Author: bonniefaurote

FAITH

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WEAK FAITH

“Faith has its trials as well as its temptations….The faith of a child of God may not only be severely assailed, but there are times when that faith may waver greatly….Nothing but the divinity that dwells within that grace keeps it….David: in the strength of faith slaying Goliath, and in the weakness of faith fleeing from Saul!…Nothing but the power of God and its own incorruptible and imperishable nature preserve it” Octavius Winslow (ref#135, June 2nd).

“You don’t have to hide in guilt when weak faith gets you off the path, because your hope in life isn’t your faithfulness, but his.  You can run in weakness and once again seek his strength.  And you can know that in zealous grace he will not leave his craftwork until faith fully rules our heart unchallenged.  He always gives freely what we need in order to do what he has called us to do” Paul David Tripp (ref#190, Feb 12th).

“…this direct faith; it is simply resting upon Christ…realizing our utter weakness and helplessness and hopelessness….” Martyn Lloyd-Jones (ref#189, Dec 10th).

FATHER, when I recognize weak faith my first reaction is to rely on myself to rise to the occasion.  Misguided, I think I own faith and it is my responsibility to make it better.  But, no; I own nothing; I have given my life to CHRIST.  Now that I know, continually remind me that my strength of faith comes from You.  If I dislike my weak faith let me turn to You and plead and not think twice of trying to raise faith myself.

FAITH

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FAITH IN SUFFERING

“…Pure gold put in the fire comes out of it proved pure; genuine faith put through…suffering comes out proved genuine…” (1 Pet 1:6-7 MSG).

“…Paul…had a thorn in the flesh, and he could not understand it.  It seemed all wrong to him.  He wanted to preach the Gospel, but the thorn was a hindrance to him” Martyn Lloyd-Jones (ref#189, May 6th).

“Let us trust this love.  Trust it when veiled, trust it when it threatens to slay, trust it when it seems to frown, trust it even when we cannot trace it” Octavius Winslow (ref#135, Sept 6th).

“Jesus…is a…Brother born for your adversity.  His grace and sympathy are sufficient for you….You are now to walk by faith and not by sight.  This, then, is the great secret of a life of faith: to hang on Jesus daily, to go to Him in every trial, to cast every burden on Him, to take the infirmity, the corruption, the cross, as it rises, simply and immediately to Jesus” Octavius Winslow (ref#135, Nov 4th).

“According to the degree of our faith will be the degree of our peace, our hope, our strength for duty, and our patience in trial” J.C. Ryle (ref#273, p195).  “…your faith may be sharply tempted or severely tried, but it shall never, never quite fail; for Jesus lives in you, and lives in you forever” Octavius Winslow (ref#135, July 3rd).

“…I am suffering…But I am not ashamed…for I know the one in whom I trust, and I am sure that he is able to guard what I have entrusted to him until the day of his return” (2 Tim 1:12 NLT).

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FROM FAITH TO FAITH

 “…the righteous will shall by his faith” (Hab 2:4 ESV).

“When faith and duty demand anything from us, we must close our eyes to all obstacles and go forward in our work; for all events are in God’s hands alone, and they will happen as he pleases.  Our duty is to proceed, even if we think our labors may be in vain and will not bear fruit” John Calvin (ref#164, April 28th).  FATHER, I desire help to possess the faith to allow the days to play out by Your hand.  May I find it not important whether I think I’m doing well or poorly.

“The grace you’ve been given is not just the grace of forgiveness and acceptance; it’s also the grace of empowerment.  So get up and follow….So here’s how this works.  God has promised to supply and empower; your joy is to follow him by faith where you live every day.  You don’t wait for the provision before you move.  God has not promised that you will see it beforehand.  You don’t try to figure out what God is going to do next and how he will meet your needs; you move forward in the certainty that he is with you, for you, and in you” Paul David Tripp (ref#190, July 6th).

“Would you have more faith?…Then take heed that you are diligent in the use of every means of grace,–diligent in your private communion with God,–diligent in your daily watchfulness over time, temper, and tongue,–diligent in your private Bible-reading,–diligent in your own private prayers” J.C. Ryle (ref#273, p195).

“For in the gospel the righteousness of God is revealed—a righteousness that is by faith from first to last, just as it is written: ‘The righteous will live by faith” (Rom 1:17 NIV).

“Faith…teaches us to hope for and to desire every blessing from God” John Calvin (ref#164, March 1st).

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CHRIST, MY OBJECT OF FAITH

“The worth and excellency of a soul is to be measured by the object of its love” Henry Scougal (ref#220, p304).

