DEVELOPING FAITH TO MOVE MOUNTAINS!
Many people we meet have said they prayed for years and saw nothing happen and shared that they are either frustrated, discouraged, angry, bitter towards God, or have just given up on God.
The truth is, God is trying to teach us how to walk in greater faith each day, by trusting in Him and exercising faith. The problem is that so many of us never learned what it means to develop real faith and walk in the Spirit by faith.
Many people we meet say to us something like “if God would answer my prayer or show me a miracle, then I could trust Him and I’d believe”, but this never works and is in fact just the opposite exercising faith and learning how to walk in power by the Holy Spirit. That stance is simply the natural man trying to make sense of the supernatural man, which is like trying to measure the weight of your car, by conjuring thoughts about peace – the two don’t add up.
Faith is a constant position of our heart and says “God, I believe in you and your promises, and I will trust in you and exercise faith despite my trials and circumstances.” This is the very position that propelled Paul to overcome trial after trial revealing God’s Glory and demonstrating miracles, signs, and wonders everywhere he walked.
Just look at the faith Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego carried as they were about to meet their death in the fire seven times hotter than ever before. They trusted in God and even without the indwelling of Holy Spirit that we have in the new covenant, they overcame the flames through faith in God. Even when faced with death by fire, they would not bow to the circumstances (or to a King posing as a false God), and neither should we.
Like them, as we begin to recognize what it means to walk by faith, trust in God, give thanks in all things, AND understand our authority to manifest God’s nature Glory through miracles here on earth, we begin to see what it means to walk by the spirit of Christ within us and see our prayers become powerful through Christ.
Too many of us who call ourselves Christian, spent years begging God to answer our prayers, feeling like our prayers fell on deaf ears with no results. That was me for many years but now I understand what it means to trust and believe, and expect miracles by the authority God has placed in me through His spirit within.
I’m no longer begging a God who seemed so far away, but now I’m co-laboring with Him who lives in me, like a son who knows and believes in what Jesus said and did on this earth, saying we will do even greater. This is not a feeling, but it is a revelation by the Spirit within, achieved by exercising faith.
When I began to understand He is not far away somewhere in the distant universe, but that He is actually living in me, eager to enjoy me, eager to fellowship and develop my faith, so I might demonstrate His will on earth as it is in heaven, then I began to see mountains move in my own life. I believe this is when my prayers began to align with His desires as Holy Spirit was counseling me and teaching me from within who I am in Christ, and not separated as some distant God I once perceived, who I never heard my prayers.
For all this to happen, I had to first believe that He loved me, and lived inside of me which in itself takes faith! This was the beginning of me changing the way I was thinking (the real meaning of repentance in the Word). I realized I had to change how (and what) I was believing (the truth will set you free) and how I was praying that simply didn’t work for years, because I did not understand what it meant to be in truth and be in relationship with my Lord.
I learned God is not a genie in a bottle ready to fulfill every wish we have, but He is a loving Father who desires we would learn to love Him, grow in truth, and grow into the likeness of His Son (Him), that we might Glorify Him and spread the Good News so more could come to love Him and be adopted into His family.
We were each created in His image for the purpose of reflecting His love. When we begin to understand these basic perspectives, we can start walking in a greater revelation of Christ in us, learn how to walk by the Spirit within, see our prayers in line with His desires, and then we begin to see those mountains in life moving through the Power in His name.
Many came to Jesus asking for a miracle to prove His claims but Jesus said “only believe” and told us if we would simply believe in Him, (believe first), then we would see our own miracles. First believe, then see, ….that’s the kingdom principle called faith.
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Thank you for this teaching…understanding faith, so important! I ask myself, do I really believe His promises!