WHAT FAITH IN GOD IS - By Reinhard Bonnke

WHAT FAITH IN GOD IS
by Reinhard Bonnke (http://reinhardbonnke.com/)

Faith is believing God. I don’t believe in miracles but I believe God FOR miracles. Not believing in “things” so that miracles will happen. That would be faith in the power of faith, which is not Bible faith. It is part psychology, part superstition, part worldly-wisdom. It is mind over matter, Positive Thinking, and self-reliance. That kind of faith has nothing whatsoever to do with what Jesus meant when He said “Fear not. Only believe” (Mark 5:36). His message was “You believe in God. Believe also in me.” (John 14:1).

The assurance of faith is like the assurance of swimming – you must act! If you want faith, put God’s Word into action.

Faith is only a wiring system. It has no power. We don’t have faith in the power of faith, but it links us with the power generators of Calvary and the Resurrection. Growth in faith is like a flashlight, which one can focus. First it picks out one promise, spotlights it, but we can widen the beam until it covers a larger and larger area of the promises of God. Faith does not increase, but its coverage does.

No task is bigger than another when measured by faith. A fence, a house, a hill or a mountain makes no difference to a bird flying over them, or to faith. By faith ‘we mount up on wings as eagles’ (Isaiah 40:31). Soaring, not snoring. Spread your wings of faith today.

With God FAITH is the qualifying factor. He places His resources at our disposal. God did not honor the famous characters in Scripture because of their own natural greatness…nor for their moral greatness. The life-style of most of them would shock us today. Saul was more moral than David, but God chose David, because David was a faith-activist. It isn’t even “great” faith He wants, just simple “every-day-faith”. Jesus called his disciples “Little-Faiths”, but He chose them and made them the most effectual figures of history. Compared to the resources open to us in God our natural abilities are a drop in the ocean. But our own limitations mean nothing to Him. When we have faith, gifted or not, we stand at the threshold of great usefulness.

Faith is the link with God—not aesthetics! Faith does not end in faith but blessing. Faith is the end of fantasy. Some accuse us of “preaching an emotional gospel”. It cannot be avoided! If the Gospel is not emotional then nothing ever was. “Sensational Gospel”? GOD made it sensational. When the preacher appeals to “believe in Him who raises the dead and calls those things which are not as though they were” (Romans 4:17) …surely it is a sensation.

Never comfort anyone in their unbelief. God does not anoint ‘honest doubt’.

Faith is not the absence of fear; it is its conquest.

The absolute ABC of faith is that as we act God acts. We respond to Him by faith and He responds to us for faith. Paul found that faith operated like the blood flowing through his veins. ‘I live, yet not I, but Christ lives in me. The life that I now live, I live by the faith of the Son of God’ (Galatians 2:20). An example from Philippians 2:13 ‘…for it is God who works in you both to will and to do for His good pleasure’. This has a play on words. ‘God is in you to will to do His goodwill’. He puts the desire in us to do His desire. That is what being ‘led of the Spirit’ means.

Faith is not presumption but assumption. You rightly assume that God will never let you down—and thus “enter into rest”.

Faith is a kind of immune system filtering out fears that otherwise would paralyze all activity. When it fails we develop all kinds of phobias and compulsions. It is a nervous breakdown. Jesus said not to have phobia but faith (Luke 8:50).

True faith is not faith in faith. We are never asked to believe in what faith can do but what God can do. Faith in faith is really faith in yourself – your own inner force of faith. Preaching that kind of faith is tough work, for very few have such dynamic self-confidence.

Faith is a torch. Switch it on and darkness is no problem! That is my recommendation to all! Need more light? Put your trust in Jesus Christ.

Faith is the eye to see the unseen. Physical optics are not the instruments to see God. He is a Spirit. Human eyes are too weak to discern “the invisible God, the King eternal, immortal, invisible” (Col 1:15; 1 Tim 1:17). We have to deal with Him as He is. “He who comes to God must believe that He is…” (Hebrews 11:6). Trust Him.

