Consider this. If faith is defined as your trust and your belief then saving faith would depend on you having enough trust and belief to save your eternal soul. By definition this would mean any lapse in your trust and belief would result in missing the desired goal should you be in a moment of unbelief or distrust when your number is called. Do you believe or trust in your ability to believe or trust that much?
I'm not going to waste time trying to convince you one way or another in regard to this. I simply want to offer up a thought for you to consider. What if Faith is as I have defined it here in these articles? What change would it bring to the Christian walk? The modern thought concerning faith places the thing in our hands. The definition I propose makes a dramatic shift.
Many years ago I accepted Jesus as my personal savior, I asked Him to come into my heart. I was discussing this with my pastor and I told him I didn't feel any different and asked him what I should do? He asked me if I was sincere in my prayer and I said Yes! He then proceeded to tell me that I had to take it by "Faith" that if I was sincere then He did what He said He would do and this thing was not about feeling but faith. I altered my life drastically after that because I wanted to prove that I meant my commitment and was going to hold fast to it. I was 16 at the time by the age of 26 the pressure on me to perform had grown so weighty that I could not take it any longer and was ready to call it quits. I began seeking something deeper something more solid than what I had in my Christian experience. I started to hunger after something more.
In the course of my personal study I ran across the writings of a man who used the definition of faith I have shared with you. The first time I read it the thing went way over my head I had no clue what he was talking about but then he used it a second time and the way he used the definition caused me to stop and think through what he was saying. His second use of the definition made me understand that the word faith and the phrase "Divine evidence and conviction" were in his mind interchangeable. He was not using one then the other but they were one and the same. I realized that if he was correct I had to go through a paradigm shift. I had spent the past 10 years trying to convince myself that God had saved me and I wasn't winning the battle.I tried using the idea that I simply had to believe but in the depths of my being I knew I did not. If this writer was correct then there was something of the utmost importance missing from my walk with God.
I had to stop and take inventory. 1. Did I ask Jesus to forgive me? Yes! 2. Did I ask Him to come into my heart? Yes! 3. Was I following after Him. Yes! Well then the inventory list is complete I have done it all. And then it hit me He said "Ask and it shall be given unto you." so where was the thing I had asked for? My pastor told me just trust my Christian friends said just believe. But I had asked for something and all I heard them telling me was just believe He has given it. My child asks me for food and I give it to them they know it when their belly is full. I had asked my Heavenly Father for something it only seemed reasonable that I should have some kind of knowledge of the gift given. I had none.
This discussion of saving faith is going to take a little more time to discuss so I am going to break away for now and encourage you to think on your own walk. When I resume this discussion I want to take you back to an Old Testament event and use it to lay a foundation to where we are going with this. Hope you check back.
No comments:
Post a Comment