“When we are satisfied with our counselor we will do what he counsels.  But more than that.  True faith delights in all that Jesus is—his character, his personality, his nature.  This means that his counsel itself will be beautiful to us.  We will love holiness because it is an expression of the personality of the One whose personality we cherish” John Piper (ref#220, p250).

“You never saw him, yet you love him. You still don’t see him, yet you trust him—with laughter and singing. Because you kept on believing, you’ll get what you’re looking forward to: total salvation” (1 Pet 1:8-9 MSG).

“…The conquering power…is our faith.  The person who wins out over the world’s ways is simply the one who believes Jesus is the Son of God” (1 John 5:4-5 MSG).

“By the indwelling of the Spirit, and realized by faith, Christ abides in the believer and the believer abides in Christ.  ‘I in them, and thou in me, that they may be made perfect in one’” Octavius Winslow (ref#135, Aug 6th).

“Faith is receiving Christ” Jonathan Edwards (ref#229, p92).  “The Christian faith is faith inChrist.  Its value or worth is not in the one believing, but in the one believed—not in the one trusting, but in the one trusted” Josh McDowell (ref#275, p4).

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FAITH IN CHRIST NOT IN THINGS

“…Jesus, the founder and perfecter of our faith…” (Heb 12:2 ESV).

“Would you have more faith?  Then seek to become more acquainted with Jesus Christ” J.C. Ryle (ref#273, p196).

“Is there anything in the true Church of God that would…indicate a proneness to substitute for Christ something in the experience of the believer?  Indeed.  Examples are…only too common.  When the act of faith is substituted for the object of faith…Faith is only the channel through which…blessings are received.  And yet, who has not detected in his heart a tendency to look to faith for the evidence of his Christianity instead of to Christ, thus making the act of believing a substitute for the object in which we believe” Octavius Winslow (ref#135, April 29th)?

“…where there is true faith, Christ will always be known and realized, as an actual living personal Friend.  He that knows nothing of Christ as his own Priest, Physician, and Redeemer, knows nothing yet of believing” J.C. Ryle (ref#273, p191)!

“We glorify God when our service comes from faith in his strength, because the one who gives the strength gets the glory….1 Pet 4:11” John Piper (ref#220, p212).

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SUPERNATURAL FAITH

“I need emancipation; I need to be lifted to another realm; I need a force and a strength and a power that I do not have myself.  That is my need, and here is the answer: I am given faith—I am given an outlook and understanding—I am introduced to a source of power” Martyn Lloyd-Jones (ref#189, Dec 7th).

“Faith means you take God at his word, you never let yourself think that you’re smarter than him, and you live inside his boundaries….We tend to live by sight, by personal experience, by collective research, or by good old intuition, but faith isn’t natural” Paul David Tripp (ref#190, April 17th).

“The highest rational knowledge of God cannot profit without the knowledge of faith….In the Scriptures, Christians are not called knowing persons, but believers” Thomas Watson (ref#225, p151).

“…trusting God to shape the right living in us…It’s the word of faith that welcomes God to go to work and set things right for us. This is…God’s work of doing in us what he did in raising Jesus from the dead….You’re not ‘doing’ anything; you’re simply calling out to God, trusting him to do it for you. That’s salvation….” (Rom 10:4-10 MSG).

“The obedience that gives God pleasure is produced by the power of God’s grace through faith.  The same dynamic is at work at every stage of the Christian life.  The power of God’s grace that saves through faith (Eph 2:8) is the same power of God’s grace that sanctifies through faith” John Piper (ref#220, p245).

 “…God’s Spirit and God’s power did it, which made it clear that your life of faith is a response to God’s power…” (1 Cor 2:4-5 MSG).

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INTELLIGENT FAITH

“…It’s what we trust in but don’t yet see that keeps us going….” (2 Cor 5:6-8 MSG).  “…Faith is the assurance of the heart in the adequacy of the evidence” Josh McDowell (ref#275, p4).

“When Jesus Christ and the apostles called upon a person to exercise faith, it was not a ‘blind faith’ but rather an ‘intelligent faith.’  The apostle Paul said, ‘I know whom I have believed’ (II Timothy 1:12)” Josh McDowell (ref#275, p4).

“The Christian faith is an objective faith; therefore, it must have an object.  The Christian concept of ‘saving’ faith is a faith that establishes one’s relationship with Jesus Christ (the object)…” Josh McDowell (ref#275, p4).

“’Faith in Christianity,’ Paul Little justifiably writes, ‘is based on evidence.  It is reasonable faith.  Faith in the Christian sense goes beyond reason but not against it.’” Josh McDowell (ref#275, p4).

