Monday – November 6, 2017 –The Role of Faith
Hebrews 11:1-3 (NIV) Now faith is confidence in what we hope for and assurance about what we do not see. 2 This is what the ancients were commended for.
3 By faith we understand that the universe was formed at God’s command, so that what is seen was not made out of what was visible.
Hebrews 11:6 (NIV) And without faith it is impossible to please God, because anyone who comes to him must believe that he exists and that he rewards those who earnestly seek him.
2 Corinthians 5:7 (NIV) For we live by faith, not by sight.
God has always desired for His creation to know Him, not only spiritually but also in a way that involves the senses. He wants you to experience Him in tangible ways. After He created Adam, He walked and communed with him in the Garden of Eden and later He communed with Enoch. He created us with feelings and emotions. The feelings that He gave to us are just like His feelings. However, to know God in that way requires faith. Faith is nothing like the popular Hollywood definition, which is believing in something despite all the evidence being against it. In fact, we discover that it is by faith that we understand that the universe was created by God’s command out of what is invisible. His command made the universe visible.
When we talk about faith being “the evidence of things not seen”, we mean the natural world, what we can’t see with our natural eyes. Faith does not see with the natural eye, it sees with the supernatural eye. It sees what cannot be seen without the aid of God. It sees what is invisible to the naked eye.
The first part of Hebrews 11:1 says, “Now faith is the substance of things hoped for.”
Hope is a picture of the future that God our Creator has in mind for us. It must be seen with spiritual eyes. The book of Hebrews is known as the book of better things. It is the book of hope. Ask God to open your eyes to see the future He has in mind for you. You can be certain that what He has in mind for you is better than what you have in mind for yourself.
The problem with hope is that it does not have a strategy to help you receive what you hope for. The strategy that you need is called faith. Faith, seeing into the spiritual world with spiritual eyes, gives the steps that you take over a period of time to enable you to receive what you hope for. When you have the eyes of faith, before you know it, you will step over into the realm of feelings and begin to experience what your spirit has shown you.
Prayer: Thank You, Lord that faith sets us on the path to experience what we hope for. When we see with the spiritual eyes that You open we will soon receive what we hope for.