From Faith to Faith

Scripture:  Romans 1:17 - For therein is the righteousness of God revealed from faith to faith: as it is written, The just shall live by faith.

The one variable of life that every believer shares is that we live life by faith in a God we do not see, but rest our entire eternity upon Him.  The progression of a true believer’s faith has a starting point from the grace of God and grows and spans into an eternal certainty of who God truly is through a relationship that becomes more and more personal.  The progression of growth in the Christian life is measured by our growth of faith.  Every act of obedience to the Word of God is an act of faith.  Our convictions and promptings to serve through what we believe is the enablement of the Holy Spirit is rooted in our faith.   Our faith can be tracked from its beginning through our rest in eternity.

Faith realizes God.  The life of faith begins with the initial realization that God is.  This realization about God is the result of God’s miraculous work on a blind, dead and hopeless soul who has lived life without God.  The first work of God’s grace is causing the sinner to realize that he/she’s greatest need is to believe out of a personal need and obligation to the God they have not known.

Faith responds to God.  It is the enabling of the will that was dead to choose to obey the call of God.  It is not enough to simply realize God is because demons do that, but respond with a bended/broken will in submission to Him is the only acceptable response that God receives.  Even an unbeliever can live realizing God, but the wrong response according to (Romans 1:18-25) is to give their obedience and worship to some idol in the place of the true God.  The Scripture says,” though men realized God, they did not honor Him as God, but exchanged the truth for a lie and gave His glory and His worship to creatures rather than the Creator.”  True faith responds to the God of the Bible and none other receives His glory.

Faith receives from God.  Before we in true faith can do anything for God, we must submit, yield and learn to receive from God.  God is a rewarder of those that diligently seek Him first and most (Hebrews 11:6; Matthew 6:33).  In other words, faith must depend upon grace or its legitimacy will be suspect.  David, the Psalmist said, “all things come from God and from God’s own hand have we given back to You” (I Chronicles 29:14).  What comes from our lives that is worthy of any glory and praise to God must first come from a heart that has first openly received the internal gift of work that God is doing in us who believe.  It is the regenerated inward life that reveals God’s heart outwardly.

Faith relies on God.  A faith that learns to receive from God must become a faith that learns to rely on God.   It is the reliance of faith in God that becomes the major challenge of the believer’s walk with God.  The growth of our faith involves living within the expectations of God above the strengths of our natural flesh.  We live within these bodies and their limitations with a belief that God is committed to working in and through us above all that we can ask or think for His pleasure and purpose by means of the eternal life and power He has put in us (Ephesians 3:20, Philippians 2:13).  The reliance of faith must endure the waiting through various trials, temptations and hardships that come even when we are in the perfect place of His will.  The reliance of faith must believe and endure despite what it sees or does not understand.  At the core of a relying faith is a confidence in the proven, unchanging character of God and the eternal Word He has given unto us to believe.

Faith rests upon God.  The rest of faith is the place of certainty, contentment, and confidence in our relationship with God and His will for our lives.  The rest of faith resigns itself and yields to the true fact that life now is a one-time opportunity and privilege given by God to all who believe for His divine purposes.  The rest of eternity does not begin in heaven, but it begins and is realized in this present life.  One of the great books of Scripture designed for the specific encouragement of our faith says, “For we who have believed enter that rest…” and “For the one who has entered His rest has Himself also rested from His works, as God did from His” (Hebrews 4:3; 10).

Prayer:  Thank You Lord Jesus for being the Author and Finisher of our faith (Hebrews 12:3), because without You I would utterly fall over and over from the challenges of growth You allow in my life.  In Your glorious name I pray, amen.

(by Pastor Wayne Cockrell)