Faith is not a talent that some people possess and some do not. Nor is it merely a feeling. Faith is action and decision available to all of us. The Bible makes that clear. “This is the work of God, that you believe in Him whom He sent” – namely, Jesus. You decide to believe. Each person must do it for themselves. If you do that now, the Lord will not delay. He will not investigate your suitability, your worthiness, or your past. No matter who or where you are, in the nick of time as you repent and believe, the parachute of salvation opens with a bang, and you are absolutely safe – for real.

Some say that the Christian faith is out of touch with reality. But the life and death of Jesus show this simply is not true. Nothing is more in touch with reality. A real Jesus was pinned with real nails to real wood and shed real blood. The cross was a bitter, bloody execution. It was more sober and practical than any other event in human history. For Christ’s real sacrifice provides real salvation from sin and destruction – for YOU. How? “Whosoever calls on the name of the Lord shall be saved.”

Faith is like strength – you get more by using it. Stop walking and soon your legs would be crippled. Never use your arms and you would become paralyzed. Never do any believing and you’ll be a cynic crippled in spirit. Begin trusting God and you’ll find He’s there.

Faith is not built on reason or even on one’s own personal experience of healing or the lack of it, but on looking to Jesus. A thousand years before Christ’s incarnation a Psalmist wrote, “It is time for you to act, O Lord” (Psalm 119:126). Two thousand years after Christ’s incarnation that same Jesus is still “acting”, working, as he did when he walked this earth. It is time for us to acknowledge it. “Take up your bed and walk,” Jesus said.

Faith is not one particular religious act. It is the transfer of responsibility for one’s life to God in total when our own resources are inadequate. It is spiritual fusion, making us one with Christ. It seems such a simple attitude – and it is.

Faith is a personal relationship, not a mathematical relationship between numbers. We know what God did yesterday, but we have to trust Him for tomorrow. Faith is similar to love. It is a heart matter. We do not decide to fall in love after weighing all the pros and cons. Couples get married on trust, not on scientific evidence or conclusive logic. “O how I love Jesus, because He first loved me.”

Faith obeys the word of God. James gave us the blueprint of what faith is and what it does. Its characteristics are unmistakable. It removes discrimination from our hearts, proves itself by works, controls the tongue, generates wisdom, exalts humility, and overwhelmingly produces a deep dependence on God. In conjunction, faith triumphs when we pray for the afflicted and even when we confront the errors of our brother. “Brethren,” James wrote, “if anyone among you wanders from the truth, and someone turns him back, let him know that he who turns a sinner from the error of his way will save a soul from death and cover a multitude of sins” (5:19–20).

Faith is just a common human faculty, ordinary everyday trustfulness. Faith has no mystique, nothing esoteric or rare. It is as good among humble people as among spiritual geniuses, religious giants or mighty Samsons of the church. A theological doctorate is not usually any help. The mixt crowd ‘only believed’ and the woman with an issue of blood ‘only believed’, and their faith put their feet into the Kingdom of God, the Kingdom which is where Jesus Christ is. He is the miracle-worker.

FAITH is the only currency accepted in the Kingdom of God. The church has often courted the wealthy and powerful but in God’s kingdom the truly great are those “poor in the eyes of the world (but) rich in faith” (James 2:5). They are God’s somebodies. He has big business to transact but only with believers. His purposes are rather greater than those of politicians. When God wrote a roll of honor He never mentioned one king or an emperor. Every golden name was a man or woman made famous by faith. (Hebrews 11). Believers are God’s begotten children. The natural abilities of these men and women were not the qualities of greatness. They were ordinary people. Only faith made them extraordinary. “By faith the elders received a good report” – nothing else. Faith is the new notation from which they composed songs of triumph no one else could sing…. Jesus said “only believe”.

For more on the ministry of Reinhard Bonnke check out this short video: Awakening 2011 - Reinhard Bonnke (original: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=71MOoD8sbUg)