Grow From Faith To Faith

Do you remember the thrill and the overflowing joy that flooded your soul when you had your first answered prayer? I mean, when you prayed for your need by yourself or you prayed for someone else and you received the answer. It is joy unspeakable. The joy of answered prayer should be a believer’s frequent experience, yet only a handful of Christians have this experience. It is one of the most basic provisions of our redemption. Instead of talking to the Father themselves, most would rather go to someone else to pray for them.

God hears and answers the prayers of His children and does not practice favoritism as long they pray in faith. The Lord Jesus, in the 16th chapter of John, said:

“And in that day ye shall ask me nothing. Verily, verily, I say unto you, Whatsoever ye shall ask the Father in my name, he will give it you.

Hitherto have ye asked nothing in my name: ask, and ye shall receive, that your joy may be full” (John 16:23 -24).

Many of these believers have strong faith in the prayers of men and women of God, and know they would be answered if someone else prayed for them. But they do not have faith in their own faith. It seems they don’t believe God will honor their prayers with an answer, but they believe in prayers, so they pray through others.

We are, of course, not saying that there’s anything wrong with going to another believer to pray with or for you, or to ask the elders of the Church to pray prayers of faith on your behalf; but every child of God should grow spiritually to a place where they can exercise faith in the Word of God and pray to the Father in the name of Jesus for themselves.

Every one of us should get to a place in our Christian walk where we can speak to God personally, listen to Him and hear Him minister to us, and receive the requests that we ask from Him. We need to grow and get to the level of maturity where we can trust Him and cast our cares upon Him in times of trouble. This is what it means to grow in the knowledge of God—not the number of Scriptural verses we’ve memorized. The men and women who know God are those who are close to Him, converse with Him, fellowship with Him, trust Him, cast their cares and troubles upon Him, and constantly receive help from Him.

You should make it a goal in your life to cultivate a personal relationship with God. It is not the perfect will of God for you to always approach Him through a third person or a middleman when you have a need or when you need to get right with Him. His desire is that you and I would approach His throne and communicate with Him spirit to Spirit. He desires to have a personal relationship with you, for the Father Himself, Jesus said, loves you.

As stated above, there is nothing wrong in requesting that a minister, a counselor, or an elder of the church should pray for or with you on an issue. These believers can also join you in faith, agreeing together with you in prayer over your request, but what we’re saying here is, that should not be a way of life for you. You must, for yourself, form a habit of going to God in prayer and praying and acting in faith for your needs, and then grow into praying and believing for the needs of other people around you.

You must begin by having faith in your own faith, and as you practice you’ll get to a level in your spiritual life where you’ll start living by faith, “for the just shall live by faith.”

Not to over-emphasize this point, but the cliché “Practice makes perfect” applies in this situation also. For example, if every time you have a problem, you rush to a strong brother or sister to pray for you and solve the problem, you’ll never grow in your own faith because you never avail yourself of the opportunity to exercise your own faith. The strong brother or sister you ran to for refuge will get stronger as they exercise their faith for you, but your faith muscles will remain flabby from lack of exercise. Faith, like everything else, grows with exercise.

It is true that you have to start somewhere, and we all start from the same place. We all begin our faith walk with redemptive faith. We heard the Word of God, received it as a precious seed into our hearts, accepted Jesus Christ as Savior, and confessed Him as Lord. This brought us salvation and was the beginning of our walk of faith.

“That if thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus, and shalt believe in thine heart that God hath raised him from the dead, thou shalt be saved. For with the heart man believeth unto righteousness; and with the mouth confession is made unto salvation” (Rom 10:9- 10).

However, this is just the beginning of a new life, and God expects us to grow and graduate from faith to faith and to live daily by faith. We are born again through faith, and we live the New Life by faith.

So, as stated in the paragraphs above, our journey in the life of faith begins with “faith for redemption.” “For by grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves: it is the gift of God: Not of works, lest any man should boast” (Eph 2:8-9). God is gracious and gives us everything generously without holding back. Salvation is a gift from God. Even the faith to receive this salvation is a gift from God, for He has given everyone a measure of faith (Rom 12:3).

“But ye, beloved, building up yourselves on your most holy faith, praying in the Holy Ghost” (Jude 1:20).

We eat and exercise and thus build our physical bodies. In the same manner, you are to feed the spirit man with the Word of God so he can grow in faith and proceed from the realm of initial salvation faith to having confidence in God.