“…defining faith…has to do with the substance (assurance grounded in reality) of our hope….It involves evidence (reliable proof) of things we can’t see.  God’s definition of faith removes it far from the realm of irrational leaps in the dark….Christian belief is based on fact” Carol J. Ruvolo (ref#228, p135).

“We shall have a full definition of faith if we say that it is a firm and sure knowledge of the divine favor toward us, founded on the truth of a free promise in Christ, and revealed to our minds, and sealed on our hearts, by the Holy Spirit” John Calvin (ref#113, p360).

FATHER, I have found it is fatal to read something in Scripture then try to implement it in the flesh.  When I read about faith moving mountains, my carnal mind thinks, “this will take a lot of energy; I’ll have to conjure up a lot of faith.”

Moving with blind faith is like being willing to step over the cliff knowing nothing more—just closing my eyes tight and jumping—just trusting GOD to catch me.

No, no, no.  I must know my action is okayed by You, FATHER.  It is not about blind faith or my abilities; the SPIRIT must enable. There is something that must go on beforehand and it is not me talking myself into it.  It is the SPIRIT strengthening my faith by evidence giving me the confidence needed to proceed.  It is what I trust in but don’t yet see.

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SAVING FAITH

“Saving faith is to cast myself and my own soul upon Christ for salvation” Thomas Cole (ref#225, p308).

“Believing in Christ is no mere intellectual assent…Doubtless there must be some knowledge before we can believe.  There is no true religion in ignorance.  But knowledge alone is not saving faith” J.C. Ryle (ref#273, p182).

“Believing on Christ…is not mere feeling something about Christ.  This is often no more than temporary excitement…We may be pricked in conscience, and feel drawings toward the Gospel…We may even tremble and weep, and show much affection for the truth…And yet all this time our hearts and wills may remain utterly unchanged, and secretly chained down to the world.  Doubtless there is no saving faith where there is no feeling.  But feeling alone is not faith” J.C. Ryle (ref#273, p182-183).

“True saving faith is not the kind of belief in the facts of the gospel that leaves the heart and life unchanged.  If it were, then God’s pleasure in obedience would indeed be bad news.  He would be saying that we are saved by faith, and then, to please him with obedience, we must move beyond faith to something else in order to produce good behavior.  This is not good news.  The good news is that saving faith is by its nature a life-changing power” John Piper (ref#220, p243-244).

“The moment that the conscience is convinced of sin, and the head sees Christ to be the only One who can save, and the heart and will lay hold on the hand that Christ holds out, that moment there is saving faith” J.C. Ryle (ref#273, p183).

“…faith expresses itself in works…a person is made right with God not by a barren faith but by faith fruitful in works…” (James 2:21-24 MSG).

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UNBELIEF

“’…If you are not firm in faith, you will not be firm at all’” (Isa 7:9 ESV).

“There is a significant difference between amazement and faith.  God doesn’t just want to blow your mind; he wants to rule your heart….You can be amazed by the grand sweep of the redemptive story in Scripture and not be living by faith…You can be amazed by the great worship music you participate in every Sunday and not be living by faith….You can be amazed by the wonderful biblical preaching and teaching that you hear and not be living by faith” David Paul Tripp (ref#190, June 27th).

“There is nothing really mysterious and hard to understand about saving belief.  But the whole difficulty arises from man’s pride and self-righteousness….They cannot understand it because they will not stoop” J.C. Ryle (ref#273, p182).

“’…my righteous one shall live by faith, and if he shrinks back, my soul has no pleasure in him’” (Heb 10:38 ESV).

“…faith…the more it is exercised, the mightier it becomes…God never places His child in any difficulties or throws on him any cross except to call faith to exercise; and if the opportunity of its exercise passes away without improvement, the effect will be a weakening of the principle and a feeble exertion of power in the next trial” Octavius Winslow (ref#135, Sept 27th).

FATHER, what scary information—that the less faith I have the less faith I have.  This hits on the subject of obedience.  How many times does my memory tell me of my disobedience?  Please keep me in remembrance of these four words: “disobedience flows from unbelief” The ESV Study Bible (ref#125, p2366, [Heb 3:15-19]).  My disobedience is caused by not trusting You fully.  Oh to have great faith!

“…the real trouble with most Christian people is not so much in the realm of their conduct and practise as in the realm of their belief” Martyn Lloyd-Jones (ref#211, p39-40).  “The commandments of God are only as hard to obey as the promises of God are hard to believe” John Piper (ref#220, p250).

“Nothing more effectually…obscures our view of Christ than the sin of unbelief.  Not fully believing His Word, not simply and implicitly relying on His work, not trusting His faithfulness and love…”  Octavius Winslow (ref#135, May 1st).

“…whatever does not proceed from faith is sin” (Rom 14:23 ESV).