WHAT FAITH IS

I’m so glad you’ve picked up this LifeLine Kit about faith. Because no matter how difficult the situation you may be facing today, there’s something I want you to know: God can turn it around!

The doctors may have told you there’s no hope. Your bank account may be empty, and creditors knocking on your door. There may be trouble in your family or on your job. Your problems may be stacked so high, you feel you can never overcome them. But don’t let the devil fool you. He has never devised a problem that faith in God can’t fix.

Nothing intimidates God. It’s just as easy for Him to heal cancer as it is for Him to heal a headache. It’s as easy for Him to buy you a new home as it is for Him to pay your rent.

Even in times like these when the whole world seems to be in trouble, God can bring you through in triumph. He can do for you what He did for the Israelites. Exodus 10:23 says when darkness covered the land of Egypt where the Israelites lived—a darkness so thick the Egyptians couldn’t see each other or move for three days—“all the children of Israel had light in their dwellings.”

Think about that! If you’ll dare to believe God’s WORD, like the Israelites, you too can have light in the middle of a dark world. You can have protection in the midst of a dangerous world. You can live healed in a sick world. You can live prosperously in an impoverished world. You can live free in the middle of a captive world.

But you can’t do it by dragging around in an attitude of defeat. If you want to walk in constant victory, you must develop a spirit of faith and persevere in that spirit even when the devil is putting pressure on you.

People with the spirit of faith always receive the blessings of God. They may go through tests and trials but they come out supernaturally every time.

I like those odds, don’t you? I like to beat the devil every time. And, glory to God, you and I can do that if we’ll walk continually in the spirit of faith.

The Faith Connection

That, by the way, is why it’s so important to develop your faith: because faith is what connects you to the blessings of God. It’s the force that gives those blessings substance in your life (see Hebrews 11:1). And, besides all that, faith pleases God (Hebrews 11:6).

It’s faith that reaches into the realm of the spirit, grasps the promises of God and brings forth a tangible, physical fulfillment of those promises. It brings spiritual blessings. It brings the car you need, or healing for your body. Faith brings action in this earth.

Romans 5:2 says we have access by faith into the grace of God. Therefore, if you want grace for the new birth, you must receive it by faith. If you want God’s grace for healing, you must receive it by faith. If you want God’s grace in your finances or any other area of your life, you must receive it by faith.

I like to think of it this way: When you believe The WORD of God, you open the window of your life to give God the opportunity to move there.

Oddly enough, that bothers some people. They can’t understand why God needs an opportunity. After all, He is God. Can’t He do anything He wants to?

Yes, He can. And He wants to respond to our faith.

You see, He’s not like the devil. He doesn’t force Himself on you. He waits for you to give Him an opening by believing His WORD.

Keep Your Eyes on The WORD

That’s what Abraham did. When God told him he and Sarah were going to have a baby, Abraham just took God at His WORD. In light of the circumstances, that was quite a step of faith. After all, Abraham was 100 years old and Sarah was 90 and barren.

Most people would have been overwhelmed by those problems. But not Abraham.He “believed God, and it was counted unto him for righteousness” (Romans 4:3). Even though in the natural realm, it was impossible for what God said to come to pass, Abraham believed God anyway.

That’s what the spirit of faith does. It stands in the midst of the most impossible circumstances and believes God anyway!

Right now you may be thinking, I really want to do that. I want to live by faith. The problem is, every time I look at the mess I’m in, I get discouraged.

Then, stop looking at the mess! Instead, focus your attention on the promises of God. Keep His WORD in front of your eyes and in your ears until you can see it coming to pass with the eyes of your spirit.

That’s what the spirit of faith does. It looks “not at the things which are seen, but at the things which are not seen: for the things which are seen are temporal; but the things which are not seen are eternal” (2 Corinthians 4:18).

Of course, I’m not saying you should ignore your problems or close your eyes to them as if they aren’t real. They are real. But, according to The WORD of God, they are temporal, which means “subject to change.” And, you can be assured that if you keep looking at The WORD, they will change!

Once again, we can look at Abraham’s life and see proof of that. Romans 4:18-21 says that he:

Against hope believed in hope, that he might become the father of many nations, according to that which was spoken, So shall thy seed be. And being not weak in faith, he considered not his own body now dead, when he was about an hundred years old, neither yet the deadness of Sarah’s womb: He staggered not at the promise of God through unbelief; but was strong in faith, giving glory to God; and being fully persuaded that, what he had promised, he was able also to perform.

Abraham did not consider his body. He didn’t focus his attention on the fact that he was 100 years old. He wasn’t looking at his wrinkled, old self, saying, “Come on, old man. You can do it!” No, he knew he couldn’t bring forth a child. He’d known that for some time.

He wasn’t looking at his own ability. He was looking at God’s. He kept his attention on the power and promise of God until he was fully persuaded that God could and would bring it to pass.

That’s What I Call Victory!

If you want to develop the spirit of faith, that’s what you’ll do, too. You won’t consider the natural impossibilities of your situation—God certainly doesn’t. Ken and I have found that out by experience!

More than 50 years ago, when Ken was praying, down in a riverbed in Tulsa, Oklahoma, God began speaking to him about preaching to nations. God said back then that Ken would have a worldwide ministry.

It was clear God had not considered our bank account. We hardly had enough money to get across town—much less go to the nations! But God didn’t expect us to fulfill that call. He intended to do it Himself with our faith. He intended to provide the power, the resources, the ability—everything! All He expected us to do was believe.

That’s all He expects you to do, too. Only believe.

Isn’t that wonderfully simple?

If you’ll just believe, if you’ll just spend your time considering God’s WORD instead of focusing on your own limitations, you’ll end up just like Abraham.

Exactly how did Abraham end up? Very well, I’d say.

He and Sarah not only had that baby God promised, they also lived long enough to raise him. Then, after Sarah died at 127 years old, Abraham (who was 137) remarried and had six more children. He became exactly what he and God said he was—the father of many nations.

Now, that’s what I call victory!

That’s what I call the spirit of faith!