“And this is the confidence that we have in him, that, if we ask any thing according to his will, he heareth us: And if we know that he hear us, whatsoever we ask, we know that we have the petitions that we desired of him” (1Jn 5:14 -15).

As we build confidence in Him, our faith develops to where we are able to ask and receive. This is a second level of faith that we may call “Receiving Faith.” The Scripture says that the reason we have not is because we ask not. With this faith, we are able to claim the promises of God to meet our daily needs.

But we need to keep making progress. Our faith needs to develop beyond these. We need to become solidly rooted in God and develop “Righteousness Faith.” This is where we become aware, consciously and unconsciously, in our hearts that we are always welcome in the presence of God and that our right-standing does not depend on what we do. Many children of God get defeated for lack of faith in their right-standing with God. Many a time, they cannot pray, because they have a sense of guilt that haunts them and prevents them from enjoying the presence of God. They are always sin-conscious and guilt-conscious. When it is time to pray or speak the word against the devil, they quickly run into the back room to confess their sins before God. Sin-consciousness has rendered them impotent, and they need to receive revelation faith in the righteousness of Christ. They need revelation faith in the Scripture that says:

“There is therefore now no condemnation to them which are in Christ Jesus, who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit. For the law of

the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus hath made me free from the law of sin and death” (Rom 8:1,2).

As believers, we need to know that Christ is our righteousness before God, and that we do not present ourselves before God on the ground of our own good works. He was made sin for us and we took on His righteousness. “For he hath made him to be sin for us, who knew no sin; that we might be made the righteousness of God in him” (II Cor 5:21).

Fearless, Radical, and Overcoming Faith

Faith-filled words brought the universe into being, and faith-filled words rule the universe today. God said, “Let there be Light,” and there was Light. The miracle is in your mouth and in my mouth. If we dare to be radical and speak and act in faith, we’ll see creative miracles come forth in our daily lives. There is a realm of fearless, radical faith that God wants us to grow into and live in like the Lord. Few saints have ever touched the periphery of this realm, but it is available for us. We are to live daily as conquerors and overcomers over the circumstances of life. Indeed, according to the Word, we are more than conquerors. “For whatsoever is born of God overcometh the world: and this is the victory that overcometh the world, even our faith.

Who through faith subdued kingdoms, wrought righteousness, obtained promises, stopped the mouths of lions,

Quenched the violence of fire, escaped the edge of the sword, out of weakness were made strong, waxed valiant in fight, turned to flight the armies of the aliens” (1 Jn 5:4; Heb 11:33-38).

Here, the child of God has become strong in faith and is no longer moved by what he sees. Like the Lord, he speaks the Word and creative miracles follow, kingdoms are subdued, supernatural deliverance results, sickness and diseases are overcome, multitudes are saved, and the oppressed are delivered. This faith does not fear threats or persecution, for it is the “faith of our fathers” that faith originally delivered to the saints.

“Beloved, when I gave all diligence to write unto you of the common salvation, it was needful for me to write unto you, and exhort you that ye should earnestly contend for the faith which was once delivered unto the saints” (Jude 1:33-38).

Dominion Faith and Reigning in Life

This is the dominating faith we see in the Lord. In the Gospels we see the Lord Jesus exercising this over the forces of nature. What manner of man is this, said the surprised disciples, that “even the winds and the waves obey Him” (Matt 8:26). He ruled over the fish of the sea, over all manner of sicknesses and over demons (Mk 1:32), and over death. He raised Lazarus, and He Himself rose from the dead and became the absolute Lord over all the laws that govern the universe. And the Scripture now says of us that we are to reign in Life by Him.

“For if by one man’s offence death reigned by one; much more they which receive abundance of grace and of the gift of righteousness shall reign in life by one, Jesus Christ” (Rom 5:17).

Here, by faith, the believer walks in the abundance of grace and power which he has received. No more struggle to believe, no more laboring, because he has entered into his rest and ceased from all his works. He is now reigning in life as a king, and his confidence in God has become unshakable. When waiting for a manifestation in the physical, he knows that it will surely come, so he spends his time resting and praising God. He knows that praise is faith in action and will result in supernatural manifestation, for “Whoso offereth praise glorifieth Me: and him that ordereth his conversation aright will I show the salvation of God, says the Lord God Almighty” (Psa 50:23).