ignore those feeling & stand in faith. I choose to exalt the Word of God over my circumstances. Now circumstances are only temporal so are subject to change. They are part of the 'seen' things which the Bible contrasts with the unseen. 2 Corn 4:18 while we do not look at the things which are seen, but at the things which are not seen. For the things which are seen are temporary, but the things which are not seen are eternal. The words "do not look" in this verse does not mean ignore but do not keep looking at, or gazing at.
Paul recognises that the outward man is perishing (v16) but by faith he sees more then the temporary things in the light of the eternal. As long as I faithfully I diligently applied the Word of God to my circumstances they had to change, & eventually they did! Spiritual things are more real then physical things. Any change in our life must take place in the spiritual realm before it will be manifest in the natural realm. Faith is the connection between the natural realm & the spiritual realm. Faith brings the things the Word says from the realm of the supernatural, that is where they are already a reality to the realm of the natural-where they need to become a reality. We need to think about, speak about, & see our answers before we have them. If we can't see then we will never have them: Prov 29:18 Where there is no revelation, the people cast off restraint; But happy is he who keeps the law. Another translation says where there is no vision, the people will perish If we are sick for example we need to see & speak ourselves into health through faith in God's Word.
Isa 53:5 By His stripes we are healed. By faith we bring the blessing of the spiritual realm into the natural
realm. The Supernatural realm is like the wind; it can't be seen but when it operates are it's effects are obvious. & Faith is the same-invisible, but powerful in effect. Heb 11:1 Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.
Acknowledgement Dr Margaret Court.
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